Was Destiny Downgraded without anyone noticing?

First off:
I can't wait to get Destiny, everything about it has me eager to get my hands on the full release. Part of that is what brought me to this realization. I've been soaking up every tidbit of information on it ever since the Beta ended because I had a lot of fun. I loved the exploration, I love to grind for levels, I love to grind for gear and I'm very interested in the story, the characters and seeing more enemy types.

All of this brought me to a full circle where I decided to check how it all started and read up on the first few stories that ever came up about Destiny. I wanted to know how long ago we first heard about it, when we first saw official concept arts and when we first saw Bungies vision in action. This site makes it all pretty easy, I just hit a Destiny tag, jumped to the last page of stories and came forward from there.
http://n4g.com/channel/dest...

There were a couple videos before their biggest reveal but they were still more in the concept art phases so I'm not going off those. The big reveal was at Sonys E3 press conference where we finally got to see the game in an in-depth way. Shooting mechanics, weapon types, special attacks, controls, player invites/joining, teams, the landscape, vehicles, everything.

http://www.youtube.com/watc...

The downgrade:

When people read "downgrade" the first thing that comes to their mind is visuals. Destiny looks just as good if not better than it did at the E3 reveal, so no, that's not what I'm talking about. If you watch the video above you might notice a few things in it that you didn't see in the Beta. The ghost acting as a flashlight and showing off the lighting effects is one thing but the biggest downgrade I noticed was in the actual enemy animations.

Let's start here
http://www.youtube.com/watc...
In the E3 reveal video we see running animations that look a lot more realistic than what was shown in the Beta. We see the animation of enemies getting shot and falling that look much more realistic than in the Beta. We see Vandals climbing down from higher areas and hanging off of beams before landing. They jumped around to attack you in the Beta but nothing as fancy as the things we see in the 2013 E3 video. At 6:22 we see a big boss type climb from a hole to engage them in battle. I really hope cool stuff like that is in the full game because it makes him look a lot more epic. In contrast, during the Beta all the strong and boss looking types were either already just standing around till we entered, came running in through a doorway or teleported in from a ship. Last thing: at 9:22 we see a tower get knocked down by a ship as a public event initiates. Is that going to be in the final game?

I'm getting Destiny on Day 1 and probably won't even sleep that night to give it some marathon gaming love. I just felt like mentioning this because I noticed it, wondered if anyone else noticed and figured this is what blog post were designed for.

Discuss :)

[Tetsujin]

I was told there was some differences between the Alpha and Beta, however I wasn't in the Alpha so I can't speak on that behalf. I have also noticed some enemy animations were "restrictive" however still performed well for a game like this. I have noticed the PS3 and 4 enemy logic was different however; since I was able to cross use my character between the two systems I have noticed enemies were behaving different when in groups as opposed on the PS4 which they almost played like real players and not just "AI." I remember the drop ship on the PS4 (forgot the zone exactly) with the boss, and they always ran as a group surrounding the boss itself; on the PS3 they all ran in different directions not protecting the boss at all. I've tried different methods (grenades, shooting before they drop, etc) and the same logic was on the PS3, however the PS4 they did respond differently and was more situational. I already plan on playing it on the PS4 anyways however that is something I did notice; and yes it "can" make a difference when playing Raids because if enemy logic is different between the two consoles (could be the same between 360 and One however I can't confirm it) that can make planning more of a challenge.

Since it was confirmed Beta characters/accomplishments DO NOT carry over (on the Bungie forums) I hope they at least enhance character development and drop rates are increased.

[Brandon_2535]

The drop rates in the Alpha and the Beta were high enough, honestly. It was so easy to get loot, you just had to know where to look and farm.

Between mission rewards, loot chests, and shops, it was really easy to get loot. Not to mention, all of the possible drops from enemies in general as well. Making good use of the Cryptarch was important.

