
Former Halo and Destiny composer Marty O'Donnell has revealed developer Bungie was very close to being reacquired by Microsoft before signing its multi-year deal with Activision in 2010 (via GamesIndustry.biz).
In an interview on the HiddenXperia YouTube channel, O'Donnell explained that the deal with Activision "was not a marriage made in heaven at all," saying that the team at Bungie "knew it was a risk right from the get-go, and then it turned out to be exactly as we thought it was going to be."
O'Donnell also noted that Bungie was keen to retain complete control of its IP - something it wasn't able to do with Halo, which was owned by Microsoft - and Activision agreed to that. However, he revealed that Microsoft was "very close to making a serious [offer]… we almost went back, if you can believe it."
Bungie's deal with Activision has since ended, with the two companies parting ways back in January of last year. Destiny 2 is now entirely self-published by Bungie, with multi-year plans for the game in the pipeline.
Would you have liked to see Bungie return to Microsoft back in 2010? Let us know below.
[source youtube.com, via gamesindustry.biz]
Comments 9
Couldn't of been as bad as they made out then..
Yeah, MS can be bad in many ways but they aren't Activision bad.
Mixed feelings about this. I always said that having Bungie as a 1st party was the best for both companies for a long time. Having Destiny as an Xbox exclusive would have been a huge win for xbox and maybe Destiny 1 wouldn't have been the mess it was had acti not been involved. But if a company wants to be free, they should be.
I'm actually surprised that there hasn't been an attempt to buy Bungie after acti dropped them. Locking Destiny as a next gen xbox exclusive would still be a game changer for many.
@EquiinoxGII if you mean, being part of MS “was not as bad”, I think a big thing for their departure was they wanted to work on stuff other than Halo but MS had them only working on it.
MS should give them some freedom. Imagine if Naughty Dog was told to shut up and focus on making Ratchet and Clank games? We would not have Uncharted.
Or later, when Uncharted was big, to shut up and only do Uncharted games? We would not have TLOU.
Sometimes, you just let the innovative studio innovate, and pass the iterative torch to a new team, if you still want that old IP to go on.
@Richnj I’m sure they have received offers. Bungie right now is entirely private, so we don’t hear about attempts at buying them via public stock trades.
Honestly, so long Destiny stays profitable they are not likely to feel the need to sell at all. Only reason to sell are:
*They low on money and need a parent to take the financial risks
*They want to expand beyond what the Destiny profits allow (new big games take a LOT of money to develop from the ground up.)
*Owners want to cash out
Anyways, everyone should be glad MS didn’t re-acquire them. 2010 MS would likely had canceled the game development a year in and force them to make Kinect garbage.
@Tharsman kind of my point. They left due to this but yet considered signing back with them.
Bungie wanted their freedom to make games other than Halo. And they wanted to make a ridiculously expensive sci-fi shooter in Destiny. Back then, Microsoft wasn’t giving Xbox the $ it has now with Phil in charge.
I get why they left & why Microsoft let them leave. But their move to Activision was puzzling to me. Sure Activision will fund their ridiculously expensive shooter, but then you also have to deal with Activision.
Microsoft should buy Bungie, I asked a few Sony diehards that are also Destiny diehards. And they said they would buy an Xbox if future Destiny became exclusive to Microsoft. Believe me it was hard for them to admit that. Goes to show if you have the games you sell the console.
@KelticDevil
I’m pretty sure I recently read that they went to Activision because they were the only suitor who would allow Bungie to maintain ownership of the Destiny IP. Everyone else said no and insisted on owning it.
@Dezzy70 thing is, it does not seem like there will be a “future Destiny”. So long people want more Destiny, they are going to simply have the game expanded.
MS killing support for Destiny expansions on other platforms would fly as well as killing support for Minecraft. Only thing MS would gain at this point from such an acquisition is making all of Destiny (DLC expansions included) part of GamePass, because the base game is already practically free everywhere.
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