As spooky season arrives for Halloween, so too doesDestiny 2’s iteration of the Festival of the Lost. Every year,Destinyfeatures its own version of a Halloween limited-time event that involves plenty of sugar, candy, aliens, and guardians. For the most part, Festival of the Lost has been a yearly celebration, dating as far back as the first game in 2015. Now in 2020, one ofDestiny’s biggest holiday events returns with just as much pomp and circumstance, even in the face of grave danger from the upcoming revelations inBeyond Light.
As more celebrations of the Festival of the Lost have gone on, the importance and purpose of the event has expanded inDestiny 2. Whereas before Festival of the Lost activities rewarded cool Halloween-themed cosmetics,Destiny 2started bringing in new activities that rewarded additional cosmetics and even seasonally-unique weapons. The event has progressively grown in scope and scale, and now even features its own dedicated coop activity in The Haunted Forest on Mercury, which is very similar to what’s coming on October 6.
Bringing Halloween to Destiny
Back in the originalDestiny,Festival of the Lost ended up coming to the game latein its lifespan. The inaugural Festival of the Lost celebration began just a few months afterThe Taken Kingreleased, only lasting for a few weeks. Much of the basis for further Festivals was based on this foundation, as players competed in the Crucible and worked in existing Strikes to finish quests and gain plenty of Candy. Each player outfitted themselves with a Mask resembling their favoriteDestinycharacter like Eris Morn or Oryx. Gathering Candy helped unlock new masks, consumables, and various other cosmetic items.
Subsequent celebrations of the Festival of the Lost have brought on new masks, new vehicles, new emoters, and other cosmetic details, but it’s withDestiny 2where the Festival of the Lost received a serious upgrade. In 2018, after the release of theForsakenexpansion, Festival of the Lost finally made its debut in the second game with some new goodies. Alongside an assortment of new masks, Festival of the Lost brought on a whole new exotic quest for the Thunderlord, alongside the Horror Story and Braytech Werewolf auto rifles.Festival of the Lost also introduced a new coop activitythat involved clearing enemies out of the Haunted Forest on Mercury.
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Celebrating Festival of the Lost, One Last Time
While it might seem inappropriate giventhe circumstances ofDestiny’s story reaching a potential peakwith the Darkness,Destiny 2always manages to find the next shiniest distraction for guardians to break up the usual grind. The same thing happened earlier this year during Season of the Worthy’s Guardian Games, which came right at the heels of the Almighty’s destruction. The same thing is happening with Festival of the Lost even though the Darkness, an enigmatic enemy that’s basically been a boogeyman inDestinylore for years, has finally arrived. If anything, it just makes 2020’s Festival of the Lost more spooky, and could have little nods to the Darkness or a Pyramid mask.
This year’sFestival of the Lost seems to be dialing up the cosmetic elementsa bit, at least compared to last year’s offering. Instead of glow-in-the-dark skeleton aesthetic style, the new armor ornaments take on a more traditional and creepy aesthetic for each guardian class. There’s an unlockable new ship, sparrow, and ghost, alongside the previous Festival of the Lost weapons returning with different stat/perk rolls. It’s also worth noting that this could be the last Festival of the Lost to occur, at least in its current form. Mercury is just one of the many planets moving into the Destiny content vault upon the release ofBeyond Lightin November.
Overall, Festival of the Lost recycles a lot for this year’s offering, but that doesn’t make it not worth participating. Those who enjoyed using Braytech Werewolf and Horror Story can now potentially roll and upgrade those guns to the new Light level cap of 1360. Any collectors out there who need any remaining masks have another chance to snag any they missed, alongside new masks. Plus, at the end of the day,Mercury’s disappearing withBeyond Light. This could be the last Festival of the Lost for a while, or it could change drastically for next year.
Destiny 2is available now for PC, PS4, Stadia, and Xbox One.
