Bungie described the setting of
Destiny as a "mythic science-fiction" world. The setting, about 700 years in the future from
present day, follows a prosperous period of exploration, peace, and technological advancement known as the Golden Age. In a universe where humans have spread out and colonized planets in the
Solar System, an event known as "the Collapse" saw the mysterious dissolution of these colonies, the end of the Golden Age, and mankind teetering on the brink of extinction. The only known survivors of the Collapse are those living on
Earth, who were saved by "the Traveler", a white, spherical
celestial body whose appearance centuries before had enabled humans to reach the stars. The Collapse was caused by a mysterious force called the Darkness, wielded by a malevolent being called the Witness, an ancient enemy of the Traveler that plagues the galaxy. The Traveler now hovers above the last safe city on Earth, simply called The Last City, which is surrounded by a massive Wall, and its presence allows the Guardians — the defenders of the City — the ability to wield an unknown power, only referred to as "Light". The player takes on the role of a Guardian, and is tasked with reviving the Traveler while investigating and destroying alien threats before humanity is completely wiped out. Upon mankind's first attempt to repopulate and reconstruct after the Collapse, it is discovered that hostile alien races have occupied mankind's former colonies and civilizations, and are now encroaching upon the City. Throughout the series, players have to combat aggressive aliens who have occupied the Solar System. Just like the Light for the Guardians, the Darkness lends powers to these alien threats, though Guardians have soon begun to wield the powers of Darkness themselves along with the Light. The powers of Light and Darkness are discovered to be forms of paracausal energy that gives their wielders the ability to bend the laws of reality to their own will, with the Light being tied to the physical world, and the Darkness being tied to thought and consciousness. Both games use settings on various planets, moons, and other features within the Solar System as the Guardians fight to defend the remnants of the Golden Age.
Destiny featured maps across Earth's Russian Cosmodrome (and an area outside it called the Plaguelands), its
Moon,
Venus, and
Mars, and also included player-versus-player maps set on Mars' moon
Phobos and the planet
Mercury.
Destiny 2, prior to the
Beyond Light expansion, included Earth's European Dead Zone (EDZ), its Moon, Mercury, Mars, the
centaur Nessus,
Jupiter's moon
Io, and
Saturn's moon
Titan, as well as the Tangled Shore and Dreaming City, areas situated along the Reef, located in the System's
asteroid belt. There was also a social space in the EDZ called The Farm. With
Beyond Light, Bungie opted to create a Destiny Content Vault, placing Mercury, Mars, Io, Titan, and The Farm content within it to start, as a means to better manage the game's future expansions. Bungie does plan to revise vaulted content as the series progresses to re-introduce these into the game.
Beyond Light also reintroduced Earth's Cosmodrome from
Destiny as well as a new location, Jupiter's moon
Europa, and a new social space called the H.E.L.M. (Hub for Emergency Maneuvers and Logistics). Another social space, Xûr's Treasure Hoard, which is located in an unknown realm of the Nine called Eternity, was added in Season 15 as part of the
Bungie 30th Anniversary Pack.
The Witch Queen added a fourth social space, the Enclave on Mars, as well as a new location, Savathûn's Throne World, within the Ascendant Realm above Mars. Upon release of
The Witch Queen, the Tangled Shore was removed and placed in the content vault, but Bungie stated that following this, expansion content would no longer be vaulted, but seasonal content would still be removed upon release of each major expansion with some exceptions.
Lightfall added the secret technologically advanced city called Neomuna on
Neptune. Simultaneously, The Farm social space returned in Season 20,
Season of Defiance. A fifth social space, the Hall of Champions, was added in Season 23 as part of
Into the Light, but was removed upon the release of
The Final Shape.
The Final Shape added a new location, the Pale Heart, located within the Traveler, with areas influenced by previous destinations explored throughout the history of the franchise—the first patrol destination that can be explored solo unless the player has a pre-made fireteam.
