Activation of House of Wolves from Destiny

On Wednesday, Bungie released Destiny update 1.2.0, which took the game offline for a few hours and prepared it for House of Wolves later this month, but the changes didn’t go live yet.

In their Weekly Update, Bungie revealed that update 1.2.0 goes live on May 12, while another update on May 19 will set the stage for House of Wolves‘ activation:

Update 1.2.0

  • Tuesday, May 12
  • Sometime after 10am PT
  • Final preparation and world changes

Update 1.2.0.1

  • Tuesday, May 19
  • Sometime after 10am PT
  • Final delivery and activation of House of Wolves

They also warned about the supposed patch notes floating around, saying, “As always, keep an eye out for official Patch Notes. The last word on game updates will be brought to you by the Destiny Dev Team. Accept no substitutes!” If you’re thinking of picking up either of the Destiny expansions on PlayStation 3 or Xbox 360, Bungie revealed that their Digital Upgrade Program has been extended indefinitely:

Many players have benefited from this initiative since it began. To enable more people to take advantage of this offering, it will be extended indefinitely. Please note that this extended offer is only for the Expansion Pass, Expansion I, and Expansion II. For our fans who will be entering the Destiny universe on PlayStation 3 or Xbox 360 we have some great news! For a limited time, whenever you buy the Expansion Pass, Expansion I, or Expansion II on PlayStation 3 or Xbox 360, you will be able to download the next-gen version within the same console family for FREE.

Finally, Bungie’s fundraising effort to support disaster recovery in Nepal has reached $400,000. You can learn more about the initiative over here.

Destiny Share Adds New Weapon Type – Sidearm

Destiny is getting a new weapon type, sidearms, developer Bungie announced during today’s Prison of the Elders livestream. Siderarms will act as secondary weapons that add elemental damage and a very high rate of fire.

As you can see in the image above, the Vestian Dynasty sidearm, for example, also has high stability and reload stats.

Bungie today released tons of new details about Destiny’s new Prison of Elders co-op arena that’s included with the upcoming House of Wolves expansion. For more, check out GameSpot’s guide to everything you need to know about House of Wolves.

House of Wolves’ new endgame mode, Prison of Elders

Destiny’s second expansion, House of Wolves, will add a new gameplay mode called Prison of Elders when the add-on hits later this month, and Bungie plans to reveal more about that new endgame activity tomorrow, May 6.

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In a new teaser video, we get an early peek at Prison of Elders, which sounds like a cooperative, horde mode-style gameplay option for three players. “Prepare for combat. Fight. Kill. Survive,” the teaser says.

Destiny: House of Wolves senior design Matt Sammons will reveal more about Prison of Elders during a livestream on Twitch on May 6, starting at 11 a.m. PT. He’ll be joined by special community guest Professor Broman.

House of Wolves will raise Destiny power leveling cap from 32 to 34, and players will be able to exchange ascendant and radiant materials and redeem commendations for reputation to help them get there. Guardians will also have the chance to level up their existing gear through a process called “ascension.” The upgrades allow for maximum attack to reach 365 on weapons like Fatebringer, Bungie confirmed in a livestream last month.

Bungie revealed details on House of Wolves’ new social space in the Reef and the Trials of Osiris competitive game mode in April.

House of Wolves comes to Destiny on May 19 for PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Xbox 360 and Xbox One.

Bungie Accidentally Nerfs Black Hammer And Fix Incoming From Destiny

 Gamers don’t need to go far to know that Destiny is among the most divisive games around; the title’s struggles are well documented. Moreover, no matter what Bungie tries to fix with their new game, it’s often the case that they end up turning yet another gamer off in the process.

Such was the case this month when Destiny released their 1.1.2 update. In it, Bungie included a handful of useful features, including increased vault space and some very important fixes for the game’s raid bosses.

But hidden among those “good” changes was yet another unexpected one. See, Bungie tried to make a change to the Black Hammer sniper rifle in Destiny, but they ended up breaking the gun (slightly) in the process. Today, the developer acknowledged the problem and vowed to fix it.

“Additionally, we are aware that the White Nail perk is not activating when targeting Fallen Walker legs. We apologize for the inconvenience. “

Any high level player should be plenty familiar with the Black Hammer. It’s a Legendary sniper rifle that only drops once a player defeats Crota in the Crota’s End raid on Normal difficulty. What makes Black Hammer truly special is its White Nail upgrade, which replenishes the gun’s 3-bullet clip any time they land 3 consecutive precision hits.

Now, in most cases the White Nail upgrade made Black Hammer a godsend – a high level sniper rifle with a seemingly endless supply of ammo. However, when the gun first launched it had some problems; specifically, the gun’s increased damage against Hive enemies made it so the While Nail upgrade didn’t trigger against them. So, the gun that came from defeating a Hive god, and that was supposed to make the Hive-centric Crota’s End raid easier, was made practically useless against those enemies.