[Tetsujin]

I meant to put an easier way to see loot/drops because there were moments which you didn't see anything until it was too late. I know some brought up drops green and above would show up in your dbox however I never noticed anything sent to me and I know for sure some green drops were missed.

[Brandon_2535]

I definitely agree with the visibility of loot drops. I wouldn't say it's terrible, but it could certainly be a lot better.

There's actually a faint line that comes out of the loot, much like in Borderlands, but it's almost impossible to see unless you're standing a certain distance away from it.

I didn't test the "missing loot" thing much, but it did work for me one time. It was completely random, so I don't know how I activated it. Nobody seems to know exactly how it works, but it's a nice feature regardless.

[Brandon_2535]

There was no downgrade with the Ghost. They simply changed that portion in the Beta. Instead of waiting for your Ghost to fly away, it now acts as a flashlight right away. Much better way of doing that scene, in my opinion. The lighting effects themselves are exactly the same, no downgrade there either. The only reason it may appear to be more noticeable in the E3 footage is that the brightness level is turned way down. You could have achieved the same look by turning down the brightness in the Alpha or the Beta.

The enemies had those same animations in the Alpha and the Beta, they were just limited a bit. There were less enemies in that area and the spawns themselves were also placed in different spots. That's why it appears to be different. As far as death animations, they don't look any better in the E3 footage to me, maybe even worse. So, the Alpha and the Beta animations were also definitely not downgraded.

There were several bosses that climbed through holes in the wall in both the Alpha and the Beta. One occurred during a story mission in the Beta. The other times, it happened when you accepted a side mission during the Explore mode.

That public event you mentioned was already in the Alpha and the Beta as well. It's just the Devil Walker event. If you were in the right spot, you could see the towers getting knocked down as well.

It seems more like you just missed these things or weren't paying close enough attention. No offense or anything, just saying.

[FamilyGuy]

No offense taken.
The game just looks different to me, the animations seem different. I know the crawling through holes thing is in there after I watched a few more videos but Vandals crawling from the pipes above, doing a flip before landing? I really don't recall any moment like that. Shooting enemies in the beta (other than the head) just looked like a few backwards stumbles before dying. In the E3 video it looks like you see an impact from a shot to the shoulder that moves his should, a chest shot the pushes him back. It just looks like better detection of where the hits are actually landing.

It could all be in my head though, not gonna lie, but what I'm seeing in that E3 video looks more dynamic and realistic to me.

[HammadTheBeast]

There's definitely been a downgrade, but I'm gonna hope that the final game is different. Beta wasn't too bad though, but I only played it a bit.

[BiggCMan]

@FamilyGuy, topic creator.

Ummm....no offense really, but did you play the beta extensively??

Every single thing you mentioned is in this game still. LITERALLY everything you mentioned.

The Ghost still acts as a flashlight in dark areas, only it activates on its own and not when you want. That should change, but it's still there either way.

The VERY first boss of the beta, in the VERY first story mission, which is the same one in the E3 reveal demo, STILL comes through a whole. It happens right in front of your eyes, so you were absolutely not paying attention.

And most hilariously of all, in the final story mission of the beta, we STILL see the tower fall down in the far distance. You were so obviously not paying any attention, that I cannot NOT be rude here. It's just so blatantly obvious, because every single topic you brought up is still there in the beta.

You remind me of people from IGN who don't do their research before talking about a game. This blog post is terribly done and ill thought out because you were not paying any attention.

[DefenderOfDoom2]

Well , according to a speech by JOHN CARMARCK , he said when they develop a video game on 30 thousand to 100 thousand dollar computers , they have think that, they need the game to run on 800 dollar to 2 thousand dollar computers,and 400 dollar consoles, for the consumers. So, that means that just about every big budget video game made, is downgraded for consumer affordability! And the number one priority for JOHN CARMARK is making the the game fun to play for consumers! I played the DESTINY BETA and had a lot of fun ! So no complaints here!