The Edge of Fate will add a new location, Kepler, a planetoid affected by a singularity located within the
Oort cloud at the edge of the Solar System and is home to the mysterious Aionian race and the Fallen House of Exile.
Renegades added a new social space on Mars, the Tharsis Cantina, home to various galactic crime syndicates and is inspired by
Mos Eisley Cantina from
Star Wars. Other destinations that have been featured in the games include the
Dreadnaught, the massive flagship of Oryx, The Taken King, situated in the rings of Saturn in the original
Destiny, and the
Leviathan, the flagship of the exiled Cabal Emperor, Calus, in
Destiny 2. The
Leviathan was originally only the location of
Destiny 2s original three raids and located in Nessus' orbit, but was removed upon
Beyond Lights release; however, a derelict version in the Moon's orbit became a patrol destination in Season 17,
Season of the Haunted, although it was removed upon the release of
Lightfall. During
Episode: Revenant, the Last City's market district and apartments were added as a social space and hub for the episodic content.
Characters The expansive universe of
Destiny features numerous recurring
non-player characters (NPCs) to assist the player. Several provide the player with quests while others are vendors to buy new gear using the in-game currency of glimmer and/or other resources. Most of these characters are human or of two subspecies: the Awoken, descendants of a human colony ship that had encountered a phenomenon in deep space that caused them to become more enlightened to paracausal forces while giving them blue-gray skin and other elf-like features, and Exo, robotic shells housing human consciousness developed by the Clovis Bray Corporation as to try to give humans immortality but require their memories to be occasionally wiped to prevent them from going insane. While all Lightbearers of the Vanguard are recognized as Guardians, the player's character is unnamed and is simply referred to as "Guardian" or "the Guardian" by the NPCs. In the original
Destiny, the character was voiced by one of six people, depending on which species and gender the player selected when creating their character:
Matthew Mercer and
Susan Eisenberg voiced the male and female Human guardians,
Crispin Freeman and
Grey Griffin voiced the male and female Awoken Guardians, while
Peter Jessop and
Cree Summer voiced the male and female Exo Guardians. In
Destiny 2 beginning with
Beyond Light, Peter Jessop now voices all male player Guardians while Susan Eisenberg voices all female ones. Guardians are accompanied by a Ghost, a robot
artificial intelligence. Just like how the player's character is simply referred to as the Guardian, the player's Ghost is simply referred to as Ghost without its own unique name, whereas other characters in the game have names for their respective Ghosts, which also have their own unique voices. The player's Ghost was originally voiced by
Peter Dinklage in the original
Destiny, but due to his availability, veteran voice actor
Nolan North replaced Dinklage with the release of
The Taken King expansion, and re-recorded all of Dinklage's lines from the base game. The Guardians are led by the Vanguard that oversees their activities. Among their leaders include the Speaker (voiced by
Bill Nighy) who was the head of the Vanguard and who speaks for the Traveler but was killed during the Red War in
Destiny 2; Titan Vanguard Commander Zavala (initially voiced by
Lance Reddick, now by
Keith David), an Awoken who oversees most of the Vanguard's military operations; the Warlock Vanguard Ikora Rey (initially voiced by
Gina Torres, now by Mara Junot), a human who instructs the Hidden, the Vanguard's network of scouts and spies to track enemy movements; and the late Hunter Vanguard
Cayde-6 (voiced by
Nathan Fillion), who was a happy-go-lucky Exo and sharpshooter that assisted across various Vanguard functions; Cayde-6 was killed during the
Destiny 2: Forsaken story content, his death having a lingering effect on the other characters, but returned in spirit form in
Destiny 2: The Final Shape. Other key members of the Vanguard include Lord Shaxx (voiced by
Lennie James), who oversees the Crucible activities, Saint-14 (voiced by
