Ubisoft confirms their 4th main installment to the Assassin's Creed series along with the publishment of the box cover art of the new game, Black Flag.

"We confirm that Ubisoft will announce all the details of Assassin's Creed IV Black Flag on Monday March 4th at 5pm GMT," read a statement sent to Digital Spy.

It will be released on Xbox 360, PS3, PC and Wii U. The PS3 version will also have 60 minutes of exclusive content.

Yesterday multiple sources revealed images and first details of the project, which suggest a pirate theme that expands upon the ship-sailing mechanics from Assassin's Creed 3.

It includes two pre-order posters that confirmed a Caribbean location, an early screenshot and news that the game would be revealed in full on March 4.

It was also suggested that the main character was Edward Kenway, a privateer, assassin and pirate, and father of Haytham Kenway from Assassin's Creed 3.

Assassin's Creed 4: Black Flag will reportedly launch on both current and next generation systems this year, including the PlayStation 4.

Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot recently confirmed that the company is working on a new Assassin's Creed game, saying that the title will feature a fresh protagonist in a new time period.

Guillemot recently told Digital Spy that the publisher would release multiple cross-generation games this year, including Watch Dogs.

The new Assassin's Creed game is supposed to be released during Ubisoft's fiscal year 2014, which ends in April 2014.

This article is from digitalspy.com.

Direct link: http://www.digitalspy.com/gaming/news/a462224/assassins-creed-4-black-flag-confirmed-by-ubisoft-reveal-next-week.html

It'll also coincide with 'Rockstar Friday', which promises multiplayer events in Grand Theft Auto IV: Episodes from Liberty City, Max Payne 3, Midnight Club LA and Red Dead Redemption from 12-5pm GMT on March 8th. Other games holding multiplayer events next weekend include Halo 4, Borderlands 2, Tomb Raider, Far Cry 3, Assassin's Creed III, FIFA Ultimate Team and Forza Horizon.

You'll be able to take advantage of next week's free Xbox Live Gold unlock weekend from 12:00 GMT on Friday, March 8th until 23:59 GMT on Sunday, March 10th

Microsoft has been having some problems with Xbox Live, and protecting Xbox Live.

Several Microsoft online services are suffering from problems this evening, with both Xbox Live and the Windows Azure cloud service in the midst of extended outages. According to Microsoft's status page, Xbox Live users may have issues accessing data and saved games in the cloud. SmartGlass is also affected, along with the Xbox Live Karaoke and ESPN apps. The problem has been ongoing for several hours and appears to be getting worse, with the company recently adding Xbox Live functionality for Halo 4 to the list of affected services. In an update posted at 9:03PM ET, Microsoft states that "We are still working as fast as we can to fix the issue."

The problem may be related to another service interruption, this one affecting the company's Windows Azure cloud platform. At the time of this writing, 52 different services are currently listed as either offline or suffering from degraded performance. Microsoft explains that Azure's storage service is currently down worldwide "due to an expired certificate." The company goes on to say that it is "validating the recovery options before implementing them," and will keep users appraised with further updates. It's not specifically stated that the Azure outage is responsible for the Xbox Live problems, but given that both revolve around storage issues the timing is certainly suspect.

THIS ISN'T THE FIRST TIME

This isn't the first time Windows Azure has suffered from an outage due to certificate problems. Key parts of the service went down for 12 hours last February as well. In that case, Microsoft cited "a time calculation that was incorrect for the leap year"; the bug caused problems with the proper processing of digital certificates. It's not clear what led to the expired certificate behind today's outage

Update: Xbox Music and Video services are now affected as well. According to a 10:31PM ET update, users may be unable to browse, stream, or buy audio and video content.

Update 2: As of 2:17AM ET, all Xbox Live services save Music and Video are listed as in normal working order. Windows Azure slowly appears to be coming back online, but according to Microsoft's status page 43 services are still affected by the outage.

Update 3: Microsoft's latest update, at 4:00AM ET, states that it has recovered "99 percent availability across all sub-regions" for Azure, while adding that "customers may experience intermittent failures during this period." All Xbox Live services — including Music and Video — are back up and running as well.

The Azure failure also affected Microsoft's Xbox game, Halo 4, Microsoft confirmed.

