The Destiny community is nearing a major fork in the road, at which point current and legacy consoles will part ways, developer Bungie has announced.
Maybe the timing comes as a surprise to some Destiny players, but there had been signs that Bungie would gradually stop supporting the PlayStation 3 and Xbox One.
When the studio announced the game's next expansion, Rise of Iron, it was clear then that it was just a matter of time before the last-gen console were prepped for stasis. Bungie revealed that the expansion will be exclusive to the PlayStation 4 and Xbox one.
Following that, the studio disabled the game's demo for legacy consoles. And then just a day later came the news that Xbox and PlayStation accounts would be split this August.
"Up to this point, player progression between current and legacy consoles in the same family has been shared by each account," Bungie says. "This summer, that experience will fork onto two separate paths that will no longer share progression."
At the start of August, player progression will be split between last- and current-gen consoles.
So for Xbox One and PlayStation 4 holdouts still playing the game on last-gen hardware, any progress they make after August won't count toward their guardians' progression on the current console. However, players can still import their accounts from legacy consoles to the PS4 and Xbox One.
As has always been the case, players looking to migrate their accounts to new hardware will have to move within the same console family. And those make that move should do so with the understanding that they may have to repurchase some content for whichever current-gen console they select.
While Bungie is done delivering new Destiny content to the dying consoles, it will still support them for a while longer and likely until it sunsets the game itself.
"Our goal is always to bring every player from this awesome community along for the ride as we continue the story of Destiny, but we will also continue to support players who elect not to upgrade their console hardware," Bungie said in a blog post on June 24.
The move won't just affect last-gen consoles with regard to future content, it will also impact currently available content, namely Destiny's The Taken King expansion.
Legacy consoles will have limited access to future content, purchasing Silver, certain Destiny events as well as certain companion app and Bungie.Net features.
