From the Power Glove to Fallout 4's real-life Pip Boy, gamers have been pitched a lot of ridiculous hardware over the years. The Destiny 2Ghost Alexa speaker and accompanying Alexa skill are no less ridiculous.
The skill, which also works on other Alexa-enabled speakers, allows Destiny 2 players to ask questions like, "Who are the Red Legion," or "What should I do next?" and get answers back in the same voice they hear in the game. Amazon and game publisher Activision claim there are more than 1,000 lines to hear. Listed functions include telling you more about the game's lore, identifying your next activity, changing your equipped gear, or inviting other players to group with you. As far as we're aware, it's the first Alexa skill to connect directly into an online game.
When Ars' Sam Machkovech tried the skill out, he wasn't impressed. For example, many query responses just cycle through several pre-canned messages, and the only gear management command that he discovered was, "Alexa, ask Ghost to equip my best weapon." It's entirely a gimmick, but would you have expected anything better? Also, sadly for those (very, very) few of us who preferred Peter Dinklage's performance as Ghost over Nolan North's, only North's voice is available. Most players will be quite happy to see Dinklage is not involved, though.
Amazon is also shipping a Ghost Alexa speaker from Activision. It looks like the in-game ghost, and it will answer your queries in Ghost's voice through the same skill. However, it additionally requires "any Alexa enabled hardware device" in your home, so it can't operate alone. That's too bad; some gamers would probably have been interested in a full-fledged, standalone Alexa device that looked and sounded like their robot pals.
The speaker is priced at $89.99 and will ship on December 19. It was initially reported that Amazon was only selling the physical Ghost speaker for three hours, but that time has passed, and it still appears to be available for pre-order. Still, if you really want this useless gadget, you should act fast. Its light will fade after the initial units are sold—though with those cheap-looking lights on the sides, that will probably happen anyway.