Brian T. Delaney), who is a fabled Titan of the past and rescued from death through time travel that manages the Trials of Osiris matches, and Iron Lord Saladin Forge (voiced by
Keith Ferguson), who had helped to end the conflict necessary to make the Last City a possibility and oversees the Iron Banner Crucible event. The Vanguard had also governed the Last City in the Consensus alongside three factions of citizens: the Future War Cult led by Lakshmi-2 (voiced by
Shohreh Aghdashloo), which had used Vex technology to see constant conflict in the Last City's future and thus maintained preparedness for this, Dead Orbit led by Arach Jalaal (voiced by
Peter Stormare), which believed that humanity must abandon the System and colonize planets outside it, and New Monarchy led by Executor Hideo (voiced by
James Remar), which sought to replace the current democratic leadership of the Vanguard with a single powerful ruler—all of these factions were disbanded following the death of Lakshmi-2 at the end of Season 14,
Season of the Splicer. Among other major recurring allied characters include former Warlock Vanguard Osiris (voiced by
Oded Fehr), who had been exiled after he became obsessed in studying the Vex but has since returned although he lost his power of Light after his Ghost, Sagira (voiced by
Morena Baccarin), was destroyed and has since learned the Darkness power of Strand;
Eris Morn (voiced by Morla Gorrondona), a former Hunter that has studied the Hive and the threat of Darkness; Ana Bray (initially voiced by
Jamie Chung, now by
Erika Ishii), the granddaughter of Braytech's founder Clovis Bray I, and helped to create the automated system defense Warmind Rasputin; Asher Mir (voiced by
Darryl Kurylo), a scientist who had been tested on and partially converted to Vex and was keen on studying how to reverse his conditions; Deputy Commander Sloane (voiced by
Cissy Jones), a Titan who served under Zavala and took to monitoring activities on Titan once it was re-secured; Shaw Han (voiced by Cory Yee), a Hunter who oversees operations within Earth's Cosmodrome and a guide for New Lights (newly resurrected Guardians); and Crow (voiced by Brandon O'Neill), a Guardian who was formerly the Awoken Prince
Uldren Sov—Asher Mir and Commander Sloane were seemingly killed following the events of
Season of Arrivals, although Sloane returned, albeit part Taken, in
Season of the Deep. The Vanguard is also aided by non-Guardian humans or allies, including: Amanda Holliday (voiced by
Courtenay Taylor), who ran flights and transit operations for missions but was killed in
Season of Defiance; Devrim Kay (voiced by
Gideon Emery), a former Last City militia who maintains watch over the EDZ; Brother Vance (voiced by Bob O'Donnell), a devoted disciple of Osiris that oversaw the Lighthouse on Mercury—he entered the Infinite Forest on Mercury upon the conclusion of
Season of Arrivals with his fate unknown; Failsafe (voiced by
Joy Osmanski), an artificial intelligence with a split personality from the starship
Exodus Black that had crashed centuries before on Nessus; Petra Venj (voiced by
April Stewart), the Awoken Last City ambassador of Queen Mara Sov of the Reef and who monitors activities in the Dreaming City, and Mara Sov herself (voiced by Kristen Potter), who is indifferent to the Vanguard but seeks to eliminate the threat of the Witness and lends her powers to the Guardian to traverse the Ascendant Realm and the Awoken ley line network. Further, the Guardians are aided by the Drifter (voiced by
Todd Haberkorn), who oversees the Gambit activities; Banshee-44 (voiced by
John DiMaggio), the Tower's gunsmith; Ada-1 (voiced by
Britt Baron), the curator of the Black Armory weapon foundry who handles armor transmogrification for players; Eva Levante (voiced by
Nika Futterman), originally the Guardian outfitter but now the Tower's seasonal vendor; Tess Everis (voiced by
Claudia Black), the vendor for the Eververse microtransaction store; the Exo Stranger (initially voiced by
Lauren Cohan, now by
Moira Quirk), also known as Elisabeth "Elsie" Bray, who is the sister of Ana Bray who first helped the Guardian destroy the Black Heart in the Black Garden and now helps Guardians learn the power of Stasis on Europa; Xûr (voiced by
