Bungie’s Sci-Fantasy Game Destiny Revealed in Infinity Ward Suit

Bungie Destiny reveal

An unintended side-effect of the long-standing legal battle between former Infinity Ward head honchos Jason West and Vincent Zampella and Activision is the reveal of the specifics behind Bungie’s contract with the publisher. Brought to light as part of the court-case, the 27 page agreement between the Bellevue, Washington studio and Activision details the plans for the studios’ new shooter, code-named Destiny.

There’s plenty of legalese in the document but the basic gist of it is that Bungie has signed on for a four game deal, the first of which is set to drop in 2013 for the Xbox 360. Subsequent games will be released on the next generation systems (aggravatingly, the agreement calls the 360 successor the “Xbox 720”) including the PS3 follow up and PCs. The games will be spaced to come out every other year with additional content packs called “Comet” filling in the gaps. Destiny is not strictly a “sci-fi” game but rather a “sci-fantasy” shooter. What that means exactly isn’t clear, so we’ll have to wait for a more specific reveal on that. The contract also stipulates that Bungie is working to revive their classic Marathon franchise.

Bungie’s official response, entitled “Well, that just happened” all but confirms this as fact, promising that the official reveal is coming soon and we’ll be seeing them starside in 2013.

What do you guys think about this? Is it unfair to Bungie to have their secret work revealed without much fanfare? Is this a low blow by West and Zampella’s lawyers to expose another developer? What do you think of the working conditions Bungie is under in the contract? Thoughts on what “sci-fantasy” means?

Source – LA Times, Bungie.net

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mitch@gamersushi.com Twitter: @mi7ch Gamertag: Lubeius PSN ID: Lubeius SteamID: Mister_L Origin/EA:Lube182 Currently Playing: PUBG, Rainbow 6: Siege, Assassin's Creed: Origins, Total War: Warhammer 2

3 thoughts on “Bungie’s Sci-Fantasy Game Destiny Revealed in Infinity Ward Suit”

  1. When I saw an article about this this morning on another site, I was thinking “This cant be true…”. When I confirmed it, which also meant looking at Bungie’s response I thine thought ” THIS is what they are working on…?”. I do think this is very unfair to them. With such a lame and mediocre way of having the jist behinnd Bungies next project revealed, I think it took almost all the wind out of their sails. Im sure if I had learned that its a space MMO shooter through some bad ass commercial/trailer, I would have been excited. This though, very unfair to them. I think they are taking it well (so far) but what a letdown for them.

    Promising 4 games, including going multi-platform….hrm, this may be very interesting. Unsure of what to think about that.

    As for Sci-Fantasy, I think this is going to sort of go the rout of the Warhammer 40k universe. It has deep fantasy roots but its going to be taking place in a sci-fy futuristic setting. We may be seeing classic fantasy races, classes, and ideas popping up in a space setting. Think battlemage with a gun.

  2. I don’t like the idea of someone being promised 4 games… Or even planning to spread things out over 4 games. A kick ass game will (and should /have/ to) earn a sequel/prequel.

    I think it’s unfair to them for sure, but I think they handled it correctly. I think it also says some interesting things about when “they” think (know?) the next gen is coming. If anyone’s close it would be the insiders, right?

  3. It’s a real shame that it came out like this, now anything Bungie comes up with might be slightly muted.

    On the flip side if you read into the contract it gives people a good idea of the money and terms involved in such a big business deal, It also builds on the disturbing trend that developers can loose out on a large chunk of their bonus just because of review scores.

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