Layoffs Hit Bungie As Destiny 2 Expansion The Final Shape Is Delayed | MMORPG.com

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Layoffs Hit Bungie As Destiny 2 Expansion The Final Shape Is Delayed | MMORPG.com

Bungie has laid off some of its staff, according to a report by Bloomberg as well as multiple now former Bungie developers on Twitter this morning. Additionally, the Sony-owned studio has pushed back the release of its next Destiny 2 expansion as well as the target window for its upcoming game, Marathon.

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Angrakhan

Guess I need to crawl out from under my rock. I didn't realize Sony bought Bungie. I'll skip the crass analogy that came to mind other than to say they've made the rounds at this point. Anyway, from what I read on the Steam reviews for Destiny 2 these days I'd say they only have themselves to blame. Poor decisions designed to milk your players results in pissed off players who don't buy your expansions results in layoffs.

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Nanfoodle

Sony needs to learn the balance of live services. Customers still need to feel like they want to give their money, not feel pressed into paying. Sadly Bungie staff need to suffer because of Sony's miss management.

Eldrach

I have never played a game with such a huge amount of developers managing to produce so little over such a long time. 

Every single expansion is around a good 1,5 hour of story and 18,5 hours of doing dailies for a new faction to progress in the story. 

The only truly «great» expansion they’ve made that at least didn’t feel like the grind of pointlessness.. is The Taken King for Destiny 

Aeander

Word going around is that Salvatori, the legendary lead composer, was among those laid off. Which would be beyond stupid, as he hard carries their mediocre game on his back.

JeroKane

Nanfoodle said:

Sony needs to learn the balance of live services. Customers still need to feel like they want to give their money, not feel pressed into paying. Sadly Bungie staff need to suffer because of Sony's miss management.

This has nothing to do with Sony, this all started already back in the day when Bungie was under Activision and when they wrestled themselves away from Activision to become independent, players expected better times with less aggressive monetization.
Well, lo and behold!... the big surprise that it was actually Bungie leadership themselves who were the greedy ones (and not Activision) and they went complete bananas and monetization became even worse after Bungie became independent!

Then Sony came along and bought them, but so far nothing has changed for the better yet.
So no, it's not Sony... it's Bungie's own management who are the culprits for the state Destiny 2 is in. They only have themselves to blame.

Scot

Aeander said:

Word going around is that Salvatori, the legendary lead composer, was among those laid off. Which would be beyond stupid, as he hard carries their mediocre game on his back.

They clearly think they can just reuse old music if that's the case. Which up to a point is viable, all games do that, but if you are going to have a game that lasts from year to year and has dlc's released they are no doubt looking at hiring someone cheaper.

Nanfoodle

JeroKane said:

Nanfoodle said:

Sony needs to learn the balance of live services. Customers still need to feel like they want to give their money, not feel pressed into paying. Sadly Bungie staff need to suffer because of Sony's miss management.

This has nothing to do with Sony, this all started already back in the day when Bungie was under Activision and when they wrestled themselves away from Activision to become independent, players expected better times with less aggressive monetization.

Well, lo and behold!... the big surprise that it was actually Bungie leadership themselves who were the greedy ones (and not Activision) and they went complete bananas and monetization became even worse after Bungie became independent!



Then Sony came along and bought them, but so far nothing has changed for the better yet.

So no, it's not Sony... it's Bungie's own management who are the culprits for the state Destiny 2 is in. They only have themselves to blame.

100% is Sony. Destiny 2 was a live service game that was going very well till Sony bought it. Sony has made it clear that live service games is their new direction and thats why they bought Bungie. After Sony did things their way, it quickly went south. I remember when I stopped playing Destiny 2. The ways to support the game went south fast. Ty Sony.

Aeander

Nanfoodle said:

JeroKane said:

Nanfoodle said:

Sony needs to learn the balance of live services. Customers still need to feel like they want to give their money, not feel pressed into paying. Sadly Bungie staff need to suffer because of Sony's miss management.

This has nothing to do with Sony, this all started already back in the day when Bungie was under Activision and when they wrestled themselves away from Activision to become independent, players expected better times with less aggressive monetization.

Well, lo and behold!... the big surprise that it was actually Bungie leadership themselves who were the greedy ones (and not Activision) and they went complete bananas and monetization became even worse after Bungie became independent!



Then Sony came along and bought them, but so far nothing has changed for the better yet.

So no, it's not Sony... it's Bungie's own management who are the culprits for the state Destiny 2 is in. They only have themselves to blame.

100% is Sony. Destiny 2 was a live service game that was going very well till Sony bought it. Sony has made it clear that live service games is their new direction and thats why they bought Bungie. After Sony did things their way, it quickly went south. I remember when I stopped playing Destiny 2. The ways to support the game went south fast. Ty Sony.

Ah yes. The game that was a PR shitshow at all stages of its life cycle was definitely Sony's fault.

harken33

Nanfoodle said:

JeroKane said:

Nanfoodle said:

Sony needs to learn the balance of live services. Customers still need to feel like they want to give their money, not feel pressed into paying. Sadly Bungie staff need to suffer because of Sony's miss management.

This has nothing to do with Sony, this all started already back in the day when Bungie was under Activision and when they wrestled themselves away from Activision to become independent, players expected better times with less aggressive monetization.

Well, lo and behold!... the big surprise that it was actually Bungie leadership themselves who were the greedy ones (and not Activision) and they went complete bananas and monetization became even worse after Bungie became independent!



Then Sony came along and bought them, but so far nothing has changed for the better yet.

So no, it's not Sony... it's Bungie's own management who are the culprits for the state Destiny 2 is in. They only have themselves to blame.

100% is Sony. Destiny 2 was a live service game that was going very well till Sony bought it. Sony has made it clear that live service games is their new direction and thats why they bought Bungie. After Sony did things their way, it quickly went south. I remember when I stopped playing Destiny 2. The ways to support the game went south fast. Ty Sony.

While I certainly don’t disagree that Sony purchased Bungie to move towards live service games (and some other Metaverse related crud the Sony president was talking about) we have different definitions of going very well.

My recollection is close to JeroKane’s with a big revolt against Microtransactions back in the Activision owned days 2018 ish. Then Bungie broke away from the corporate overlords (kind of like the kickstarter mantra) in 2019 but what followed was an increase of the Ever verse Microtransactions and the creative director even went on the record that the shop would be expanding its services not reducing / removing which is what many expected.

Since then, without fail there is some kind of uproar almost yearly from the players that the shop is getting too out of hand, its too confusing, its too piecemeal, its too expensive, things they purchased are obsolete or removed from the game before they can utilize them etc etc etc. I bailed on it before the Sony purchase and have never looked back.

Sony purchased and took ownership of Bungie July 2022 and the deal was made in January 2022 (assuming they even started creative control then). So sure, Sony may have no reason to change the live service transactions and perhaps are making it worse (i don't play now so wont know) but lets be honest that Destiny 2 has had monetary issues long before they entered the picture.