Fred Tatasciore), a strange vendor of exotic wares who speaks for the Nine, dark matter beings trapped in the System's gravity well for eons and have watched humanity developed and oversees the Dares of Eternity activity; the Emissary of the Nine (also voiced by Moira Quirk), formerly an Awoken Titan named Orin, who also speaks for the Nine and serves as their puppet and once presided over the Trials of the Nine event; Fynch (voiced by
Ian James Corlett), a Ghost who regrets joining the Hive and guides the Guardian in Savathûn's Throne World; Nimbus (voiced by Marin Miller), who is one of the Cloud Striders, the cybernetically-enhanced defenders of Neomuna, alongside their mentor Rohan (voiced by
Dave Fennoy) and who guides the Guardian on Neptune but was killed during the events of
Lightfall; Micah-10 (voiced by
Pooya Mohseni), an Exo Hunter who helps find and save unpartnered Ghosts and assists the Guardian in the Pale Heart; Lodi (voiced by Brian Villalobos), a 21st-century human who was brought to the Guardian's time period by the Nine and guides the Guardian on Kepler; Aunor Mahal (voiced by
Dawn M. Bennett), a human Warlock of the Praxic Order who once opposed the Drifter's presence in the Tower and helps the guide the Guardian on Tharsis Cantina and in their outlaw bounty work on Mars, Europa and Venus; and Blue (voiced by Stephanie Kerbis), who is the Drifter's Ghost and also aids the Guardian in their outlaw bounty work.
Alien races Multiple alien races have been introduced in the series. Five were originally introduced with
Destiny. A sixth race, the Scorn, was introduced within
Destiny 2: Forsaken, a seventh, Nightmares, were introduced within
Destiny 2: Shadowkeep, and then an eighth, the Dread, were fully introduced in
Destiny 2: The Final Shape, although a faction of Dread, Tormentors, were first introduced in the prior expansion,
Destiny 2: Lightfall. • The Fallen, also known as the Eliksni, are an insectoid race of nomadic pirates who scavenge ruined settlements on Earth, Earth's Moon, and Venus for resources. The Fallen are split among several tribal-like Houses, each with its own leader known as a Kell. Long before the Traveler arrived in the System, it had visited the Fallen's home world of Riis and similarly gave rise to a golden age, where they worshipped it as their "Great Machine". In the midst of this age, the Traveler suddenly left them, and their society fell apart as Houses turned against each other. The survivors abandoned the planet to seek out the Traveler, following it to Earth and scavenging whatever technology they could along the way.
Rise of Iron added a faction of Fallen called the Devil Splicers, which are Fallen who have been modified by a Golden Age nanotechnology called SIVA. They are found on Earth in a zone outside of the Wall called the Plaguelands. During the course of events in
Destiny 2, some of the Fallen Houses find that alliance with the Vanguard would become beneficial, while other Houses remain fully hostile to the Vanguard, such as Eramis, Kell of Darkness (voiced by
Salli Saffioti) and House Salvation on Europa, which have acquired the use of the Darkness power of Stasis. As revealed in
The Witch Queen expansion, the Krill were to have been visited by the Traveler and were about to be granted a Golden Age, but the Witness (voiced by
Brett Dalton), an extremely powerful being of Darkness, interceded to make Sathona distrust the Traveler and seek out the Worm Gods instead and turn to the Darkness, leading to the birth of the Hive. Even still, Savathûn eventually decided to abandon the Darkness and the Worm Gods by trying to get rid of her worm. Queen Mara Sov freed her from the worm but then also attacked her. Savathûn was fatally injured but managed to flee the scene and ended up dying in the Last City after speaking with the Traveler. She was then resurrected by a Ghost, Immaru, becoming a Lightbearer. Using a wellspring within her Throne World, Savathûn was also able to grant her Hive lieutenants the power of Light with their own Ghosts, making them her Lucent Brood. Eris Morn also briefly became a Hive god, the Hive God of Vengeance, to banish Xivu Arath from her own Throne World. • The Vex are semi-organic