With the possible leak of Destiny’s newest expansion catching like wildfire, we can not help but speculate what, where, or when Rise of Iron actually takes place. While Destiny has had a fair amount of ups and downs, it’s impressive how dedicated the community really is to this game. The Taken King ushered in the second year of Destiny, and the April Update fixed and added some much-needed features that players were clamoring for. Now with Destiny 2 still a year away, it’s not surprising that Bungie would be releasing a second expansion sometime in late summer/early fall.
A couple other looks… #RiseofIron pic.twitter.com/LaTaHQzSMC
— Bungie Informer (@BungieInformer) May 20, 2016
There are a lot of possibilities for what this new expansion could bring, as Destiny has a very rich and defined lore that’s been building up since launch. Seeing major hero’s like Saladin take the stage is interesting, but there are many other avenues Rise of Iron could go down. Here are a few concepts that this new expansion could easily explore and develop.
Story of Iron Banner/Lord Saladin
As stated before, Destiny really doesn’t combine the competitive and single player sides of the game. It’s possible that this new story could be explaining how the Iron Banner was created and the origins of Lord Saladin. He is a decorated warrior who led forces against various Fallen Houses during the Battle of Twilight Gap, so maybe we will be participating in this event.
It’s not even like Destiny hasn’t played with the idea of time before, as the entire Vault of Glass raid was based around the concept of time and moving through it. So going back to the time of Lord Saladin’s campaign against the Fallen Houses could open up Destiny to a very interesting and intense story. Powers such as Sunbreakers and Nightstalkers all existed before the events of The Taken King, so explaining how our Guardians have these powers wouldn’t be difficult. We know the outcome of this battle, but seeing how it all went down could really give the story a shot in the arm it desperately needs.
Europa
When Destiny’s story was ripped apart and stitched back together, one of locations that got left on the cutting room floor was Europa. While we were originally supposed to travel to this area in the vanilla game, we have yet to actually experience this lost content.
Having Rise of Iron be the story of Europa, or at least set in it, is a very real possibility for this expansion. In some of the early concept art, Europa was snowed over, which is reflected in the leaked art as the setting is clearly Earth. Unless we have space wolves now, which let’s be honest, would be amazing and should absolutely happen. We haven’t had a chance to really explore Earth or the aftermath of the various wars and battles the planet has suffered, so getting a new window into what happened is a tantalizing idea.
House of Wolves Continued
House of Wolves was one of those DLC’s that received extremely mixed reviews, as it was incredibly short but included the new Prison of Elders. In terms of lore alone, there is a possibility that an old foe may be rearing his ugly head to fight once more. See, House of Wolves ended with players capturing the Fallen Pirate leader Skolas and Variks locking him away in the Prison of Elders for…entertainment?
Honestly, what Variks does down there is questionable at best. However, during the Taken invasion, Skolas actually escaped from his prison and we haven’t heard from him since. This explains why he is not in any of the new high-level PoE content introduced in the April Update. So, Rise of Iron could very much be a sequel to the House of Wolves, with us setting out to kill Skolas once more. Which sounds really awesome, as long as we don’t have to dismantle any more mines…
Just a Raid
Speaking of House of Wolves, one of the biggest complaints was that it didn’t include a raid at all. There are arguments to be made that PoE was pretty much a raid, but there has never been an official Fallen themed raid. At this point, we have had a raid for the Vex, Hive, and the Taken, yet one of Destiny’s biggest villains haven’t received one.
This is even more interesting given that they received an entire DLC based around them and have a wealth of great locations to actually conduct a raid in. Storming a Fallen Ketch could make for a truly dramatic and dynamic raid and with Skolas gone, he would make a formidable end boss. Rise of Iron could very much be just the name for our new raid, whether it’s the lost House of Wolves raid is still very much up for debate.
It’s Fake
There is a small chance this is just an elaborate hoax and it has absolutely nothing to do with future content. In which case, we still have no idea what to exactly expect from Destiny in the fall. Though there is another faction in Destiny that has received very little love from and that is the Cabal. Sure, they had a part in The Taken King expansion, but never on a grandiose scale. Despite being one of the more interesting factions in the game, we know so little about the actual makeup and backstory of this culture. Having a DLC dedicated to them would be a welcomed change, as would an entire raid based around fighting your way to some high ranking Cabal.
Obviously, we are just speculating here, but this new poster has certainly sparked out interest. Destiny is a game that has always had tons of potential, but never fully realized thanks to some hardware limitations. While it’s most certainly going to be revealed at E3, it’s impressive just how much support the game is getting two years after its rocky launch. Hopefully, Rise of Iron is the expansion that Destiny has desperately been needing for months now.
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