The highest-profile incident may have had the least effect: "a small number" of Microsoft PCs were penetrated by an unknown intruder. No user data was compromised, Microsoft said in a blog post.

"Consistent with our security response practices, we chose not to make a statement during the initial information gathering process," Matt Thomlinson, general manager of Microsoft's Trustworthy Computing Security unit, wrote. "During our investigation, we found a small number of computers, including some in our Mac business unit, that were infected by malicious software using techniques similar to those documented by other organizations. We have no evidence of customer data being affected and our investigation is ongoing."

The attacks were consistent with other efforts to penetrate computers within Apple and Facebook, Microsoft said. Facebook discovered its attack last week, which followed attacks on the Wall Street Journal and The New York Times via an unpatched exploit within Java, exploited, experts believe, by the Chinese military.

Separately, ZenDesk reported Friday that it too, was hacked, exposing emails that clients Tumblr, Twitter and Pinterest used to communicate it with it for service-related requests.

At press time Friday night, Microsoft still had not implemented a fix for the Azure issue, caused by a failure to obtain a new SSL certificate. That brought its Azure storage services down across all of its worldwide regions, as well as services that were dependent upon them.

At 9:30 PM UTC (4:30 PM ET), Microsoft discovered that "HTTPS operations (SSL transactions) on Storage accounts worldwide are impacted," the company said. By 9:45 PM UTC, the the management portal, WindowsAzure.com, and the service bus, plus the websites that Azure serves were also down. By 10:15 PM, the company had begun validating steps to repair the problem, but hadn't formally announced a fix. After users began circulating screenshots of what appeared to be an expired SSL certificate, the company acknowledged its error.

"Windows Azure Storage has been affected by an expired certificate," a spokesman said in an emailed statement. We are working to complete the restoration as quickly as possible. We apologize for any inconvenience this has caused our customers. For more information please go to http://www.windowsaz...ce-dashboard/." Microsoft also apologized to customers via Twitter.

Microsoft also reported problems with its Compute services, preventing users from creating new virtual machines. That left users who needed to create those virtual machines to host new apps scratching their heads. "Most of our apps are screwed up now!" pinvoke.in, one commenter, complained. "WHATS NEXT? All compute instances die because someone at the data center switched them off?"

Unfortunately for Microsoft, this sort of thing has happened before. At the end of February 2012, Microsoft failed to account for the leap day at the end of the month, Feb. 29. As a result, the Azure services was down for more than 12 hours before Microsoft could issue a fix. Microsoft hasn't said whether or not the recent outage was a result of an oversight, or a more serious technical error.

Oddly enough, Netflix began reporting problems of its own on Friday night, leading to the intriguing possibility that two cloud services may have been failing at the same time. But although Netflix has gone down before when Amazon's AWS service failed, Amazon's own AWS service dashboard didn't indicate any problems.

One senior Sony official, who did not wish to be named, claimed Sony had "ruffled some feathers" at Microsoft with its next-gen pitch and was another to lend his voice to the possibility of an April riposte.

War is brewing

reports also revealed that a Microsoft PR partner, which has worked with the company on previous launches, has registered the domain name XboxEvents.com. Make of that what you will.

If Microsoft does unveil the next-generation Xbox in April it is highly unlikely that we'd see a repeat of the hardware no show, which somewhat overshadowed Sony's two-hour launch event in New York.

Shortly after the PS4 event Microsoft's director of programming for Xbox Live Larry Helb (aka Major Nelson) mocked his company's great gaming rival for not showcasing the goods.

He tweeted: "Announce a console without actually showing a console? That's one approach"

On Friday PlayStation's US boss Jack Tretton assured that the physical incarnation of the PS4 will be showcased at E3 or sooner.

Could it be timed to coincide with Microsoft's big reveal?

They can be read here.

http://www.archangel...en_heavens.html

http://www.faithfree...s/sina40712.htm

It was believed that heaven was made up of seven layers, here is a quote from the article from the first link explaining this belief.

