Home Gaming Despite a killer month on the charts, Activision still isn’t happy with Destiny 2 sales

Despite a killer month on the charts, Activision still isn’t happy with Destiny 2 sales

2 min read
33

As a game, Destiny 2 is better than ever thanks to sweeping changes that were introduced in the Forsaken expansion. There’s a constant grind that’s thoroughly enjoyable as players battle to reach the ceiling of their power, with a wide variety of activities giving everyone a chance to feel like a legend. From Gambit to Nightfall Strikes, there’s always something to do, always some activity to try your hand at that feels properly rewarding within the structure of that sandbox.

Throw in more regular seasonal events such as the recent Festival of the Lost, the Iron Banner and a story that tugged on the heartstrings, and Destiny 2 players are happier than ever. That surge in joy could be seen in sales numbers for the game as well, as Destiny 2 was offered for free in September over on PS Plus, resulting in plenty of purchases of its expansion content. Heck, Destiny 2 was pretty much the top-grossing console game of the month, beating even the mighty Fortnite.

It apparently wasn’t enough for Activision.

According to Kotaku, Activision’s lofty ambitions for Destiny 2 and the Forsaken expansion has seen the publisher express its unhappiness with current sales results, despite the fact that the expansion has earned rave reviews and an overall much better critical acclaim that has seen a far better retention of players over the last several months. “Some of our other franchises like Destiny are not performing as well as we’d like,”Activision COO Coddy Johnson said in an earnings call via Kotaku while promising investors more monetisation options for the game.

We have not yet seen the full core re-engage in Destiny, which has led to the underperformance against expectations to date. Some players are in ‘wait and see’ mode. If you’re in, you’re deeply engaged. If not, we think now’s the time to bring players back.

It’s an odd statement from Activision, seeing as how Destiny 2’s community is stronger than ever and filled with plenty of veteran players currently. As mentioned above, Destiny 2 did gangbusters in September, but this could also be a sign of Activision having extremely high expectations of the game despite an obvious lack of support in fully promoting it as they do their other properties.

It could also be a sign of Activision not being happy with Destiny 2’s current microtransaction services, which are surprisingly minimal and pretty much fully constrained to a single vendor in the game. That approach works well enough, resulting in a relatively unobtrusive system of being bombarded with cosmetic flair as players run around the solar system and earn cool-looking gear with bullets instead of credit card swipes.

Last Updated: November 9, 2018

33 Comments

  1. Maybe they should re-launch it as a mobile game

    Reply

    • Original Heretic

      November 9, 2018 at 09:27

      If it was still a thing in this site, this should totally be comment of the week.

      Reply

      • Admiral Chief

        November 9, 2018 at 09:28

        I did what I could, featured it

        TO THE TOP!

        Reply

        • Original Heretic

          November 9, 2018 at 09:32

          Good man!

          Reply

    • Admiral Chief

      November 9, 2018 at 09:46

      Its been 29 minutes since I read your comment….I’m still laughing

      Reply

  2. Original Heretic

    November 9, 2018 at 09:18

    Mon dieu! New pic and bio for The D!

    Oh, and something something Destiny 2 something something. Bleh.

    Reply

    • The D

      November 9, 2018 at 09:21

      YAY SOMEONE NOTICED MY NEW MUG

      Reply

      • Admiral Chief

        November 9, 2018 at 09:27

        I’ve been hard for 12 ‘straight’ hours now since I first saw it

        Reply

      • Original Heretic

        November 9, 2018 at 09:28

        New? You still looking the same. Fire your surgeon!

        Reply

  3. Admiral Chief

    November 9, 2018 at 09:28

    Maybe stop giving the game away for free then?

    HO HO HO

    Reply

    • Admiral Chief

      November 9, 2018 at 11:28

      Also, giving the game away for free to entice people to pay for more content means a lot if they aren’t even interested in paying more?

      Reply

      • Original Heretic

        November 9, 2018 at 11:40

        I didn’t make it very far.
        Irritates the living crap out of me that all the “good” content is so far into the game.

        Reply

  4. CrAiGiSh

    November 9, 2018 at 09:33

    THEN DON’T GIVE IT OUT FOR FUCKING FREE AND PISS OFF ALL THE PEOPLE WHO PAID FOR YOUR FUCKING GAME !!!

    TTTTTTTTRRRRRRIIIIGGGGGGGEEEERRRRRREEEEEDDDDDDD !!!

    Reply

    • Admiral Chief

      November 9, 2018 at 09:34

      xD

      Reply

    • PestControl

      November 9, 2018 at 13:46

      Well you still have to pay for the annual pass + Forsaken which is close to R1k

      Reply

  5. Ghost In The Rift

    November 9, 2018 at 09:39

    I got it free over on Battle.net but still have to download like 80GB of files…Need to try this though.

    Reply

    • Admiral Chief

      November 9, 2018 at 11:40

      One day, but not today

      Reply

      • Pariah

        November 9, 2018 at 11:42

      • Ghost In The Rift

        November 9, 2018 at 12:19

        Indeed….Once i have enough friends..or a friend.

        Reply

        • PestControl

          November 9, 2018 at 13:51

          I played solo until lvl 50… then I joined an SA clan where we regularly group up to do gambits and crucibles. Playing solo was perfectly fine for me – most of the story content isn’t too hard.

          Reply

  6. Lord Chaos

    November 9, 2018 at 09:47

    Sales numbers or the fact they gave it to everyone for free?

    Reply

  7. Yondaime

    November 9, 2018 at 12:39

    I’m mad at the fact that I have to buy Forsaken to get the DLCs to the original game

    Reply

    • PestControl

      November 9, 2018 at 13:54

      Technically they’re more like small expansions rather than just DLC. Forsaken simply has more content etc then Osiris and Warmind.

      Reply

  8. WickedMONK3Y

    November 9, 2018 at 14:32

    I have loved Destiny a lot more since Forsaken. Base game was ok but ran out of shit to do real fast. Curse of Osiris was like a new wallpaper at most, Warmind had a little more flesh but it was still a single pork rib. But Forsaken… wow what a blast. It is actually easy to get decent gear outside of the raid, and pretty quick to get to 600 Power Level if you do the right stuff weekly, and the only good things from the raids are the weapons and you can get those from the 2 secret chests using the wall of wishes. I already have Age Old Bond, Chattering Bone, The Supremacy, Apex Predator and Techeun Force, and 3 pieces of Titan Armour. Yes yes doing the RAID is betterererrrer but I am too lazy and the local clan I am in runs 3 raid teams 😛 so I am super lazy. Forsaken now includes the 2 other xpacs for free so its actually worth it. I wonder what ratio Activision are expecting to convert from Free to Forsaken…

    Reply

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