In case there was any doubt, Bungie wants you to know that developing Destiny 2 is the company’s top priority moving forward.
“Long-term, Bungie is committed to Destiny,” says Destiny director Luke Smith via a letter posted on the Bungie website. “We created the universe and we hold its future entirely in our hands. The vast majority of the team is hard at work envisioning future experiences, enemies, and ways to play the Guardian you’ve been building since 2014. We’re going to keep doing that…we’re thinking about what it means to be truly independent, what it means to self-publish, and crucially, what Destiny‘s future can now look like for our players.”
That last line might read as a shot at Activision, but that doesn’t seem to be the case. Smith takes the time to thank Activision just as others at Bungie have in the past. Granted, that’s most likely a piece of PR obligation, but it doesn’t seem that Bungie is placing all of Destiny‘s problems at the feet of Activision.
Instead, the letter reads more like an admission of sorts in which Bungie confesses that they’re not entirely sure where Destiny goes from here, but that the majority of their team is committed to answering that question. There’s a welcome bit of honesty hidden in the letter, with Bungie admitting that they have to figure out what Destiny looks like now that they are independent seemingly doubles as confirmation that they didn’t leave Activision with a firm plan in place regarding what they intend to do with the game.
That might sound like a bad thing, but it does shed a little light on the split from Activision. It really does feel like Bungie’s general feeling was that they were being constrained by Activision’s requirements and felt the need to break free in order to have the chance to discover what Destiny can be.
Certainly, those fans who still believe in Bungie and the Destiny concept may see that as the best thing to happen to the game. Whether or not that proves to be the case remains to be seen.