Report: Why Destiny 2 Won't Be Delayed to 2018
By Weston Albert 11 February 2017
[UPDATE: Activision has denied the earlier report from Kotaku, saying that “There is no scenario where Activision, or any other partner we work with, is awarded Bungie stock.”]
Activision clearly has big plans for Destiny 2. In its latest earnings call, the publisher said that Destiny 2 should appeal to a wider audience and that the company is “very excited” about the game’s release in late 2017. Activision and Bungie have both said time and again that Destiny 2 will in fact hit its target release of 2017. And according to a new report, there may be more at stake for Bungie than just hitting a desired release date.
In a report from Kotaku, if Bungie does not get Destiny 2 out in 2017, Activision will be awarded a large amount of Bungie’s company stock. Bungie is not owned by Activision but is an independent studio, partnered with Activision for publishing the Destiny franchise. And according to this report, whose sources are said to be two people familiar with the situation, “Bungie employees’ stock vesting schedule is […] based on game releases.”
That means Bungie may stand to lose some stock ownership of its studio if Destiny 2 (and future releases, for that matter) misses its launch window, and could be an additional driving force for the developer to get the game out this year. But before fans worry that Destiny 2 will be rushed out to meet this deadline and avoid the loss, there’s a few things to consider.
Destiny 2 has been in development for quite some time, as it was originally scheduled to launch in September 2016 but was delayed, only to be replaced by the Rise of Iron expansion in its place. While there have been some shakeups at Bungie since the launch of Destiny, and some rumors that Destiny 2 was rebooted, the leadership team that launched The Taken King is said to be working on the sequel.
Considering that all the content and expansions since The Taken King has been handled by the smaller Live Team at Bungie since then, with the majority of the development team working on the sequel for quite some time, a lot of work has likely gone into the game with hopes of delivering on fans’ expectations for Destiny 2.
Add to it that two other studios are working on Destiny 2 in some capacity, whether that is content for the game proper or for additional content to support the game after its launch, and there is quite a force that Activision is placing behind getting the game out and attempting to make it a hit. The good news for fans in all of it is that a delay into 2018 for Destiny 2 is looking more and more unlikely.
Destiny 2 is slated to launch in late 2017.
