Skip to main content

Destiny’s ‘The Dawning’ holiday event is live now in ‘Destiny 2’

MMO return Destiny 2
Destiny 2‘s holiday event, “The Dawning,” arrives on Tuesday, December 19, and it opens up all kinds of winter wonders, including snowball fights in social areas, snowball attacks in Strikes, and a number of new items and cosmetics to acquire for the next few weeks.

As in the original Destiny, The Dawning adds a coating of snow, ice, and decorations to social areas in Destiny 2, along with its various modes and item introductions. Although the snowball fights give the game a somewhat playful feel, that’s not to say that this event doesn’t introduce some more serious gameplay alternatives, too.

Related Videos

In the Tower and the Farm, you can dig up a snowball from the various piles of snow and tag your friends, but in Strikes, you can hit an enemy with a snowball to stun them and do surprising damage considering the consistency of your projectile. “Mayhem,” a seasonal Crucible mode, is back, as well, giving Guardians the option to fight it out with faster ability recharges for some frantic, snowy action.

It wouldn’t be the holidays without presents, of course. Take part in Mayhem Crucible matches or the augmented Strikes and you’ll be able to earn new loot. Completing certain milestones each week will reward you with a Dawning engram. There are also new consumables for everyone who plays the game during this time.

If you want a specific holiday item, you can buy one straight from Tess Everis (with real money). Her inventory will rotate new holiday items in and out every week. On “one week or another,” during The Dawning, you’ll also be able to buy a new thematic exotic ship, ghost, and emote, as well as a new set of seasonal armor.

Celebrating the idea of giving during this holiday season, The Dawning also lets you craft a special present for your favorite vendor. Grab a “Dawning Gift Schematic” in the Bazaar and then craft it using items from various locations, before giving it to a vendor or agent. You’ll then receive a gift in return, though Bungie is staying mum on what exactly that will be.

The Dawning runs through January 9. Destiny 2 is available now on Xbox One, PlayStation 4, and PC. Its Curse of Osiris expansion recently launched on all platforms.

Editors' Recommendations

The best Final Fantasy games, ranked from best to worst
Final Fantasy X

While the role-playing game (RPG) has become a catch-all genre, now encompassing an almost silly range of games that don't share much in common, there was one video game franchise in the 1980s that was the quintessential RPG. Yes, we're talking about Final Fantasy from Square Enix.

The fantasy Japanese RPGs debuted on the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) in 1987, but they became cultural touchstones in the '90s as Super Nintendo games. From there, the series made an incredibly successful jump to 3D on the PlayStation 1 before the mainline series started to take more risks, including the elimination of turn-based battles and massively multiplayer online game (MMO) entries, and the latest game, Final Fantasy XVI, becoming a full-on character-action game.

Read more
The best upcoming Xbox Series X games: 2023 and beyond
A spacecraft in Starfield.

The Xbox Series X and Series S have now been out for over two years, bringing better resolution, higher frame rates, and ray tracing to gamers around the world. The upcoming Xbox Series X games on this list promise to continue to show off all those bells and whistles in fun, new experiences.

If you're eager to find out what Microsoft has in store for the years ahead, we've rounded up every game confirmed so far, including new offerings, franchise installments, and ports of existing titles. We're looking beyond the first-party projects here to encompass all the great games coming to this powerful piece of gaming hardware.
2023

Read more
Don’t start the Resident Evil 4 remake before playing these 5 games
Saddler looms in front of amber in the Resident Evil 4 remake.

Capcom’s Resident Evil 4 remake is just a few days away and the anticipation couldn’t be higher. After a wave of glowing reviews, fans of the GameCube classic are ready to have their heads chainsawed off all over again. That wait will come to an end on Friday, March 24, but impatient players may find themselves looking for a way to kill the time until then.

If you’re in the boat, or simply want to properly prepare yourself for the remake, we’re here to help. Part of the Resident Evil 4 remake’s appeal is the way it engages with not just the original game or the series’ past, but the 20 years’ worth of gaming history that would follow it. With a game as important and influential as Resident Evil 4, you don’t need to go far to see how it impacted the action-adventure genre. The remake shines because it’s seemingly aware of that idea, examining the original through a modern lens.

Read more