Season of the Worthy forDestiny 2built up a lot of hype in the lead up to its release. In the month or two leading up to the season’s reveal, data miners and leakers learned the Trials of Osiris would be making a triumphant return to the game. After years of the mode’s absence, along with a sub-par version of Trials of the Nine, guardians wanted the pinnacle endgame competitive activity to return for a long time.
And yet, now with Trials of Osiris finally available to players to compete in each weekend, the mode has fallen under the weight of its own expectations. Top players and fans on theDestiny 2subreddit have aired various grievances on the fan-favorite mode’s homecoming, ranging from issues that plague the game in general to Trials-specific problems. Many are wondering if the Trials of Osiris will ever be as good as the original competition from the first game.
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What Happened to Trials
Towards the end ofDestiny’s life span (a month beforeDestiny 2’s release date), the Trials of Osiris saw its final weekend in the base game. As the highly anticipated sequel released, Trials of Osiris was eventually replaced witha similar event entitled Trials of the Nine. Trials of the Nine Though there was some interest in the mode early on, the competitive player base dropped off much faster in comparison to the original Trials. Trials of the Nine, according to game director Luke Smith, was designed not to discourage new players from taking part in endgame PvP content. Though at that point much ofDestiny 2’s core issues at the time only made Trials of the Nine worse.
Many pointed to overpowered team-shotting across all ofDestiny 2’s PvP modes,though Trials of the Nine accentuated the issue. There was also the issue of the mode having a rotating playlist between the Countdown and Survival modes, instead of the typical 3v3 Survival-like mode seen in Trials of Osiris. The biggest changes between Nine and Osiris were the facts that there was no level-advantages enabled in Trials of the Nine, nor were there any “Adept” weapons that were present in Trials of Osiris. Much of what made Trials of Osiris great didn’t transfer into the arguably watered-down version of the PvP activity.
Eventually Trials of the Nine, along with the presumably finished Trials of Osiris, was put on “hiatus” when the Forsaken expansion launched.Citing a low player count and dwindling interest, Bungie’s development team took the mode out entirely to re-work the endgame activity into “a fitting challenge for the hardcore warrior” inDestiny 2. From September 2018 onward, it was radio silence for Trials of any kind, up until the month or two before Season of the Worthy when there were leaks/rumors of Trials of Osiris returning. Though now that it’s here, fans may be having déjà vu after the first few weekends of the new Trials of Osiris.
The Hiatus' Impact
For just about three years fans have wanted a proper endgame of any variety to return toDestiny 2. While things like Crucible Labs and Gambit were nice refreshers for multiplayer content,PvP still had some inconsistencies and problemsthat were turning away the game’s most hardcore fans. Now that the fan-favorite Trials of Osiris have returned, it seems these hardcore players that returned are finding themselves in the exact same situation as they did with Trials of the Nine. While several problems fromDestiny 2overall were solved in the three years since Trials of the Nine, many of the core issues present in both Trials andDestiny 2altogether are killing hardcore players' passions quickly.
Fans question what the point of the hiatus truly was, and rightfully so.Flawless rewards from Trials of Osiris inDestiny 2just aren’t interesting enough for players to continue grinding for. There are no Adept weapon rewards for going Flawless in Trials anymore, meaning only higher-level pinnacle rewards using similar perk rolls from other pinnacle activities will come from the Lighthouse. Fundamentally the Trials of Osiris are no different compared to the Trials in the originalDestiny, with very little changed in the three years in between.
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What Could Be Improved in Destiny 2’s Trials of Osiris
There is still potential for Trials of Osiris to be just as popular, or more popular, than its initialDestinyiteration. Trials in its current representation is simply not enough for the hardcore playerbase, and we could see a similar Trials of the Nine situation in the coming seasons. Obviously now,with Bungie’s ties to Activision severedand their development freedom expanded, the development team has been very receptive to feedback.
In the short-term there likely won’t be any significant changes, but overall we could see Trials of Osiris expanded into something greater. Bringing back something like Adept weapons/armor could boost interest in the mode overall, but a wider spread of changes would be hugely beneficial to Trials. The truth isTrials of Osiris inDestiny 2is almost exactly the same asDestiny, and while that’s not necessarily a bad thing, it’s not the renewed focus on PvP fans expected fromDestiny 2’s continued development.
Destiny 2is available now on PC, PS4, Stadia, and Xbox One.
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