Destiny 2’s Festival of the Lost returns with new focusing system and revamped rewards

Some significant changes are in store for Destiny's Halloween event.

A Titan in insect-themed armor carries a glowing pumpkin while under attack from bolts of Arc energy.
Image via Bungie

With Halloween right around the corner, players have been hotly anticipating the return of Destiny 2’s Festival of the Lost event to get into an appropriately spooky mood for the holiday. In today’s This Week in Destiny blog, Bungie dropped the first details about what players can expect from the event’s 2023 iteration, revealing that it’s undergoing some fairly significant updates when it launches next week.

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Haunted Sectors will be making a return as the event activity again but will now offer an alternatively higher difficulty option called Legend Haunted Sectors. For braving the trials and tribulations of the Legend mode, players will receive a higher drop chance for a new event currency, Eerie Engrams. Taking the lessons learnt from other focused loot pursuit tools in Destiny 2, Eva Levante gives players the ability to focus these Eerie Engrams into deterministic rewards throughout the event.

Those deterministic rewards don’t just account for Festival of the Lost loot, like the new Acosmic grenade launcher, either. Taking a page out of Rahool’s book, Eva Levante also has options for Exotic armor focusing with the Eerie Engrams. For 2500 Candy, players will have access to a plethora of Exotic armor, which includes armor they haven’t earned previously. If you’re still missing Osmiomancy Gloves or Renewal Grasp from The Witch Queen, this is your chance to get it through a reasonable cheap limited-time offer.

You can still crack open Eerie Engrams individually at no cost to earn the usual slate of rewards, but Hocus Focusing will make it a lot easier to get the rolls you want of the Festival of the Lost weaponry before it goes away at the end of the event.

One of the most surprising new inclusions, though, is an event-limited Memento. Not only is this the first of its kind, but Destiny 2 hasn’t even received a new Memento since the release of the original batch in season 16 for Gambit, Nightfalls and Trials of Osiris. The Festival of the Lost Memento will be a random drop from Eerie Engrams, but the text in the blog implies its acquisition may also be tied into event Triumphs as well. The Memento in question paints your crafted weapon in a pure black, textured to mimic leather, which will undoubtedly be a hit with many player’s cosmetic sensibilities.

As expected, Festival of the Lost will also debut the new insect-themed armor for Hunters, Titans, and Warlocks the community voted for as the new Halloween skins earlier this year. Like the event cosmetics that have come before them, these will be available in the shop for both Silver and a hefty Bright Dust price for those that want a wardrobe that’s appropriately creepy for their Haunted Sector runs.

Festival of the Lost begins next week on Oct. 17 with the weekly reset. While an end date hasn’t been officially confirmed, it will more than likely follow suit with last year’s event and run for three weeks through to Nov. 7.

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Alexis Walker
Alexis is a freelance journalist hailing from the UK. After a number of years competing on international esports stages, she transitioned into writing about the industry in 2021 and quickly found a home to call her own within the vibrant communities of the looter shooter genre. Now she provides coverage for games such as Destiny 2, Halo Infinite and Apex Legends.