As part of Actvision’s best buds deal with Sony , the PlayStation edition of Destiny is getting everything from exclusives weapons to vehicles to armor to missions, and early beta access to boot. We've known for a while that the PlayStation Destiny beta begins July 17th, but now we have word about the Xbox beta as well.
That will be starting in “late July” according to Video gamer, though whether that means a week later, July 24th, or possibly even two weeks later, July 31st, is unclear. The game launches September 9th across all platforms, so I can’t imagine it would be any later.
We still don’t know much else about the beta other than these launch dates (or in Xbox’s case, a launch window). The most pressing questions are what it will contain, given the fun, but limited scope of the alpha, how long it will last (a week, two?) and if progress made will carry over to the final release of the game.
For as much as I would love progress from the beta to be saved for the full release of the game, I’m not sure that’s a good idea, or sets a proper precedent. Given how the beta works, that it’s being given out to A) people who pre order the game and B) is being released differently on rival consoles, I think the best possible option is to simply launch the game with everyone having a clean slate. Otherwise at launch, the game will undoubtedly be full of max beta level players, which is a bit uncomfortable for an MMO-type game. Not to say this has never happened before, but I think it’s enough of an advantage for the beta players to have extra experience being familiar with the game, and they don’t need 10 or 15 bonus levels and top notch gear to start with as well. That said, I will admittedly be bummed when I sink 30+ hours into the beta (as I’m one of those people) and find all my progress gone, so I suppose it’s a mixed bag.
