If you’ve been away from Destiny for a while, this is a great time to jump back in and take part in some spirited Halloweeny festivities. In the Destiny universe it’s the Festival of the Lost, which kicked off October 26 and will be going until November 9. The Tower has been decked out with spooky, flickering candles and colorful streamers; random screams and moans pierce the otherwise familiar ambient soundscape; you’ll find some of the NPCs are getting into the spirit as well. Cayde-6 can be found wearing an Eris Morn mask, which I thought was hilarious, and the Cryptarch decided he wanted to be an Engram (of course).
If you’d like to take part in the Guardian’s Masquerade Ball all you need to do is pay a visit to Eva Levante who will hook you up with a random legendary mask and a bag to collect candy. Here’s the deal with the masks: once you get collecting candy, either by visiting NPCs or by killing enemies, you can return your full candy bag to Eva who will give you a random, rare (blue) mask. Rare masks will disappear after the festival is over, but you can use mats to upgrade your favorite masks to legendary status if you want to keep them. Some masks are cooler than others, and I’ve decided to list my top six. These are the masks that I thought were either too funny or too badass to let go of:
Exotic Engram
Love life in a bit of a rut? Having trouble meeting new people? Why not dress up as the most desirable of all desirables: the exotic engram. Make new friends and brace yourself as total strangers attempt to drag you to the Cryptarch. This mask is especially fun to see out on patrol; enemies used to drop engrams, now engrams are dropping enemies.
Skolas
This is one of the bigger, more detailed masks. I found myself wearing my Skolas mask in the Crucible even when I didn’t need candy, just because it looks so cool. Plus, if you manage to pick up some heavy weapon ammo and wield a rocket launcher it’ll take players right back to the Prison of Elders, facing off against a pissed off Skolas armed with a scorch cannon. Good memories.
Oryx
Become the she-king himself. I wish they would add a quest to give some stats to this one so I could justify wearing it all of the time, especially as a warlock. Do you know how terrifying it is to see a Warlock wearing the Oryx mask hovering toward you in a storm trance? This one is worth keeping for the intimidation factor alone. While the Crota mask stands out more, the sheer number of people wearing it ruined the mystique for me.
Xur
Right after the festival started I saw a forum post by someone who swore that they saw Xur run past them in the Tower. Xur can be hard to find, but at least he doesn’t run from you. This shady, Jovian vender is anything but jovial, but his mask will make you the life of the party. When I saw that they faithfully recreated his wispy face-whiskers (what else am I supposed to call them?) I was sold. It’s nice to see Bungie having fun with some of its more serious characters.
Skull
As far as aesthetics go, the skull mask is the winner. This thing actually replaces your head with a freaking blue flaming skull. None of the other masks are animated, although you can consume a Jackolyte which will replace your helmet with a flaming jack-o-lantern for half an hour. If you upgrade your skull mask, though, you’ll get to keep it forever, and months from now noobs will see you in the Tower and think that you completed some kind of gnarly raid for it.
Eris Morn
This is hands down my favorite mask. I don’t know why, but there is just something about dressing up as the ultimate, pessimistic party-pooper for the festival that induces endless giggles. Eris looks so cool, but she sucks! If you go trick-or-treating in the Tower Eris actually gives you raisins. RAISINS. I nearly spit out my beer when I saw Cayde-6 rocking his Eris Morn mask; the chemistry between those two is pure magic.
What’s your favorite mask, and which masks have you upgraded to keep after the festival is over? Have you and your clan composed any funny group pics? Post some screen caps in the comments if you got ‘em. In the meantime, you can check all the masks out in this video by IGN: