Destiny 2: Season of Plunder is the penultimate season in the Witch Queen DLC. With one more season on the cards, the number of players in the game has been on the decline for a while now.
There are a few reasons behind this drop in player numbers. But before we move on, it’s worth noting that the looting season was slightly different from the previous iterations.
The general theme revolved around pirates. While the developers could have done a little more in terms of infusing the theme with the overall season storyline, they managed to nail the visuals pretty well.
However, here are a few reasons why players haven’t come to the game.
Note: This article reflects the opinion of the writer.
Why are players avoiding Destiny 2: Season of Plunder?
There are a number of reasons why players stay somewhat away from the game. Before going any further, the only way to keep track of the player count for this game is through Steam.
While Destiny 2 is also available on other platforms, getting a total player count from each platform is rather difficult. Out of all available data, player counts are related to what has been seen on Steam itself.
While the number of players continues to change over time, the dip was quite strong during Season of Plunder.
The reasons behind the decline in the number of players are as follows:
1) Old game
The game is essentially old. Released in 2017, it is currently five years old. Yes, it’s time long way since releasebut that does not alter the fact that more modern alternatives are available.
While there isn’t much to complain about in terms of graphics, the game as a whole does feel repetitive over time. Despite the constant additions to the title, there had to be a drop at some point.
2) Release of other major titles
Destiny 2 has its own fan base, yes, but there were some heavy hitters that went live recently. The first one is coincidental Overwatch 2. Despite being buggy at launch, the game managed to attract quite a few people.
The second main rival is Modern Warfare 2. This title had been on the cards for a while and once the beta went live, players stepped up to get a first-hand experience. More fans jumped on the game’s hype train when the entire game went live.
Aside from these two games, a few other titles went live as well, which could be one of the reasons many players stopped coming back to Destiny 2.
3) PvP
PvP has always been a sore spot for Bungie. For a long time, players constantly complain about how unbalanced the PvP aspect has been in play.
The developers have recently introduced certain changes to the PvP segment that will likely bring a large number of players back to Destiny 2. In addition, the mode has been stagnant for most of this season. The competitive segment has only seen Trials of Osiris on consecutive weekends.
iron banner was only seen once this season. It’s scheduled to go live again on November 11, but that’s about it. Given that the mode has been absent for so long, it’s understandable why players wouldn’t be interested in it either.
Finally, matchmaking remains an issue in PvP. While Bungie has talked about introducing some loose SBMM into the Crucible, it still seems all over the place for now.
4) Lack of storytelling
The stories in Destiny 2 have been slow from the start. The seasonal storyline gains new traction once a week. However, that too is very short and full of repetitive actions.
While the overall story time has increased over the past few seasons, it still doesn’t feel like enough. Frankly, the storyline feels like it’s stagnating, which is an important aspect that does need some good rework.
The developers have done a good job of reworking the subclasses in the game, and now it’s time to probably focus on some other things in the title as well.
5) The grind
Destiny 2 is essentially an RPG. It’s in the nature of any title in the genre to be labor intensive, but the grind here feels too tedious and boring. The power creep is also painful. The seasonal activities are also the same and feel so repetitive that it’s pretty boring at the moment.
Not only that, they don’t feel that rewarding either. To make matters worse, the raid the developers added this season was carried over from the previous game. Overall, everything feels very repetitive, making player retention a difficult task for the developers.
These are some of the reasons that can be attributed to the low player counts seen during Season of Plunder. With Destiny 2 Season 19 on the charts right now, it will be interesting to see how the numbers change once it drops.
Moreover, light is only one season away and the developers have announced some big changes for it too. It will be really interesting to see how things play out for the game in the coming months.
