It hasn’t been an excellent couple weeks for Bungie. On the finish of July, the Future 2 studio laid off 220 workers, representing roughly 17% of its complete workforce; shortly after that, a report surfaced alleging that Bungie CEO Pete Parsons had spent greater than $2.4 million on classic automobiles over the previous two years; and shortly after that it got here to mild that hopes of avoiding layoffs by actually nailing The Closing Form enlargement have been utterly misplaced, as a result of the cuts have been reportedly deliberate whatever the enlargement’s end result.
Bungie is below strain from Sony to get its home so as, but it surely appears more and more unable to. Parsons acknowledged when the latest spherical of layoffs landed that the studio was overextended on varied “incubation tasks” and was bleeding cash because of this, but it surely’s unclear how it should pull out of that spiral. The Closing Form is meant to be the ultimate Future 2 enlargement, however the nigh-inevitable Future 3 continues to be a good distance out, and Marathon, presumably the studio’s subsequent huge factor, is struggling: The sport just lately underwent a management change, and Bloomberg reporter Jason Schreier mentioned in a current Pals Per Second podcast that he is been advised the present state of growth is “not nice.”
“There is a purpose that it was deliberate for this 12 months and slipped a complete 12 months,” Schreier mentioned. “People who I’ve talked to are a little bit pessimistic about it even hitting its present deliberate deadline, however we’ll see. I do not know precisely when that’s—someday in 2025, I am undecided. I imply, the sentiment I’ve heard shouldn’t be nice round it. At the very least as of some months in the past.”
Bungie’s future has by no means appeared as shaky because it does proper now, and the Future group is understandably down about the entire thing. It isn’t as if Sony is about to tug the plug on Future 2—you do not kill the golden goose you paid $3.6 billion for only a couple years in the past—however the way forward for the collection, and the studio that makes it, is an enormous ol’ query mark proper now.
In a current put up on Reddit, the Future 2 staff acknowledged these issues and promised to deal with them within the close to future.
“We all know that current adjustments at Bungie have created uncertainty surrounding the way forward for Future,” the staff wrote. “Relaxation assured we stay dedicated to Future, to supporting our group with transparency, and to delivering common updates in regards to the recreation.
“We’ll be speaking with you all about the way forward for Future and plans for our subsequent multi-year journey quickly. As soon as we plant a flag for the date, we’ll allow you to all know.”
The message hasn’t precisely impressed a wave of confidence. That is hardly the primary time Bungie has approached its gamers with a “belief us” and a promise to do higher after whiffing in a technique or one other, and after a number of rounds of layoffs at what by all measures ought to be a profitable, money-making recreation studio, firm management—significantly Parsons, Bungie’s CEO—is going through an open revolt amongst its gamers.
“The one purpose we’re right here within the first place is that management as soon as once more fumbled the bag and mismanaged issues to the purpose that many proficient builders who completely cooked on TFS needed to be laid off,” redditor shieldoversword wrote. “I wish to see management take some accountability and usually have a brand new plan for administration that may be capable of sustainably preserve all the devs that make this recreation nice. The remaining will fall into place.”
The most recent This Week in Future replace, which resumed this week after taking final week off to accommodate the layoffs, says Bungie stays “devoted to supporting our group with transparency and delivering common updates in regards to the recreation”—an almost verbatim repeat of what it mentioned within the Reddit put up—and that “all of our beforehand communicated recreation content material plans stay unchanged.”
“The current adjustments inside Bungie will current challenges that we’ll have to work via, so please pardon our mud over the following few weeks. We could expertise just a few bumps right here and there, however our groups are dedicated to maintaining you within the loop and listening to what it’s important to say.”
Proper now, although, I feel the larger concern for Future followers is listening to what Bungie has to say.