"The ancients believed that there were Seven Heavens which related to the seven observable planets in our solar system. The Sun and Moon, where referred to as planets by the ancients due to lack astronomical understanding and with these they also included the five planets which were visible by the naked eye, Mercury, Venus, Mars, Saturn and Jupiter. According to this belief each planet occupied its own layer of Heaven or potion of the sky/space, each occupying an orbit further and further away from Earth, as Earth was the considered centre of the Universe. Today we realise that this apparent distance is in fact the planets orbit around the Sun, not distance from the Earth"

These planets also represented each day of the week as stated in the second link provided above.

Monday to Moon

Tuesday to Mars

Wednesday to Mercury

Thursday to Jupiter

Friday to Venus

Saturday to Saturn

Sunday to Sun

Two weeks ago on the week of February 11th Bungie started an ARG (Alternate Reality Game) for Destiny, this game was on a website called alphalupi.bungie.net and on that site there are seven sections that correspond to each day of the week. To access each section on the day it corresponds to we had to rearrange a series of dots, once these dots were arranged correctly they made up geomantic figures. Geomantic figures was an art that was practised in the Europe during the middle ages. There are 16 of these figures and they each represents the state or mind of the world and each figure is associated with the planets in the solar system.

Out of the 16 figures here are the seven that Bungie used for the ARG.

The first symbol to retrieve was this

This symbol is called Populous which is Latin for "The people" and it is affiliated with the moon. Just like in the seven heavens story the moon represents Monday which was the day we had to retrieve this symbol in the ARG

The Second symbol was this

This symbol is called Puer which is Latin for "The Boy" and it is affiliated with the planet Mars, and in the seven heavens story Mars represents Tuesday which was the day this symbol was used in the ARG.

The third symbol was this

This symbol is called Albus which is Latin for "White" and it is affiliated with the planet Mercury which represents Wednesday and it was the day this symbol was used in the ARG.

The fourth symbol was this

This symbol is called Acquisito which is Latin for "Gain" and it is affiliated with the planet Jupiter which represents Thursday the same day this symbol was used for the ARG.

The fifth symbol was this

This symbol is called Puella which is Latin for "The girl" and it is affiliated with the planet Venus which represents Friday the same day this symbol was used for the ARG.

The sixth symbol was this

This symbol is called Tristitia which is Latin for "Sorrow" and it is affiliated with the planet Saturn which represents Saturday the same day this symbol was used for the ARG.

The seventh and final symbol was this

This symbol is called Fortuna Major which is Latin for "The Greater Fortune" and it is affiliated with the Sun which represents Sunday and you guessed it, it's the same day this symbol was used for the ARG.

That was the first connection I believe destiny has to the seven heavens, the symbols representing the planets from the story and were used on the same days that the planets represented, In my opinion I think that may be a solid connection. The next thing that at noticed was this piece of the the story from the second link.

"There are seven earths. The first is called Ramaka, beneath which is the Barren Wind, which can be bridled by no fewer than seventy thousand angels. With this wind God destroyed the people of Ad. The inhabitants of Ramaka are a nation called Muwashshim, upon whom is everlasting torment and divine retribution. The second earth is called Khalada, wherein are the implements of torture for the inhabitants of Hell. There dwells a nation called Tamis, whose food is their own flesh and whose drink is their own blood. The third earth is called Arqa, wherein dwell mulelike eagles with spearlike tails. On each tail are three hundred and sixty poisonous quills. Were even one quill placed on the face of the earth, the entire universe would pass away. The inhabitants thereof are a nation called Qays, who eat dirt and drink mothers' milk. The fourth earth is called Haraba, wherein dwell the snakes of Hell, which are as large as mountains. Each snake has fangs like tall palm trees, and if they were to strike the hugest mountain with their fangs it would be leveled to the ground. The inhabitants of this earth are a nation called Jilla, and they have no eyes, hands or feet but have wings like bats and die only of old age. The fifth earth is called Maltham, wherein stones of sulphur hang around the necks of infidels. When the fire is kindled the fuel is placed on their breasts, and the flames leap up onto their faces, as He hath said: The fire whose fuel is men and stones (2:24), and Fire shall cover their faces (14:50). The inhabitants are a nation called Hajla, who are numerous and who eat each other. The sixth earth is called Sijjin. Here are the registers of the people of Hell, and their works are vile, as He hath said: Verily the register of the actions of the wicked is surely Sijjin (83:7). Herein dwells a nation called Qatat, who are shaped like birds and worship God truly. The seventh earth is called Ajiba and is the habitation of Iblis. There dwells a nation called Khasum, who are BLACK and short, with claws like lions. It is they who will be given dominion over Gog and Magog, who will be destroyed by them…"

