In 2018, Bungie got a lot of money for a new game – now we know what came of it

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In June 2018, it was announced that Bungie (Destiny 2) was entering into a new partnership with the Chinese company NetEase to develop a new game or several new games. They received $100 million for this. The plan was for them to publish the games from this deal themselves. 6 years later, it is becoming clear what became of the partnership.

This was the message back then: Bungie announced on the Destiny website on June 1, 2018 that it had entered into a partnership with NetEase to take a new direction and develop new worlds.

The Wall Street Journal reported that Destiny had received $100 million and wanted to develop new games.

Bungie CEO Pete Parsons told the Wall Street Journal at the time: Bungie will release these games themselves and also decide which business model they will use to release them into the world.

The move was apparently planned as a kind of liberation and the next step in Bungie’s development. Bungie was to become a major entertainment company itself and certainly wanted to distance itself from its overpowering partner Activision Blizzard.

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Activision Blizzard was reportedly against the deal – Bungie should stay with Destiny

What happened to the deal? Over the last 6 years, little has been heard about the collaboration between Bungie and NetEase:

But the fact is that nothing tangible has come out of the deal since 2018.

Conditions for Bungie in 2024 are very different from 2018

This has changed: Since Bungie entered into the deal with NetEase in 2018, two things have changed:

Bungie is no longer independent, but has been bought by Sony, so the dream of “publishing games ourselves” is history.

On the other hand, Bungie has announced that it will not create any new game series, but will limit itself to Destiny and Marathon.

Bungie’s position has deteriorated significantly compared to 2018.

New Destiny game sounds like Diablo Immortal

So what kind of game will it be? According to recent reports from early September, Bungie is said to be developing a Destiny game with NetEase (via thegamepost):

  • The game will be called Destiny Rising
  • It should be a mobile game
  • It will supposedly be an MMORPG shooter with 1st person and 3rd person view

    • The term “MMORPG” should be used with caution when referring to Asian mobile games. Ultimately, it just means that there will be loot and leveling.

    Other sources indicate that NetEase is carrying the brunt of the project and Bungie is only “providing minimal input.” It is said that the game will feature pre-made heroes rather than creating your own characters.

    All this information is currently unconfirmed.

    Deal apparently did not go as planned

    This is what’s behind it: After 6 years and $100 million, it’s fair to ask whether a “Destiny for mobile” was really the goal Bungie originally had in mind when they made the deal.

    If such a game had been developed from the beginning, it could certainly have been released in 2021 or 2022. It is quite possible that in collaboration with NetEase, some prototypes were created that were ultimately discarded and now they are “playing it safe”.

    NetEase are the makers of Diablo Immortal in collaboration with Blizzard. If you take that as a benchmark, Destiny Rising could end up being something similar to Diablo Immortal. Diablo Immortal was generally praised, but criticized for its heavy monetization through microtransactions: I’m now in the endgame of Diablo Immortal and suddenly Pay2Win is no longer the biggest problem

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