androids who are attempting to seize control of Venus, Mars, and the Jovian moon Io by turning them into their machines, which they have already done to Mercury and later the centaur planet Nessus. Vex are actually millions of microscopic artificial organisms that are linked via a giant mind network and survive in an organic fluid called radiolaria; each individual Vex android hosts a number of these organisms in its core. Because of their massive processing power, the Vex are constantly running simulations of the past, present, and future to try to outmaneuver their enemies in their goal to convert the entire universe to Vex, and have mastered some elements of
time travel. Alongside the Hive, a particular collective of the Vex from the Black Garden known as the Sol Divisive worship the Darkness and are allied with the Witness. A new Vex collective called the Nessian Schism appeared during the events of
Episode: Echoes, which are controlled by Golden Age scientist Maya Sundaresh (voiced by
Shohreh Agdashloo), who created the collective via the Echo of Command that was created after the Witness's defeat. • The Cabal are a military-industrial empire of gigantic amphibians who continue to expand their galactic empire from their homeworld of Torobatl, comparable to the
Roman Empire. Within
Destiny, they have secured bases on Mars as scouting posts for a potential invasion of Earth. The Cabal become more central within the "Red War" plot of
Destiny 2, as their leader, Dominus Ghaul (voiced by
Neil Kaplan), sought to capture the Traveler and draw out the Light for himself and destroy the System, but ultimately was defeated and destroyed. Later, the System is visited by the former exiled Emperor Calus (voiced by
Darin De Paul) aboard the
Leviathan, who tries to seek a tenacious alliance with the Vanguard after seeing portents of upcoming threats by the Darkness. The Cabal's homeworld of Torobatl was eventually invaded by Xivu Arath and her Hive forces, with some of the Cabal falling under her control, forcing them to flee Torobatl and their current leader and Calus' daughter, Empress Caiatl (voiced by
Courtenay Taylor), was forced to seek alliances to help with fighting their homeworld battles. While Caiatl and her loyal Cabal soldiers became allies of the Vanguard, other Cabal remained loyal to Calus and joined his Shadow Legion faction in
Lightfall, being lent powers of the Darkness by the Witness. A new Cabal faction called the Barant Imperium (inspired by the
Galactic Empire from
Star Wars) had suddenly appeared after the events of
The Edge of Fate and is led by Dredgen Bael (voiced by
Aleks Le) and Premier Lume (voice provider unknown), all influenced by VI of the Nine. • The Taken, a race introduced in
The Taken King, are ghostly-looking corrupted versions of regular enemies, who infest areas on every planet. Through his communion with the Witness, Oryx was granted the ability to create his Taken army by drawing foes into the Ascendant Realm, which granted them new paracausal powers but drained them of their individuality and compelled to serve the one that created them. Other major enemies, especially the Witness, have since been able to create their own armies of Taken forces. A new faction of Taken, called Dire Taken, appeared in Oryx's Dreadnaught during the events of
Episode: Heresy, which were the result of them manifesting a new master from within the Ascendant Realm. • The Scorn, a race introduced in
Forsaken, are undead Fallen, reanimated through a substance called Dark Ether. The reanimation process leaves them loyal to the Scorn Barons, led by Fikrul, the Fanatic (voiced by
Matthew Mercer). The Scorn Barons are from an exiled house of the Fallen who have occupied the Tangled Shore (located within the Solar System's asteroid belt) and the Dreaming City and seek revenge against the Fallen, the Awoken, and certain Guardians. As revealed in
The Witch Queen expansion, the Scorn are now being controlled by the Witness through one of its Disciples, Rhulk (voiced by Andrew Morgado), and are engaging in a turf war against the Lucent Hive for supremacy in Savathûn's Throne World. Following Rhulk's defeat by the Guardians, the Scorn came under the control of the Witness itself, though it is revealed that Fikrul had in fact survived and has an army of Scorn loyal to him. Fikrul had resurfaced during
