Bungie shows off a large collection of Destiny concept art from very early explorations of the game’s characters, races, classes, enemies, and worlds.
Destiny is in what its fans and developer call Year 3, with many anticipating a concept update in the spring followed by what Activision promises to be a full sequel later this year. But with it being over two years since the launch of Destiny in September 2014, fans are starting to commemorate their time spent with the game and with each other. Recently, IGN’s Fireteam Chat celebrated their 100th episode, and during that podcast, Bungie shared a large amount of concept art, much of it being pieces no one outside of Bungie has ever seen.
Game Director Christopher Barrett and Community Manager DeeJ sat down to spin through the art and explain some of the thoughts and creative process that went into designing Destiny. They explained that many of the pieces come from the musings of artists before many things were decided on from the worlds to the classes to what weapons were actually in the game.
The first few pieces are early concepts for the Vanguards, Cayde-6 and Commander Zavala. While Zavala looks very similar to how he is in the game, the early concept of Cayde cast him as a human instead of as an Exo.
The three iconic classes of Destiny—Titans, Warlocks, and Hunters—are well known to fans, but at a time in Destiny’s development, Bungie was exploring what those classes would look and feel like. From a heavy space marine with a minigun to a space wizard with a pistol, and a roguish soldier with an energy blade, all those details had to be worked out when creating Destiny’s classes.
Next, Bungie showed off concepts of the world of Destiny, planets and locations that players are no doubt familiar with. These were concepts of the Tower, including one of the Speaker’s machine, which one concept artist actually took further and built in 3D in Destiny’s engine because he wanted to get it in the game.
“There is the lore with the Hive that is wrapped up with moths and worms and stuff like that, sort of insect side of them, so we were exploring looking at moth wings […] and bringing that into the design of Oryx’s cloak.”
Another, is a piece that many will think came from concepts for the Rise of Iron expansion, but the developers say this is an rendering from much earlier than Rise of Iron. But clearly its ideas made its way into the game’s latest expansion.
Clearly, Bungie spent a lot of time dreaming up their newest franchise. And there is undoubtedly even more work currently going on as the developer works on the sequel to its rich sci-fi shooter.
“The artists made fun of me when I told them I wanted it to feel more underwater. But literally I wanted the Hive to feel like a sunken ship that was slowly floating through space. So you had something that had been buried at sea for thousands of years that had barnacles growing on it, that had treasure, that had undead inside it. So, yeah, they were basically underwater tombs.”
Destiny: Rise of Iron is out now on PS4 and Xbox One.