 Luckily, it wasn’t too long before Destiny fixed the problem simply by turning the Hive damage off. At the very least it made the sniper rifle more useful. That is, before the latest Destiny update hit.

With said update, Bungie was hoping to nerf a specific part of the Black Hammer’s White Nail upgrade that let ‘Immune’ damage count as precision hits. In essence, players could hit a precision shot and then put two shots into an immune target and still refill their ammo. This was a particularly useful trick with the Fallen Walker, whose massive legs double as precision spots and immune spots depending on whether the Destiny tank is vulnerable or not. It was basically an exploit that Bungie wanted to get rid off.

By doing that, however, Bungie ended up making it so the Walker’s legs no longer counted as precision spots for the Black Hammer either. As a result, any player using the Black Hammer against the tank saw no White Nail perk and ran out of ammo quickly.

There’s no word from Bungie as far as when a fix for the problem might arrive, but the good news is they are aware and looking into it. The bad news is that this isn’t the first time Bungie has tried to change something in Destiny and broken something else in the process.

 For that matter, why they even needed to address such a small issue when so many other problems are left unchecked is just one of the reasons many deride Bungie and Destiny. They focus on taking away from players more than giving to them. That will hopefully change when the House of Wolves DLC hits on May 19th, bringing with it a new social space and cooperative experience called Prison of Elders. At least we hope…

Did you notice this problem with the Black Hammer sniper rifle? Are there any issues like this that Bungie needs to fix in Destiny ASAP?

Destiny: Broadcast To Show New Gear Upgrades And Areas

Now that we know that Destiny’s massively anticipated House of Wolves DLC expansion has an official release date of May 19th 2015, players of the popular multiplayer shooter have been clamouring for some new official information from Bungie. Sitting at just over a month away, the House of Wolves has been a long time coming, or at least it feels that way for Guardians.

To help appease the masses that have been diligently waiting for their next Destiny fix, Bungie have scheduled a Twitch broadcast that will show off a number of the new gear upgrades coming to the game, as well as some of the new areas that until now have only really been seen by glitching your way through certain areas of the game.

The stream will be going live at 11 a.m. Pacific, which is around 2 p.m. Eastern, on Bungie’s official Twitch channel. If you’re interested in the upcoming DLC, then this is a must see stream for sure.

Xur’s Location And Exotic Goods For Weekend From Destiny

Bungie slipped a jukebox into the Tower bar area with the Destiny 1.1.2 update released earlier this week. Naturally, this is where the mysterious Exotic vendor made his appearance Friday morning. Will PlayStation and Xbox players have a reason to dance though?

Xûr can be found in the very back of the bar located underneath the Future War Cult in the hangar this weekend. It’s a long jog, but easy to find. Just turn left when you enter the hanger, go down the stairs to the left, and then straight back. Here’s where you can find him on the Tower map just to be sure though.

Xûr and his items will only be available in Destiny through the morning of Sunday, March 29. As soon as the clock strikes 5 a.m. ET / 2 a.m. PT, he will be gone.

The Exotic items on sale this weekend in Destiny are led by “The Last Word” Hand Cannon. This gun hasn’t been sold often by Xûr, but it is an absolute beast in PVP due to its rapid fire capabilities. Meanwhile, the stat rolls on the Titan and Hunter armor pieces are quite good this week while Warlocks get a frequent visitor with a decent stat roll.

This week’s selection of upgrades is fairly average all around. The Achlyophage Symbiote and Sunbreakers are the only ones with great stat rolls. That said, it may be hard to advise to re-purchase or upgrade any Exotic piece of armor that you currently have with The House of Wolves just a couple of weeks away.

Here is what is available for sale and upgrade from Xûr this weekend. Thanks again to DestinyDB for the Exotic information below.

Destiny: The Agent of Nine’s Exotic Items, Times And Location April 17-19

Hey, “Destiny” fans! It’s Friday, and you know what that means. Xur, Agent of the Nine, is back in Bungie’s popular shooter “Destiny.” This week, Xur is in the hangar downstairs.

Check out the Agent of the Nine’s items below:

  • Exotic Engram [Chest armour] – 23Mol
  • Helm of Inmost Light [Exotic Titan helmet] – 13SC
  • Radiant Dance Machines [Exotic Hunter leg armour] – 13SC
  • Voidfang Vestments [Exotic Warlock chest armour] – 13SC
  • The Last Word [Exotic hand cannon] – 23SC
  • Exotic Shard – 7SC

This week, players can upgrade the following armour — Crest of the Alpha Lupi, The Armamentarium, Sunbreakers, Heart of the Praxic Fire, Knucklehead Radar and Achlyophage Symbiote.