Note that each of the heavens/worlds has only one nation, just like in destiny humanity is reduced to only one last city on the planet and the people in that city are probably known as the last and only nation left on the planet. We could later find out that there could be 6 other planets that are suffering the same situation at earth but at the minute this theory isn't certain yet.

Going back to the first linked site I may have found 1 or 2 other connections to destiny, but again this theory isn't certain yet but I thought it was worth mentioning.

"The First Heaven was also considered to be the place where Adam and Eve lived and here you would experience winds and the landscape contains water and clouds.

The Second Heaven was the place that Moses visited and is considered to be the place where the Fallen Angels are imprisoned. Moses visted Raquia and met the angel Nuriel who hade governorship over 50 myriads of angels, who are composed water and fire.

The Third Heaven has a small contradiction, Firstly it is considered the place of the Garden of Eden, juxtaposed to this, it is also thought to be the location of Hell to the North .It is also reputed to be the home of the Tree of Life.

The Fourth Heaven contains the heavenly city of Jerusalem. Also the location of the Garden of Eden

The Fifth Heaven, Samael the Ruling Archangel is served by two millions of angels. These are divided among the four quarters of the world, in each quarter three, who control the twelve months, and over these are twelve chief angels. The northern regions of this Heaven is the area where the Watchers, (Grigori) reside. To the South reside the angels (ministering) who endlessly chant the praises of God."

The Sixth Heaven, Archangel Sachiel, with two millions of angels. The angel Zebul is placed over these during the day, and another angel, Sabath, during the night. They rule over kings, create fear, and give protection from enemies. This Heaven is covered in snow and frequently experiences many storms.

The Seventh Heaven is reputed to be the Holiest of all the Heavens and contains the Throne of Glory which is attended by the Seven Archangels.The 7th Heaven is the home of God and his Throne. He is surrounded by the angels of the orders of Seraphim, Cherubim, and Thrones. Michael, Gabriel, Uriel, and Fanuel (Penuel) are introduced as "the four angels of the face of the Lord."In Enoch, lxxi. 7-13, these four stand near the crystal throne of God, which, encircled by fire, is surrounded by the Seraphim, Cherubim, and Ofanim. Click here to see Angelic Hierachy page

Note the second heaven, which is Mars is the place of the Fallen Angels. Destiny features and Alien faction called "The Fallen" which control an exclusion zone on Mars.

The third world is where the Garden of Eden is and it is thought to be the location of the hell of the north, in destiny there is a place called the black garden, why would it be called the "black" garden. Maybe it is place of evil or a fierce enemy? Also worth noting that there is a place in destiny called "hell mouth"

And the fifth world has angel or being that control the twelve months, to me that sounds like time control or time travel and in destiny there is a faction of robots/ AI's called "Vex" and they have the ability to time travel.

Thats all I have so far, this may seem crazy or over the top to some but I believe these may have connections and if you think about it, it would seem that it does.

Calling in the Big Guns - 40G

In Majestic DLC Matchmaking, call in 3 ordnance drops during the same game

I Thrust at Thee - 20G

In Majestic DLC Matchmaking, perform a melee kill right after using Thrust pack

Didn't see it Comin' - 10G

In Majestic DLC Matchmaking, assassinate an enemy who's in zoom mode

Bird of Prey - 50G

In Majestic DLC Matchmaking, perform 5 AirAssassinations

Bullet Sponge - 30G

In Majestic DLC Matchmaking, get the close call medal twice during one match

I See You - 10G

In Majestic DLC Matchmaking, kill 5 enemies while Promethean Vision is active

Clever Girl - 10G

In Majestic DLC Matchmaking, kill 5 enemies while Active Camo is active

Flash of Light - 30G

In Majestic DLC Matchmaking, get a double kill or higher with one Pulse Grenade

Last Man Grinning - 20G

In Majestic DLC Matchmaking, get 4 kills using the SAW without dying

Pigs Can Fly - 30G

In Majestic DLC Matchmaking, kill 3 enemies while they are using Jet Packs

So thats it 250 Gamerscore comes with the Majestic Map Pack

-credit to Spectral Jester

Batman: Arkham City, BioShock, Halo 4, Borderlands 2, Dead Island, Max Payne 3, Resident Evil 6, and Metal Gear Solid HD are just a few of the titles you'll see on sale next week.

