Destiny's famed 'lore daddy' releases a 10-hour history recap, with 12,000 people tuning in for the live premiere (2024)

Destiny's storytelling and worldbuilding has come a long way since the days of grimoire cards, but that hasn't necessarily made the lore any easier to keep track of. Destiny 2 is a game dense with proper nouns, and it only gets denser: Each season and expansion piles on more in-game lore books and implication-heavy item descriptions, any one of which could eventually become a focus for the ongoing story.

Luckily, we've got tireless Destiny lore YouTubers like

, affectionately titled "Lore Daddy" by his many pupils, to keep all our story-relevant space orbs in order. And don't get it twisted: those orbs take a hell of a lot of ordering.

, released today with a live premiere, clocks in at a healthy nine hours—roughly a third of which I'd guess involves cataloging the setting's various Shapes of Cosmic Importance.

Clearly, there's an eager audience for it. As Byf tweeted around two hours into the video's live premiere, nearly 12,000 people were watching to brush up on their Destiny lore mastery in time for The Final Shape.

Nearly 12,000 of you watching along. Thank you so much for an incredible launch so far. We have a long way still to go. Almost 2 hours down.We're about to hit the collapse.https://t.co/X1vEzY7s2hMay 31, 2024

For the story-hungry Destiny player, Byf's work is a valuable reference. We're close to seven years since Destiny 2's original release, and it still hasn't entirely figured out how to present its lore in a coherent way.

I won't argue that the 10-hour runtime on Byf's history recap, which covers everything from the setting's prehistory to the current in-game moment, isn't a substantial undertaking for the viewer. Hell, it's about as long as a back-to-back marathon of the Lord of the Rings movies (unless you're watching the extended editions). But it's still less time than you'd otherwise have to spend cross-referencing fan wikis and the

.

Take my word for it. I've been doing it for a decade. And while I wouldn't take back the thrilling hours I've spent surveying the existing evidence for the origins of the Vex, I can't recommend that anyone else do the same.

You're better off with Byf. And hey, you've still got plenty of time to catch the live premiere. As I write this, there's around six hours of lore left. In thirty minutes or so, we'll just be starting the story recap for Destiny 2! Or you can just watch it at your own pace. If you start tomorrow, you'll only need to watch around two and half hours a day to be caught up before the Final Shape. Easy.

Lincoln Carpenter

Contributor

Lincoln spent his formative years in World of Warcraft, and hopes to someday recover from the experience. Having earned a Creative Writing degree by convincing professors to accept his papers about Dwarf Fortress, he leverages that expertise in his most important work: judging a video game’s lore purely on the quality of its proper nouns. With writing at Waypoint and Fanbyte, Lincoln started freelancing for PC Gamer in Fall of 2021, and will take any excuse to insist that games are storytelling toolkits—whether we’re shaping those stories for ourselves, or sharing them with others. Or to gush about Monster Hunter.