Game Devs revisit their past | Destiny 2 - Zero Hour

Fractal Grove Co-Founder and Lead Game Designer Vince revisits the Zero Hour mission in Destiny 2 alongside long-time friend and colleague Josh. Vince and Josh worked together on the team at Bungie that brought the Zero Hour mission to life.
They are joined by long-time Bungie content creator OlManMakowski for his first experience of this iconic piece of Destiny content - he does an excellent job of asking questions and gaining insights from the devs who helped make this memorable mission.
Vince and Josh share tons of awesome behind-the-scenes insights and stories from their days working on Destiny and even received a visit from one of the first players to ever complete "The Whisper" mission.
Special thanks to:
‪@MakowskiHalo‬
‪@gelatosquid5094‬
00:00 Intro and Fireteam
00:45 Fractal Grove
01:14 Setting the Stage with OlManMakowski
01:35 ‪@gelatosquid5094‬ appears
02:58 Starting the first run
03:34 Mithrax and mission lead-in lore
03:56 Respawn timer is short for a reason
04:30 Changes to the first combat encounter
04:46 Vince always believed in the timers
05:05 What's up with the difficulty?
05:34 Vince wished for tighter combat in The Whisper
05:54 Intentional Tether Design
06:24 Cranking up the development process
07:04 Zero Hour had more dev resources than The Whisper
07:33 Josh got asked to work on a secret project
08:05 Core team of 8 people, full season dev cycle
08:42 Public Events to Zero Hour?
09:23 Zero Hour QA process details
09:43 Vince was open to feedback from other team members
10:10 Vince wanted the true gamers in the studio for playtests
11:02 Lighting and Environment design
12:35 Deceptive ledge geometry
12:53 Tester smashes controller over fan room
14:06 Makowski meets T.R.E.V.O.R.
14:34 T.R.E.V.O.R. almost got cut entirely
14:54 Testing T.R.E.V.O.R.
15:33 Burning Floor Puzzle
17:05 The Cryptarch Vault
17:26 New Puzzle Hints
17:43 Used a shader callback from Destiny 1
18:14 Nightstalker bias
18:46 Designed to use Whisper of the Worm
19:06 White Nail isn't OP
20:10 Was the game designed around Whisper of the Worm?
20:26 Bringing D1 assets into D2
21:00 D1 vs D2 graphics pipelines
21:46 Reusing Red War campaign assets
22:49 Zero Hour level artist made The Tower assets originally
23:11 How hard was it to QA this mission?
23:36 Debug commands and cheats
24:14 Noticing differences to end of mission
24:41 Vault Puzzle contentions
25:26 Puzzle compromises
25:40 More Mithrax and lore discussion
26:40 Normal vs Legendary mode
27:10 Triple Outbreak Perfected is OP
27:38 Vince felt like The Whisper was easier to master
27:54 More changes to ZH than Whisper
28:21 Comparisons to Red War mission Ikora scene
28:56 No more fall damage
29:20 Entrance differences between difficulties
29:48 Jumping traversal explanations
31:02 Imagine jumping UP
32:01 Does Josh have PTSD from testing?
32:57 Being a tester makes you OP in retail
33:18 Insane T.R.E.VO.R. juke
33:29 More T.R.E.VO.R. development lore
35:26 First working T.R.E.VO.R. playtest
36:01 Dev bias vs Player bias
38:41 More Vault puzzle discussion
39:08 Testing every possible combination
39:23 Vault Lore
40:33 Easter Egg Artifacts
41:22 Outbreak Perfected Catalyst
41:51 Nervous to include so much lore?
43:07 Lore and story is important for all games
43:46 Fractal Grove philosophies
44:57 You've gotta have an IGL
45:47 Not a fan of the Brig
46:19 Difficulty calibration feels right
46:37 Final thoughts and reminiscing

[@mc_poly]

Really enjoyed the Whisper commentary and glad you guys talked about Zero Hour. Lots of awesome insights into making some of the best Destiny content!

[@Isabelle-mp8rk]

fun hearing you talk about the design behind these experiences, kinda reminds me of the raid alongs with the devs that bungie has done. these missions are like up there with the raids and dungeons as the reasons to play destiny.

[@rileytedrow6732]

YEAAAAAAAAAAH I WAS HOPING YOU'D DO THIS

[@whoisthis4948]

I really wished you would have touched more on the solution to the puzzle and gave us closure 😭

[@jamer25]

This was a great mission back in the day and it’s still great now. I love that you specifically went to the employees that played the game for feedback. I’d love to hear your thoughts on content that’s in the game right now especially with the new Salvation’s Edge raid.

[@Left-sh1db]

This is so Damm sick, I don’t know if it’s possible but you should definitely try to do a raid analysis or a strike analysis! Imma sub and wait on whatever is next yo!!!

[@PugzTheArtist]

1st

[@chasekeylime9717]

second

[@felipechalreo]

Sorry. I insulted you many many many times.

[@tokdo4960]

The timer was extremely punishing back in the day. Often I feel like you talk to only people who are playing your game 24/7 and that has really hurt your dev team's perception. I remember spending hours with a friend trying to get a clear for them after my clear. Afterwards we were no longer friends. Destiny has largely divided me from my friends because of all the emphasis on the 24/7 no-lifes and streamers. Even now everything is a factor of 10 too much time to do things and for the most part I don't complete content enough repetitions that I miss out. FOMO=miss out for most and then you start asking, why even bother. Recently the tedium has really left a bitter taste.... things you've repeated a lot were not enough to get what you were going for on in the first place.