I have maintained that the long-requested “horde mode” of Destiny 2, which arrived during the game’s 10th anniversary event, Onslaught, is one of the best new activities Bungie has done. A wave-based structure that can get decently hard on higher difficulties, loads of loot and fun things to earn with some level of rarity.
I did in fact appreciate that Onslaught was being expanded on for the Revenant episode, with new maps, new enemies and turning it into a seasonal loot farm. Though after a few weeks now, the problems with the mode are becoming a bit more obvious.
Awkward Attunement – The attunement system in original Onslaught, which still exists, was easy. You pick what weapon you want to focus, and it will remain focused as long as you have that attunement live. But now in Revenant, in order to jam the new potion system into this, you need to have the crafting materials to make each individual potion for each weapon, and then you have to manage expiring timers for these every time you use one. It’s the same system with annoying extra steps that just don’t need to exist, and feel injected into it because of the seasonal concept. I get that the potions extend to other modes, but it’s annoying to have a 60 minute potion for a 70 minute Onslaught run. At worst, these things should last hours.
Not Enough Loot – I have zero problem with the Revenant loot not being craftable this season and just farmed through Onslaught and other activities (at least once they fix the insane perk pair bug). But the reason original Onslaught felt great without crafting was the sheer amount of drops you got. That’s just not the case here, as yes, you will get drops over the course of a match, but there is no “token” chest at the end to spam to get lots of drops in a row. We only have seasonal rank-up engrams which are not the same thing at all. So, not enough loot compared to how good the original felt.
No Shinies – We need more shinies! Again, even though it was a cosmetic thing, it still felt great to chase or get randomly. Yes, Onslaught can drop masterworked double perk weapons sometimes (I’ve gotten one, ever), but they are not shiny with a unique look. And in this case, given the new system, I think it would be cool if they dropped with all perks pre-enhanced, too. MW double perk once every 50 drops is not nearly as fun.
Onslaught Remains Too Long – This is a more general problem with Onslaught that did impact the original, but Bungie doesn’t seem to have learned this lesson. The 10 wave playlist mode is boring, short and unrewarding. The 50 wave one effectively cannot take less than an hour 99% of the time because of how timers work alone. It feels like the mode should be cut to 30 or 40 waves instead, and the early super easy first 10-20 rounds cut entirely, as they simply feel like filler. A 50 wave run of Onslaught should not take as long or longer than an entire dungeon, and so much of the time spent there feels wasted.
I like the changes they made. I like the maps, the new enemies and bosses, the loot. But it has lost some of what made the original Onslaught so fun and rewarding, and failed to fix one of its core problems. I hope that can change.
Follow me on Twitter, YouTube, Bluesky and Instagram.
Pick up my sci-fi novels the Herokiller series and The Earthborn Trilogy.