Hard Light, Red Death, Thorn, Patience and Time, Plan C, Hawkmoon and SUROS Regime are the upgradeable weapons.

Meanwhile, Bungie is preparing for the upcoming “Destiny” downloadable content (DLC) expansion pack, “House of Wolves,” which is scheduled to reach the Xbox One, Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and PlayStation 4 on May 19, four months after the game’s first expansion, “The Dark Below.” Publisher Activision confirmed the release date in a news release earlier this week.

“Destiny” booked a record for most initial sales in the first 24 hours of a franchise debut. The online action title went on sale last September and Bungie sold $500 million worth of the game to retailers within two days, making it the largest new game franchise launch in history. Activision Blizzard Inc. CEO Bobby Kotick claimed the sales figure was an “industry milestone” that “marks another blockbuster success for our company and demonstrates our unique ability to create some of the most successful entertainment franchises in the world.”

House of Wolves Info Revealed in Data-Mining Leak From Destiny

Destiny’s House of Wolves DLC finally has a release date, nearly six months after the game’s last major expansion went live, and a series of weekly dispatches from the folks at Bungie will help count down the final month separating the Destiny community from a new wave of post-launch content.

Earlier this week, Activision published the prologue video for Destiny’s House of Wolves DLC. The video dropped alongside news that we’re just over one month removed from the expansion’s release date and we’re already starting to get some idea of what to expect when House of Wolves goes live.

According to a follow-up post on Bungie.net, the studio behind Destiny will gradually unveil some of the new content from House of Wolves, beginning with a tour of The Reef on April 22. The road to Destiny’s second expansion also includes  some live gameplay previews of the new Trials of Osiris and Prison of Elders endgame content. Relatively little is known about the former, which was revealed this week, but Bungie has already confirmed the latter will be a “cooperative multiplayer arena.”

In addition to the upcoming House of Wolves reveals, Bungie published Destiny Update 1.1.2 this week, along with patch notes for the game’s latest update. The biggest change in this week’s patch is also the one that received the most publicity in recent weeks — the expansion of Destiny players’ vaults — but there’s plenty of other changes in the latest Destiny update.

Those interested in the complete patch notes for Destiny Update 1.1.2 can find them on Bungie.net.

If you haven’t yet, take a couple of minutes to check out the House of Wolves prologue video that debuted on Monday. Then head down to the comments section and let us know if the new expansion and/or Destiny Update 1.1.2 is enough to get you playing the game again with any regularity.

Destiny’s House of Wolves DLC is being developed for PlayStation 3, PS4, Xbox 360 and Xbox One. The expansion is currently scheduled to hit PSN and Xbox Live on May 19.

Be sure to check back with iDigitalTimes.com and follow Scott on Twitter for additional Destiny coverage throughout the remainder of 2015 and for however long Activision and Bungie continue to publish new Destiny content in the years to come.

Destiny Share ‘House of Wolves’ DLC Gets A Release Date And A Trailer

But now Bungie is starting to dole out actual information about House of Wolves, namely when we’ll actually see it released. The expansion will be out May 19th, and the announcement debuted alongside a new “Prologue Trailer” which can be seen below.

The 100-second spot is a prerendered, not-in-engine cutscene, which is a relative rarity for Destiny. It’s narrated by the Awoken Queen of the Reef (voice actress Kirsten Potter) who explains that after showing the Fallen mercy, the Awoken were betrayed by them. She’s “offering the riches of the realm” as bounty for Guardians to come into the Reef and exact vengeance on the Fallen.

The clip confirms what most have known for a while about House of Wolves, that we’ll be working for the Queen and the Reef will be a new, playable area, at least in part. I suspect that it won’t be the size of a full-on planet like the zones we see in Earth, Mars , Venus and the Moon, but a genuine new area is something to celebrate nonetheless, as the first DLC, Crota’s End, only unlocked a few nooks and crannies of existing maps.

Also promising is the idea that there might actually be some semblance of story attached to this DLC, including hopefully new cutscenes which expand on the lore of the game. The Queen and her brother are characters we’ve already encountered in the game to date, and already this would seem to be more involved story-wise than Crota’s End, which introduced its story through the addition of a new Tower vendor alone whose exposition was limited to a handful of mission voiceovers.

It seems likely that Bungie has worked to rectify many of the problems of Crota’s End, hence the delay between the last DLC and this one. Crota’s End came out just three months after the release of the original game, but now House of Wolves won’t arrive until the end of May, meaning it’s going to be about five and a half months in between the last two pieces of content. The delay means more fans have probably lost interest in the game, but if the content itself is good enough, it could bring them back.