Look at the full list below and at MajorNelson for all 61 titles to be discounted over the coming week.

• Assassins Creed
  
• Assassins Creed 2
  
• Batman Arkham Asylum
  
• Batman Arkham city
  
• Bioshock
  
• Borderlands
  
• Borderlands 2
  
• Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood
  
• Call of Juarez
  
• Call of Duty 2
  
• Call of Duty 3
  
• Call of Duty: Black Ops
  
• Call of Duty: Black Ops 2
  
• Call of Duty: Modern Warfare
  
• Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2
  
• Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3
  
• Call of Duty: World at War
  
• Code Veronica
  
• Dark Messiah of Might and Magic: Elements
  
• Dead Island
  
• Dirt 2
  
• Dishonored
  
• El Shaddai Ascension of the Metatron
  
• Fable III
  
• Fallout 3
  
• Fallout 3 New Vegas
  
• GRID
  
• Halo 3
  
• Halo 4
  
• Halo Reach
  
• Halo Wars
  
• Kane & Lynch Dead Men
  
• Left for Dead 2
  
• Max Payne 3
  
• Metal Gear Solid HD
  
• Metal Gear Solid Peacewalker
  
• Mortal Kombat
  
• Mortal Kombat vs. DCU
  
• Orange Box
  
• Portal 2
  
• Raccoon City
  
• Rainbow Six Vegas
  
• Rayman Raving Rabbids
  
• Resident Evil 4
  
• Resident Evil 5
  
• Resident Evil 6
  
• Red Dead Redemption
  
• Revelations
  
• Sid Meier’s Civilization Revolution
  
• Street Fighter IV
  
• Street Fighter X Tekken
  
• Super Streetfighter IV Arcade Edition
  
• TC’s H.A.W.X.
  
• Tekken 6
  
• Tekken Tag Tournament 2
  
• The Darkness
  
• The King of Fighters XIII
  
• Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter
  
• Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter 2
  
• Tomb Raider Legend
  
• Virtua Fighter 5
  

Sony has just revealed its new game machine -- the PlayStation 4 -- as well as a new controller with a touch pad, a "share" button and light bar.

"Today marks a moment of truth and a bold step forward for PlayStation as a company," said Andrew House, president and Group CEO of Sony Computer Entertainment, as he took the stage at the Hammerstein Ballroom in New York City. "Today we will give you a glimpse into the future of play."

House told a room packed full of journalists that the new machine -- the successor to the PlayStation 3 -- would take the moniker PlayStation 4. Sony then revealed the new touch-sensing DualShock controller as well as a new camera that works in conjunction with the controller.

Mark Cerny, the PS4's lead system architect, went on to reveal the powerful guts of the machine explaining, “The architecture we chose is like PC in many ways.” He said the PlayStation 4 will have an X86 CPU and 8 gigabytes of unified system memory.

David Perry – CEO and founder of Gaikai – also took the stage. Sony bought his game streaming company last year. He said the integration of the streaming game service Gaikai in the PlayStation store will allow gamers to instantly try games before they buy them.

He said with the "share" button on the controller you can broadcast your live gameplay to your PlayStation Network friends. He said your friends will not only be able to watch your gameplay, but can post comments to your screen. You'll also be able to allow friends to take over your game to assist you in a difficult area or interact in other helpful ways.

Todd Kenreck

Sony highlights the powerful insides of its new PlayStation 4 machine.

"What we’re creating is the fastest, most powerful network for gaming the world," Perry said. Our vision is to create the first social gaming network with meaning."

