The World of 'Destiny': Battlegrounds Across The Solar System

Video Games

Mar 15

Destiny as a franchise has been running for ten years, and while there has been some rocky news at Bungie and the wider gaming industry, it is a world with a rich lore full of amazing characters, intriguing concepts and some beautiful locations.

These locations, scattered across the Sol system, are diverse and very different from how they appear in the real world due to terraforming and transformation initiated by the forces of Light and Dark. Some are also completely unique locations, formed by paracausal powers. Today, on CultureSlate, we break down these battlegrounds across our solar system, noting their significance and history within the franchise.

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Earth - Cosmodrome & The EDZ

The original Destiny began with players exploring the Cosmodrome, an ancient launch site for colony ships in the Golden Age, and during the fall of humanity, a site of attempted evacuation. But these efforts largely failed, and the region was left to rust in the aftermath of the Collapse that crippled the world. This abandonment allowed the Fallen and later the Hive to embed themselves in the area.

Guardians dealt critical blows to both factions in the first game, but the region later returned in Destiny 2, and now serves as part of the “New Light” experience for new players. The Fallen and Hive still call the region home, and the remnants of countless pieces of ancient space-faring tech can be found dotted across the region. A Hunter named Shaw Han is the region’s vendor, and is specifically focused on helping new Guardians, called New Lights (hence the name of the introductory experience).

The other notable space on Earth players have had access to is the EDZ, introduced in Destiny 2. A slice of ruined townscape, Cabal military base, and paracausal-power-warped ruins, the EDZ is where an immense Shard of the Traveler crashed to Earth during the Collapse. This Shard of Light has since attracted a number of enemies, while others lurk and attack the scattered settlements of Humanity known to exist in the region.

The Red Legion of the Cabal is stationed here, clinging on after the Red War and other losses, the Fallen of the House of Dusk are also found here, and the Taken seek to feed off the power of the Shard of the Traveler. The region’s vendor is Devrim Kay, a mundane human member of the Last City militia.

The Moon

Another location seen in the first Destiny, the Moon was populated with the Fallen but also the Hive. Their reawakening was a notable plot detail in the first game that became part of its first DLC and major expansion content. It returned in Destiny 2 when the Hive became considerably more active, raising the Red Keep, and challenging the Guardians to face their Nightmares, apparitions of past foes fought and beaten over the years, which spread across the system.

The Hive had managed to stir a dormant Pyramid Ship of the Black Fleet, though they did not control it, and were also being manipulated by the Hive God Savathûn. The Moon is covered with some of Earth’s first off-world settlements, and facilities where scientists encountered artifacts of Darkness that gradually drove them completely insane. Eris Morn, a Hunter with considerable arcane knowledge on the Hive who had a deep vendetta against them for killing her fireteam and her Ghost, serves as the destination vendor.

Europa

This icy moon of Jupiter was once the heart of BrayTech, one of the greatest companies of the Golden Age of humanity. However, its founder Clovis Bray was utterly immoral and many horrific experiments were conducted in all manner of fields on the planet’s surface. This was where the Exos were born, humanoid machines with the imprinted minds of humans, all an attempt by Clovis Bray to live forever. However, an invasion by the Vex and the Collapse led to Europa being abandoned. A Pyramid Ship crashed into the world, and remained dormant, until Fallen from the soon-to-emerge House Salvation found it and were given the gift of Stasis.

They tried to rebuild their old homeworld, Riis, on the surface, but the Guardians came to wield Stasis as well, and defeated this force of Fallen. Vex also remain on Europa, while the remnants of the House Salvation persist until today. The region’s vendor is Variks, a member of House Judgement and last of his kind with a complex past in Destiny’s lore who nonetheless seeks to atone and aid the Guardians.

Nessus

In our real world, Nessus is a planetoid orbiting around our solar system named after a centaur of Greek myth. In the universe of Destiny, the planetoid was intercepted and seeded by the Vex, whose structures now coat the surface. An Earth colony ship crashed onto Nessus centuries ago, with all of the living crew unfortunately passing away, leaving the ship’s sentient AI alone with the Vex.

Later, the Fallen and Cabal also arrived, and most recently, Nessus was impacted by the rise of a powerful entity that sought to take control of all Vex in the Sol system. They were defeated, and Nessus has broadly returned to normal, though it remains a striking destination with rich red foliage and monolith constructs and wreckage across the surface. The crashed colony ship’s AI, Failsafe, is the destination vendor.

Neomuna

A second city of humanity was inconceivable just a handful of years ago, but the major expansion Lightfall gave us just that. Hidden on the surface of Neptune, Neomuna is a highly advanced society which retreated into a digital paradise called the CloudArk to escape the invasion of the Black Legion Cabal led by former Emperor Calus, who had become a Disciple of the Witness. It is a society defended by Cloudstriders, nanite-enhanced humans who, following the procedure to transform them into these guardians of Neomuna, have an incredibly short lifespan of at most, a decade.

They are needed because of the considerable Vex presence on Neomuna, but the two Cloudstriders of Neomuna were not enough to defeat a full-on invasion, so the besieged city accepted the Last City’s aid and the Guardians. Neomuna is also home to the Veil, an artifact of immense power in the Darkness, and is where players first encountered and came to wield the powers of Strand. The location’s vendor is the Cloudstrider Nimbus.