I think it’s great Bungie took some extra time with House of Wolves, and I have to imagine they’ll have learned a lot from Crota’s End. They’ll have had to, given that the most common sentiment I heard among fans after the release of the first DLC was “if House of Wolves is just like this I’m done.

The super-rare gear sale this weekend from Destiny

Xur deals in Destiny’s so-called “exotic” gear. In a game ruled by random loot drops from virtually any scenario, exotics are the most sought-after of them all. They’re also the only class of gear in the game with usage restrictions; namely, you can only have one exotic armor piece and one exotic weapon equipped at any given moment.

Every Friday is a holiday when you’re a Destiny fan. That’s when Xur, Agent of the Nine, appears in a random part of the game’s Tower social hub to peddle his rare weapons and armor. As long as you have enough Strange Coins, a rare currency that can be earned by completing Weekly Heroic Strikes, Xur has the goods for you.

Xur’s in the Tower from 4 a.m. ET on Friday to 4 a.m. ET on Sunday. To find him, hook a right on your way to the Tower hangar. Let’s take a look at what he’s got in stock for the weekend of April 10 to 12.

The Armamentarium (Titan chestpiece): This Titan chestpiece is for players that like to bring massive firepower to bear on anything standing in their way. In addition to boosting both special and heavy weapon ammo capacities, The Armamentarium — once upgraded — also gives Titans a second grenade to toss. Cost: 13 Strange Coins

ATS/8 ARACHNID (Hunter helmet): This helmet is mostly of interest to Hunters that like to run the Gunslinger sub-class. Its Arachnid Sensorium upgrade increases the range of the Gunslinger’s Golden Gun “super ability,” while its Ashes to Asset upgrade refills the super’s meter faster with every grenade kill. There’s also a third upgrade, Light the Blade, that reduces the cooldown of the Hunter’s melee ability — for Gunslingers, that’s a throwing knife — when dealing damage with a grenade. Cost: 13 Strange Coins

Starfire Protocol (Warlock chestpiece): Starfire Protocol is basically the Warlock’s version of The Armamentarium, but it’s only of interest to the Sunsinger sub-class. Boosts to heavy weapon ammo and fusion rifle ammo are handy, but the marquee upgrade for Starfire gives Sunsinger Warlocks a second fusion grenade to toss. Cost: 13 Strange Coins

SUROS Regime (auto rifle): Long one of Destiny’s most sought-after exotic weapons, SUROS Regime is available to buy from Xur this week. This auto rifle has a number of features that make it unique, starting with the Focused Fire upgrade. Once unlocked, SUROS switches from a high rate-of-fire bullet hose to a slower firing, higher damage headshot beast as the user moves between hip fire and sighted aiming, respectively. Then there’s the upgrade that the weapon is named for, which causes the bottom half of each magazine to deal bonus damage and potentially restore some health to the user. As with any Destiny gear that has healing capabilities, this is most useful during the final phase of the Crota’s End raid, when healing is limited. Cost: 23 Strange Coins

Exotic Chestpiece engram: Destiny’s engrams are unidentified gear that spit out a random item when “decoded” by the Cryptarch vendor in the Tower. Xur occasionally sells exotic engrams in exchange for another rare currency, “Motes of Light.” It’s always a roll of the dice when you buy an exotic engram. Given that Destiny’s next expansion, House of Wolves, is likely just a few weeks away, it’s probably a good idea to hang onto your Motes and wait to see what the DLC brings. Cost: 23 Motes of Light

Exotic Shard: This crafting material was introduced alongside Destiny’s first expansion pack, The Dark Below. One is required to fully upgrade any exotic gear, weapon and armor both. You can always get a “free” exotic shard when you dismantling an exotic, but Xur sells them every week.

In addition to the gear, Xur also peddles a rotating stock of consumables every week. For this week, he’s got Pulse Rifle Telemetry, Hand Cannon Telemetry and Machine Gun Telemetry (temporarily increases the XP gains on the designated weapon class) in bundles of five, for 1 Strange Coin apiece; a Plasma Drive that boosts the speed and durability of rare Sparrows (Destiny’s speeder bikes), for 23 Strange Coins; an Emerald Coil, which works the same as a Plasma Drive but also adds a green contrail to the Sparrow, also for 23 Strange Coins; and bundles of five Heavy Ammo Synthesis (ammo packs, y’all), for 1 Strange Coin.

If you want to dive even deeper on the relative value of Xur’s offering this week, head over to the Destiny subreddit. User aWrySharK provides weekly analysis that breaks down the stat rolls on each armor piece, complete with recommendations covering what’s worth it and what’s not. Check out this week’s rundown right here.