I have been playing “Destiny” for weeks, and it has been a mixed bag of emotions since its release. On the one hand, the basic mechanics of the game are fun, which I expect of the creators of the “Halo” franchise. As I moved and gunned through the beautiful worlds, it was intriguing and kept me coming back for more. But the more I play the game, the more I’m introduced to mechanics and missions that bring me to the inevitable conclusion: Bungie’s “Destiny” is an average game.

The game, compared to its clear FPS (first-person shooter) predecessors and to the MMO (massive-multiplayer online) genre, offers a lot of components many MMO fans will find familiar. You level up your character through a variety of actions and activities to gain experience and collect loot that contain weapons, armor and other items. Many bosses and missions require from three to six players to complete. The comparisons end after that, however.

Perhaps we should not make comparisons at all, because the MMO components of “Destiny” don’t stack up well to the competition. Bosses in virtually all cases are just larger versions of regular enemies that take more bullets to kill. Many times this seems fine, but at others it feels absurd. As a player, you rarely get to interact with other players, as you only run into them in the “overworlds,” and once you reach any area of narrative significance those outside your party are shut out.

Several different types of weapons and armor are available but with little diversity. The game presents items as if there are large variations and complications, yet you keep or get rid of them solely based on its power. They are all very simple, making most worthless over the course of the game. That is, until you reach the level cap at Level 20.

The creators said that the game doesn’t really start until you get to level 20. There, armor gives you “Light,” which lets you progress to higher levels and gain more powerful armor and weapons that actually have interesting variations.

Part of the problem may be that the game isn’t fully out yet. Events such as “The Vault of Glass” raid, where a team of six finished in 10 hours and reached a death count in the quadruple-digits, demonstrate Bungie’s intention to support the game for a full decade. “Queen’s Bounty” missions have also been going on since last weekend, which allow players easy access to “Legendary” weapons and equipment.

At the very least, Bungie shows their willingness to patch up existing issues within the game. They just announced intentions to fix part of the frustrating and poorly designed loot system that gives out items and engrams randomly, which often results in the worst player receiving the rarest item in a competitive multiplayer match.

The patch target in particular eliminates an issue with engrams, encrypted items that can be decrypted to reveal actual items. The system originally allowed for the most rare to become the most common items at an consistent rate, frustrating players and bringing to life one of the funnier gaming parody twitter accounts. Thankfully, Bungie heard the criticism. The patch will make rare engrams only become items of the same or higher rarity.

Other issues may not be so easy to fix. The repetitive missions call players to “Point A,” where a robotic companion voiced by Peter Dinklage speaks sci-fi jargon that is about as uninteresting as the repetitive hordes of enemies.

The flaws are painfully obvious. The “supers” in each of the three classes of the game feel extremely unbalanced. For example, the Hunter class’ “Blade Dancer” lets a player mash a button to cut down other players in a single hit while simultaneously taking any bullets shot their way.

The amount of currencies is silly. Some are randomly acquired and, for some unexplained reason, are limited in how many you can earn per week. Progression hinges less on skill and effort and more on putting in excess time and patience to complete multiple consecutive objectives.

Basically, “Destiny” has a lot of flaws and when it comes down to it, I cannot call it anything more than an average game. On the other hand, I’m still playing it. So there’s that.