Destiny 2’s Renegades leans hard into Star Wars — and it might actually work

Why Renegades actually caught my attention

This caught my attention because Bungie is doing something it rarely attempts at this scale: grafting another franchise’s DNA onto Destiny without turning the whole thing into a parody. Renegades feels like an intentional remix – Star Wars motifs stitched into Destiny systems – and the preview I played showed real mechanical additions that could change how the game plays. That said, there are obvious rough edges: a crowded narrative that will befuddle newcomers and Eververse-linked cosmetic choices that will piss off long-time fans.

• Star Wars vibes done as mechanics, not cheap fan service: Praxic Blade and audio cues land hard.
• Meaningful weapons and abilities: Heat guns and nine Renegade Abilities introduce new playstyles.
• Onboarding risk: Dense lore + new factions could make the campaign inaccessible to new or lapsed players.
• Monetization red flags: Eververse-exclusive blade colors and hilt variants are a predictable backlash point.

Breaking down the opening: Star Wars, but still Destiny

Bungie opens Renegades with a mission that smacks of A New Hope’s beats – tractor beams, a ragtag crew, and a heist that turns into a space-brawl — but it never stops feeling like Destiny. The new Cabal faction, the Barant Imperium, plays the Empire analog with a satisfying visual and audio palette; John Williams-leaning cues in the score help sell the homage. Importantly, the story leans into established Destiny threads (the Nine, Dredgen lore, Eris Morn), not just borrowed tropes, so the tone lands as a genuine Destiny chapter rather than a costume party.

That said, Bungie throws a lot at you: three newly-centered factions, multiple crime syndicates, prophecy beats, and the Praxic Order all front-loaded into the campaign. For veterans who follow lore, this is a feast. For newcomers or returning players, it risks being a confusing, patchwork narrative — which is exactly the audience Bungie should be trying to win over with a Star Wars tie-in.

Praxic Blade and heat guns: real mechanical punch

The Praxic Blade is the headline here — think lightsaber functionality realized in a first-person shooter. You slash, you throw it like a boomerang, and you can deflect incoming fire. The Blade’s mods change how it behaves, offering defensive windows that actually matter in harder content. This isn’t a gimmick; it’s a new toolkit that will affect solos and fireteam metas alike.

Heat weapons are the other important add: guns that build heat instead of relying only on reloads. You vent heat to keep firing, and a tight timing window rewards a near-instant vent (a bit like Gears’ active reload). It won’t upend Destiny overnight the way a blade does, but adding a whole class of weapons with unique stats and mods is the kind of systemic growth Destiny desperately needs.

The Lawless Frontier: a new activity loop with teeth

Renegades’ new loop, the Lawless Frontier, is a hub of extraction-style missions across Mars, Europa, and Venus — each dressed to echo Star Wars locales. Three syndicates offer bounties, smuggle, and sabotage mission types with daily allegiance systems and reputation unlocks. The nine Renegade Abilities (each with seven upgrades) feel substantial on paper: healing domes, an AT‑ST‑like Behemoth vehicle, and upgrades that change how you approach encounters.

Extraction mechanics, limited revives, and non‑regenerating health push these toward higher-stakes, action-first gameplay that suits Destiny’s combat. The raid‑adjacent optional invasion mode (available only at master/grandmaster tiers) is a smart nod to Gambit fans and a way to sprinkle high-risk PvP into PvE, assuming it doesn’t devolve into griefing.

What worries me — and what I want Bungie to prove

The campaign’s density is the biggest concern: Renegades expects players to care about new factions and long-running lore threads simultaneously. That’s a tall order if Bungie wants fresh faces. Then there’s monetization: several Praxic Blade colors and hilt variants will be available through Eververse, which is a predictable hot-button issue. Finally, preview builds handed out maxed abilities, so the real-world grind and time-to-unlock remain unknown — that could make or break retention.

TL;DR

Renegades is the most interesting Destiny expansion in a while because it blends an unmistakable Star Wars flavor with meaningful new toys: the Praxic Blade can change combat, heat weapons add new pacing, and the Lawless Frontier offers a fresh extraction loop. But Bungie still has to prove the story is accessible and that Eververse doesn’t carbon‑copy controversy into the launch. If the campaign ties its threads cleanly and the grind feels fair, this could be a real shot in the arm for Destiny 2.