Destiny 2's next big expansion The Witch Queen is now just one week away—here's the launch trailer, in case you haven't seen it. But, and I'm sure this will come as a big surprise, the leadup to launch isn't going perfectly smoothly. There are bugs in the new Exorcism mission that dropped today that are keeping some unlucky players from seeing the post-mission cutscene that's meant to wrap up this season's narrative and cue up the next one. In some cases, the issues are actually preventing the mission from being completed.
Numerous complaints about both an inability to progress through the quest, and the cutscene being skipped at the end, have appeared over the past few hours on Bungie's help forum. Bungie said on Twitter that it is investigating the problem, and in the meantime has a workaround for one problem: Your progression can be blocked if you're moving too quickly on the Bridge encounter, so if that happens, double back—and, I guess, do it slower.
It's at this point I will note that our intrepid Brand Director attempted the mission at lunch, and found his progress blocked when a Hive tomb ship became lodged in a rocky outcrop, and could not be blasted loose. That required a full restart, but on the second go around things went fine. Luckily, no one in his fireteam opted to skip the closing cut scene either. Which is somehow behaviour that's possible, despite Exorcism being a mission that matchmakes you with five entirely random players.
If anyone in the fireteam skips the video after the mission ends, it will be skipped for everyone in the team. This obviously opens up the possibility of deliberate trolling, particularly by players who've already watched once on an alt and don't feel like sitting through it again. Disabling the ability to join the Exorcism mission while it's in progress will help reduce the likelihood of players being hosed out of the season-ending experience by others who are grinding through it repeatedly.
As we continue to investigate, please note:❖ Progression can be blocked if moving too quickly on the Bridge encounter. Double back if blocked.❖ Don’t skip the final cutscene❖ We're disabling the option to join this activity in progress via MatchmakingStay tuned for more. https://t.co/Wb7bYu2sI4February 15, 2022
The cutscene is available on YouTube for those who just want to see what's going on, but for a lot of Destiny 2 players, seeing the big transition into The Witch Queen play out properly is a big part of the sense of achievement. Destiny 2 player @ohsapphy got right to the heart of it on Twitter: "I've waited 26 fucking weeks for the end of it," they wrote. "Now I wanna see it with my own Guardian on my own screen."
That sentiment is probably exacerbated by the fact that this has been a prolonged sixth-month seasons due to The Witch Queen's delay, so cramming the final reveal into the last week feels like something of an unnecessary risk.
Along with working on fixes for the progression and cutscene problems, Bungie has also lowered the recommended power level of the Exorcism mission from 1270 to 1170 to help ensure that lower-level players can finish the mission and see the big seasonal switchover too.
Destiny 2: The Witch Queen goes live on February 22. Here's a 15-minute vidoc on what's in store.
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- Destiny 2: The Witch Queen review: The best expansion yet.
