Bungie today pushed forward an array of new details regarding Destiny 2 and what players can expect to discover in the game over the next year. The scope and range of topics touched upon was extensive, though it’s clear that many of the more comprehensive details will arrive in other formats in the coming weeks and months. Even so, there’s a lot to unpack from what was shared.
Much of the stream focused on The Edge of Fate, an expansion set to arrive on July 15. The Edge of Fate takes players to a new destination – a planetoid floating through the Oort Cloud at the edge of the solar system – called Kepler. Here, players navigate a Metroidvania-inspired destination of mysteries and secrets, fueled by new powers granted through dark matter. Kepler will feature multiple world tiers of challenge that unlock over time as you play. Mysteries and puzzles might be solved one way in an early tier, only to change as you acquire new abilities and power in later tiers.
Kepler will also bring an array of new powers. The premier ability is called Matter Spark, which allows players to use a special pad to transform into a ball of bouncing arc energy and zip about the environment, jumping, electrocuting enemies, squeezing through tight spaces, and rolling along ramps for distant leaps. It was visually reminiscent of Samus Aran’s morph ball feature from the Metroid games.
Players also gain other new abilities on Kepler, like a Relocator Cannon that allows for teleportation through the space, and Matter Morph, which allows players to use Strand energy to reshape the environment, creating bridges, revealing secrets, and opening doors.
The Edge of Fate storyline is the opening salvo to a new multi-year saga from the Destiny team which they’ve dubbed the Fate Saga. As The Edge of Fate gets going, players are finally going to get more details about the mysterious entities called The Nine – a group of godlike extradimensional beings that are each individually connected to one of the major bodies in the solar system (eight planets and the Sun). We’ll see returning characters like Ikora Rey play a major role, but also new characters, including a bespectacled new character named Lodi. On a broader level, the Fate Saga appears to deal with the idea that The Nine have their own motivations that have often manipulated the Guardians to a particular fate. The new storyline questions how much the Guardians are able to alter that fate, if at all.
As a lead-up to the new expansion, today, Bungie is launching a new prologue chapter called the Rite of the Nine. The new event includes access to three dungeons, each at three different tiers of difficulty, aiming to be inviting to all player skill levels. The Rite of the Nine includes exclusive rewards, including a new title. And it also serves to reintroduce the Emissary – a prior character from earlier storylines that we still know very little about.
While we learned a good bit about the expansion, we also got a peek in today’s stream into more substantial changes coming to the core game of Destiny 2. The longtime use of “The Director” as a front page to play is being overhauled. Starting with The Edge of Fate, players will be invited to “Open Portal” to jump into a streamlined menu selection of activities, dominated by different ops split into Solo, Fireteam, Pinnacle and Crucible ops.
The overall focus for changes is on providing increased player agency, so these different ops allow for dramatic levels of activity customization, including 50 new modifiers to tweak the gameplay. As an example, we heard about a grapple modifier that gives environment navigation a Spider-Man-like feeling. For those who want a more curated experience, there are also Quickplay selections; most activities also allow for a fireteam finder.
Gear is also changing, including a dramatic reinvention of equipment being dubbed Armor 3.0, which includes set bonuses for armor, and the ability to fully tweak armor perks as soon as an item is acquired. Gear tiers are another major change, which see acquired gear coming in at one of five distinct tiers of quality; players who acquire a Tier 5 weapon (which are the hardest to get) will have a special shader treatment and other features that make them unmistakable as the best in a given class.
We also received a scattering of other info drops about what’s on the way. Some of the most important is the soon-to-arrive new Crucible mode called Heavy Metal, which pits tanks against mech-style brigs in large-scale battles; engage with this activity and you can earn the new Griffin combat vehicle, which can be equipped into your Sparrow slot. We learned of a new permanent feature of the Tower called the Shooting Range, where players can test out their builds against a variety of enemy types. Players were also shown new holofoil treatments that will come on weapons, including a slick ocean wave effect that will be available with Solstice weapons later this summer. We also learned that the new raid will launch only days after The Edge of Fate reaches players; expect to try for that world-first title on July 19.
Of all the announcements, the most surprising was the reveal of 2025’s second expansion, which we’ll learn more about through a dedicated reveal in September. Renegades is described as a full-on in-lore Destiny expansion that moves the core story forward. But it’s also described as a direct homage to the universe of Star Wars, and appears (among other things) to include crossover elements between the two sci-fi/fantasy properties, including Guardians wielding lightsabers. It’s safe to say that longtime Destiny fans may have strong opinions about such a direct melding of the two popular universes. Regardless, it’s clear that Bungie has robust plans for what’s to follow, as we also learned that the Fate Saga will continue into 2026 with additional expansions titled Shattered Cycle and The Alchemist.
There’s plenty more detail to discover through an in-depth viewing of the event; you can check out Bungie’s full recap, or watch an archive of the lengthy reveal event below.
