Imagine you’re about to eat a pizza. Before you sink your teeth in, you’re told that it will be perfect in all aspects; it was made by gourmet chefs, contains the best ingredients, and everyone agrees it’s amazing. All you can think about is taking that first delicious bite. But when you do, you realize something awful: all the trimmings are there but the flavor is absent. “Destiny” is just that – a pizza without flavor. Sure, there’s something to be said for its outer mechanics and features, but overall, it feels lacking.

Just in case there’s anybody out there who missed the hype, “Destiny” is a first-person shooter produced by Bungie, the developers of the Halo series. The game centers around basic and understandable (albeit clichéd) plot points: the remnants of humanity are in danger, and you need to stop the bad guys from destroying everything.

While there are plenty of lackluster things about “Destiny,” let’s start on a positive note. This game has absolutely breathtaking visuals. Every set piece feels lovingly crafted and meticulously created; this game is sure to strike awe in those who load it up. In addition, the core mechanics are intuitive and fluid. Guns fire with snappy sound effects, vehicles control smoothly, and the central controls are mapped and coordinated near perfectly. As a whole, the game feels great, looks great, and controls with ease. So what makes “Destiny” so flavorless?

Without question, the biggest thing “Destiny” lacks is a cohesive story line. It’s clear that immense time and effort were put into this product, but very little of the world is given backstory or reasoning, making the objectives empty and pointless. Sure, there are bad guys to shoot, but why? Sure, the environments on places like Venus are gorgeous, but why does Venus suddenly have plant life and a city on it? There are no answers, and as such, players feel as though the journey was meaningless. With repetitive mission objectives, lackluster boss encounters, a shallow earn-loot-through-challenges system, an underdeveloped character set, and an overall air of emptiness, this game is definitely not the fine dining experience so many were expecting.

Is “Destiny” a bad game? Not by any stretch of the imagination. If anything, it’s an underdeveloped game that was massively overhyped and couldn’t live up to expectations. There’s no question that it’s fun the first time around, but the longer you play, the more the flaws reveal themselves.

There’s a saying that there’s no such thing as bad pizza, and in the case of “Destiny,” it’s true. However, just because a pizza looks great, smells great, and is generally agreed to be great doesn’t mean that it actually is.