In a post-Activision world, Destiny 2 now has $20 character boosts

They work a little differently compared to the old ones

When Destiny 2 was an Activision joint, players blamed the Big A for a lot of the microtransactions present in the game. Now that Bungie has gone rogue and needs to recoup some money without a huge backer, they also need to rely heavily on microtransactions to keep production going. It’s a catch-22 isn’t it? Destiny was always destined for real-money transactions on top of the premium model.

The latest non-cosmetic transaction to pop up without warning is a Power Level 900 boost for 2,000 silver, or, $20 in real money (after you have one 900 character on your account). Now on paper this isn’t actually a huge deal. Players are automatically boosted to power level 750, and by completing Shadowkeep, the newest expansion, they should be hovering around 850.

After a few hours of play, they’ll hit 900, the soft cap, in a bid to approach and surpass 950, the new grind. You also benefit from the power level of your first/main character, which enhances your alts and makes the run for 900 even easier. At best this will save you an hour or two.

Destiny has hosted level boosts in the past for alternate characters, to allow them to catch up. In fact, you got one for free per account in the past. But this is sort of new, and for many players who have all three classes, an enticing prospect to just spend $40 and get your other two characters raid-ready.

I don’t really know what to make of it. I mean, I don’t like it, that’s for sure (the same goes for the new front-and-center, more intrusive store on the main menu, plus a premium season pass model on top of that), but no one really seems to have a problem with it. This is 2019 after all, and people are much more forgiving of non-cosmetic microtransactions.

Character Boost [Bungie.net]