Episode: Revenant, wielding the Echo of Riis that was created after the Witness's defeat, which he used to create a new breed of Scorn called Revenant Scorn from living Fallen. • Nightmares, introduced in
Shadowkeep, are formless entities conjured by the Darkness based on the memories of those who encounter them. Nightmares take the form of any being, depending on the type of trauma the memory has caused, and when taking a form, they are surrounded by a miasma of crimson reddish-black Darkness with radiating ghostly tendrils. The Nightmares were first discovered and accidentally released by Eris Morn in investigating the dormant Lunar Pyramid, which was originally the Pyramid ship of the Disciple Nezarec, Final God of Pain (voiced by
Ben Pronsky). The Nightmares originally only appeared around the Scarlet Keep on Earth's Moon, as the Lunar Pyramid is located below the Keep, but the Nightmares began appearing within Lost Sectors on other destinations, and also Calus's
Leviathan ship when he later created a link with the Lunar Pyramid. It is also later discovered that the Nightmares were created by Nezarec as a defense mechanism for his Pyramid ship. • The Dread, a race that was introduced in
The Final Shape, are the Witness's personal soldiers of Darkness that appear within the Pale Heart of the Traveler. They are beings from other species that were reshaped by the Witness using both Light and Darkness. These include Grims, flying bat-like units reshaped from the shattered minds of dissenting Precursors which shoot from midair and attack with a sonic scream; Husks, fast-moving enemies reshaped from Fallen that wield twin blades that unleash a Geist upon defeat; Attendants and Weavers, reshaped Psions that use Stasis and Strand powers; Subjugators, which are tall, bipedal, glaive-wielding beings similar to Rhulk that are split between Stasis-wielding Omens and Strand-wielding Harbingers; as well as Tormentors, which were first introduced in
Lightfall and are massive bipedal beings similar to Nezarec. Every race utilizes different tactics and weapons in combat. The Fallen possess cloaking and short-range teleportation technologies to increase their mobility. The Hive use superior numbers to overwhelm their opponents in close quarters while more elite units attack from a distance. The Vex utilize hard-light shields and teleport units of infantry into the battlefield en-masse. The Cabal rely on heavy armor, ballistic shields, and jump packs to combat players. The Taken, in addition to all the other races specialties, use high mobility and plenty of long-range attacks to out-maneuver the player. The Scorn, in addition to similarities to the Fallen, do not take cover and have the most aggressive
artificial intelligence, with the ability from Dark Ether to move incorporeally a short distance to evade damage. Nightmares mimic the capabilities of whoever or whatever they are impersonating. Tormentors are slow moving but wield massive scythes and utilize paracausal suppression abilities. Attendants, Weavers, Omens, and Harbingers all wield Stasis and Strand powers against their opponents. Grims shoot their opponents from midair and can unleash a suppressing sonic scream. Husks unleash a Geist enemy that homes in on their opponents upon death. All of these races are hostile towards each other (except between Dread, Taken, House Salvation Fallen, Shadow Legion Cabal, Sol Divisive Vex, Hive, and Scorn, between Nightmares, and between Lucent Hive), as they can often be observed attacking one another in-game for territorial dominance. In the original game, the majority of the lore, which details backstory on characters, weapons, the alien races, planets, etc., was found in Grimoire cards collected throughout the game but could only be accessed through Bungie's website and the
Destiny companion app. In
Destiny 2, lore can be read through dedicated lore books in an in-game menu, as well as through lore tabs on various gear found throughout the game. There are also various scannable items found on the different planets that contain lore-related information. ==Gameplay==