Perry also revealed Remote Play -- which will allow gamers to take their PS4 gaming to Sony's smaller game screen. If you're in the middle of a game on your PS4, you can use Remote Play to instantly transfer your it to Sony's handheld Vita, he said. And their ultimate goal is to make it so all PS4 games will be playable on the Vita.

So what games will be coming to the PlayStation 4? Hermen Hulst, co-founder of Guerrilla Games, took to the stage to introduce "Killzone: Shadowfall" a stunning looking futuristic shooter.

Sony

The futuristic shooter "Killzone: Shadowfall" will be coming to the PlayStation 4.

Stay tuned right here for more information. This event is ongoing and we will be updating this story with all the news as it happens.

Sony has long been rumored to be working on the PlayStation 4. Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo have been duking it out for years, vying to be the prime purveyor of home video games and, in recent years, other home entertainment as well. But Sony's news today is the opening shot in an all new console war.

It's been six years since Sony launched the PlayStation 3 and seven years since Microsoft launched its competing Xbox 360. Late last year, Nintendo revealed the Wii U -- its new home game machine and the successor to the Wii. But so far, the Wii U's lackluster sales and technical specs that make it seem more on par with the current generation Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 suggest this machine is more of an interim step in the three-way gaming battle.

With Microsoft rumored to be working on its own new home game console (which it will reportedly unveil in the coming weeks), it is Sony and Microsoft who are widely expected to offer up powerful new game machines that leverage the Internet in new ways. And so they are expect to go head-to-head in the coming years, vying for the same demographic and to become the all-important entertainment hub in your household.

Pillar #1: A World Players Want to Be In

“This pillar really influenced us early in development,” Jones said, noting that Destiny has already been a six-year odyssey for him, while the rest of Bungie started to get in on the action in 2009 and jumped fully onboard after Halo: Reach shipped in September of 2010. “Is this world cool? Do I want to stay here? Do I want to learn more about it?”

That world is a post-apocalyptic earth. Humanity has been nearly wiped out, but saved by the extraterrestrial protection of The Traveler, a gigantic white globe that now floats claustrophobically close above the planet’s last safe city – a place where humanity’s greatest minds have come together. Over time, humans have regained their technological mojo and again taken to exploring the stars of our own galaxy: Mars, Venus, the Moon, etc. Except now various forms of alien life seek to stamp out humanity once and for all, and it’s up to you as a Guardian to help stop them and keep earth safe.

Pillar #2: A Bunch of Fun Things to Do

Staten proceeded to tell a story about a possible gameplay scenario in Destiny, in which Staten’s Warlock class character and Jones’s Vanguard (Staten explained that every Guardian wields some of the Traveler’s power: “You can call it magic, I guess.”) head off on an adventure together.

You’re at the Tower, a reinforced monolith that serves as your home. Here you can socialize, gear up, or group up and then aim for the stars – literally. Many other players mill about. Some you may know, some you may not. Some are making plans for adventure, but others may simply be watching the sunset – a worthwhile endeavor thanks to the spectacle of Destiny’s new engine, which pairs real-time dynamic lighting with global illumination for some truly spectacular vistas (one of the few things I actually did get to see with my own eyes).

Jones is a higher-level player, and as such has better gear, including an impressive sleek, black spaceship that makes Staten’s smaller, simpler vessel look like, in his own joking words, a “Space Corolla.” Ships will serve various purposes. Only a Scout class was specifically mentioned, though it was implied that space combat will factor into Destiny as well.

Whooshing to Mars, the pair finds “the bones of a lost human civilization.” It’s “an ancient city,” Staten detailed. “Buried in sand. The precious remains of a golden age.” Here to prevent you from reaching any of the literal gold that’s rumored to lie beneath the ruins of the Dust Palace are the Sand Eaters, a group of massive, armored rhino-esque creatures known as the Cabal.

A shootout soon turns ugly for Staten’s Warlock and Jones’s Vanguard. Fortunately, a mysterious female player – rocking a Hunter class – speeds in on the very Ghost-like Pike vehicle and helps turn the tide thanks to her unique weapon, dubbed “The Fate of All Fools.” The battle was won thanks to invisible, behind-the-scenes matchmaking that linked the players – think of it as the next evolutionary phase of Bungie’s groundbreaking hopper technology that served as the online backbone for every Halo game starting with 2.

