Destiny is a weird one. It's been called a thousand names - addicting, repetitive, shallow, gorgeous - but the game's unorthodox mixture of first-person shooting, MMO-lite design and social elements is an unquestionably black sheep. Stranger still is its place within Bungie: the culmination of the studio's experience developing a series they no longer own. Indeed, you don't need to look hard to find Halo in Destiny. Hell, you don't have to look past the first gun or enemy. Despite the radical design gap between them, the two IPs are in many ways connected by blood - though at this point Destiny is more like a half-brother. Theirs is a relationship rife with parallels: the Fallen to the Covenant, the Flood to the Hive, right down to AI companions Cortana and Ghost (a criminal comparison, admittedly, but a valid one). It's been years since Bungie passed the torch to 343 Industries, but it's clear they haven't forgotten the franchise that put them on the map. And how could they? Their tenure both revitalised and overhauled the FPS genre; they'd be foolish not to leverage that experience. 343 is in a similar boat. Halo 4 was proof enough that they've got the chops to continue the franchise, but they'd be just as foolish to ignore the successes and blunders of their would-be ancestor. Every developer can learn something from every game, but Halo 5 is in a unique position to extrapolate, learn and incorporate the best and most 'distinctly Halo' shards of Destiny.
A freelance games writer, you say? Typically battling his current RPG addiction and ceaseless perfectionism? A fan of horror but too big a sissy to play for more than a couple of hours? Spends far too much time on JRPGs and gets way too angry with card games?
Well that doesn't sound anything like me.