The Dreaming City

The Awoken are an offshoot of humanity who originated from the clash of Light and Dark at the edge of the solar system. Once the population of an independent colony ship sucked into a pocket of reality, where they built an entire society and complex history over centuries and millennia, some Awoken eventually left their domain to find mere decades to centuries had passed in the wider world. The Dreaming City was a marvelous city later built with the help of Wish Magic by the Awoken Queen, Mara Sov, cooperating with a Wish Dragon named Riven. However, it was corrupted when Oryx, the Taken King invaded the Sol system, Taking Riven, with her later death by Guardians locking the City into a dreadful three week cycle.

The settlement gradually grows more and more infested with Taken, Hive and Scorn, more and more would be lost, and then it all resets and everyone in the time loop snaps back to where they had been at the start. Guardians, Queen Mara and the playerbase, have sought ways to break the loop but it is seemingly impossible. The destination vendor is Hand of the Queen Petra Venj, who uniquely shifts location each week, the only vendor to do so.

Eternity

This mysterious pocket realm is the home of the enigmatic Nine, strange unseen beings who seek to test Guardians, and explore different facets of life by making deals and experimenting. Their realm is bizarre, a mix of strange structures, spiralling fabrics and lines, and huge blocks of pale stone. The activity Dares of Eternity, where a celestial horse runs a gameshow (yes really), is the most prominent example of Eternity in the game at present, but Eternity is about to make a big appearance in the form of Rite of the Nine, an upcoming activity during this year’s last Episode of content, Heresy.

Savathûn's Throne World

The realm of the Witch Queen is a beautiful but tricky place. Throne Worlds are paracausal creations of major Hive figures that serve as a sort of phylactery upon their death in the material world. Able to regain their strength, they can then be called back into the real world when a great act befitting their ideals is dedicated to them in the mortal world. Savathûn's Throne World is linked to her ship hovering over Mars, and is home to the Lucent Brood, Hive who have taken on the Light but who are still just as vicious and ruthless as before.

Her realm is part magnificent castle, a structure bathed in light as befits her new Light allegiance, and part wretched swamp, watched over by a sunken Pyramid Ship containing Rhulk, a Discipline of the Witness, who has directed an invasion of Scorn against the Lucent Brood. Savathûn also knows of everything happening in her throne world, with supreme power in this pocket realm. But we do have some allies who stand against her complete control. One of these is Fynch, a Ghost to a Hive Guardian who has forsaken his charge, and instead helps the Vanguard in operations inside the Throne World, serving as the destination vendor.

The Pale Heart

The most recent battleground to appear in Destiny 2, the Pale Heart is the heart of the Traveler itself. Breached by the Witness and its forces over a year before our Guardian and others was able to finally follow after, the ancient gestalt being twisted and corrupted the fount of Light to serve its own purposes. It spawned the Dread, crafted using the remains and memories of past ancient civilizations it had destroyed, and corrupting others like those Psions who had fallen into the service of Emperor Callus. The Pale Heart is full of surreal imagery reflecting the memories of those who have entered it, but it did not just suffer an invasion by the forces of the Witness. The Lucent Brood somehow also infiltrated the Pale Heart, meaning all major enemy factions, including the newest, the Dread, can be seen across the diverse terrains present in the Pale Heart. The destination’s vendor is each Guardian’s longtime companion, their Ghost.

Honorable Mentions

Several past destinations in Destiny 2 were removed from the game a number of years ago due to various reasons. While they are gone in part, they are not entirely forgotten. Several pieces of seasonal content have returned players to sections, or reformatted versions, of these destinations. The following is a brief list of locations we’ve lost in Destiny 2.

Mercury: Terraformed by the Traveler into a garden world, and then terraformed again by the Vex back into a barren landscape, Mercury was lost to the Last City when the Black Fleet of the Witness arrived. It has remained entirely inaccessible.
Mars: Originally a destination in the first Destiny, Destiny 2 introduced a new region of Mars, and served as the base of operations for the advanced AI called Rasputin. Much like Mercury, Mars was lost to Darkness when the Black Fleet arrived. It has since partially returned thanks to content from the Season of the Seraph, and in The Witch Queen campaign.
Titan: Like others on this list, this Hive and Fallen-heavy world was lost to the Black Fleet. It returned in Season of the Deep, alongside its old vendor, Deputy Director Sloane. A Titan (a class of Guardian) who had been only half-Taken by the Hive god of war Xivu Arath, Sloane helped Guardians uncover the background of the Witness.
Io: This moon of Jupiter was once the site of Vex, Taken and Cabal activity, and was also the last place terraformed by the Traveler before the Collapse centuries ago. When the Black Fleet arrived, it vanished like the rest, but recently a small section of Io was made accessible during a new activity in Episode: Heresy.
The Tangled Shore: A section of the Sol system’s asteroid belt, it was full of various enemy factions, but was also the birthplace of the Scorn. It has remained lost since the Black Fleet’s arrival, with its key residents having scattered across the system.
The Leviathan: An immense entity of unclear origin capable of eating worlds, the Leviathan was the spacefaring mode of transport for Emperor Calus in his exile out of the Cabal Empire. It arrived in the Sol system and was the venue for Calus’ temptation of Guardians to his cause, before it vanished as Darkness rose to prominence. It later returned to loom over the Moon in Season of the Haunted, unleashing new Nightmares for the Guardians to face.