“Every time you run into another player, it’s amazing,” Staten exclaimed. “It just doesn’t happen in other shooters.”

“And just like that,” Staten explained. “The Dust Palace becomes part of my story. The breadth and depth of Destiny’s world encourages me to find my own adventures."

Pillar #3: Rewards Players Care About

Jones explained how the game will have “a lot of great things to earn, find, and make,” reiterating that “everything you do in Destiny earns rewards.” Besides unique weapons, every piece of your kit will be your own, from your helmet to your cape to your armor pieces to your face. Their goal, he said, is to keep players coming back “day after day, week after week, month after month, [and] year after year.”

The two of them are now three, and the trio plumbs the depths of the Dust Palace, reaches Charlemagne’s Vault, and Staten scores a new pistol. Like the Huntress’s sidearm, it too has a custom name: “Thorn,” a fitting description for a 45-caliber hand cannon. With this outing complete, the Hunter leaves just as quickly and quietly as she arrived. If this sound a bit reminiscent of IGN’s 2012 Game of the Year Award-winning Journey in that regard, you’re not alone.

Pillar #4: A New Experience Every Night

“Imagine you could spend an hour and accomplish something,” Jones mused. Bungie aims to have emergent activity, where “you get distracted from doing the thing you meant to do when you logged on.” Furthermore, Jones expressed hope that “every time you sit down to play Destiny you have a different experience than last time.”

The word “raids” – a term MMORPG fans know well – was used at one point during the presentation, suggesting large group scenarios as well as solo and smaller-party endeavors. Bungie says they’ll have “an activity for every mood.”

As an extension of this pillar’s concept, Destiny will have no main menu. Instead, it just lives and you’re always in it when you boot the game up.

Pillar #5: Shared With Other People

Though all of the Bungie representatives on hand made sure to emphasize that there’s plenty of fun to be had in Destiny by yourself, they made repeated efforts to nudge my thinking in a more socially minded direction.

“Everything that’s fun to do is more fun to do with your friends,” Jones mused. Naturally, of course, there will also be a fully featured competitive multiplayer mode, though neither Jones nor anyone else from Bungie was willing to offer even a hint about any details just yet. Well, other than the fact that you won’t be forced to engage in player-vs.-player combat unless you explicitly desire to.

Pillar #6: Enjoyable By All Skill Levels

He also made a point to emphasize that Destiny seeks to appease everyone from shooter neophytes to hardcore FPS players. “All core activities can be enjoyed by a novice player,” Jones promised. That, he intimated, is not hard. “What’s hard is keeping it interesting for your advanced players.”

Pillar #7: Enjoyable by the Impatient and Distracted

Destiny is alive whether you’re in it or not. But you’re busy can’t live there 24/7. To that end, a Destiny mobile phone app – shown as a prerecorded iOS demo this time – illustrated how the game could send you updates about new quests and what your friends are up to. Bungie also teased that you may be able to use the mobile connection to affect your friends’ games, but declined to provide any additional details.

Within the game proper, Jones said they know that players “don’t want to work hard, they don’t want to read, and they don’t’ want to go to the Internet to figure out our bull****.” In other words, they understand that what they’re making is escapist entertainment.

“This has led us to a huge investment in [user interface],” Jones explained. Clearly, Bungie has a story to tell and information to convey, but they don’t want to bog you down with any of it.

What Else?

Bungie art director Christopher Barrett dubbed Destiny a “mythic science fiction” universe and shared a number of locales we can look forward to visiting: the Cosmodome Breach, the ruins on the edge of the European Dead Zone, the swamps of Old Chicago (likely a nod to Bungie’s original home city), derelict fleets floating in the rings of Saturn, the earth Moon’s Hellmouth, the uncharted depths of Reef, giant obsidian pyramid ships, mile-long tomb ships, and much more.

Then there are the characters we’ll be encountering: fellow Guardians in at least the Titan, Warlock, and Hunter classes; the Fallen, the time-traveling robots known as the Vex, the aforementioned Cabal, Spider Pirates and their rusted machines, evil space zombies, the FOTC (apparently a Guardian faction of some kind) and...that's everything they'd cough up for now.