Since I left business operations for a data analyst job I have not heard "SME" for a couple of years. That takes me back.
Yeh the past week has left a super sour taste in my mouth. I don't think they could have done a faster 180 when it comes to community perception if they'd tried. I don't know how they can claw it back honestly. If perception around the game was patchy before it's in the gutter now and no one is sat there thinking highly of Bungie anymore, which is what pulled them through negative sentiment around the game before.
I mean, you could explain what you don't get if you're gonna quote me :P
But the original Destiny wasn't exactly a critical success (76 metacritic). I definitely expected more from the creators of Halo. There were a lot of problems with Destiny 1. The story was thrown out and put back together piecemeal, causing a Bungie legend (Joe Staten) to leave the company. The worlds were not designed very well or had a good sense of exploration (thinking of the moon in particular and its invisible walls). It was a game designed around a carrot, but the actual mission design wasn't even good outside of the raids. I remember playing the beta in Destiny and thinking there had to be more than this and we were just seeing a slice of it. Turns out that wasn't the case.
It's why I think Bungie could find success in spite of how badly put together the game was because their gunplay and the stuff around it like art, music, etc. was so good. The live service aspects were not why I played Destiny and it made me leave Destiny quicker than I would have otherwise. Then you have issues like content vaulting, player onboarding, etc. on top of all of that. I think Bungie's original vision was to have a game that evolves, but honestly Activision wanting sequels was a better idea if Bungie's only option would be to take content away as their game gets more and more bloated (as we see in Destiny 2).
I'm still playing the Bungie Halo games to this day, but it would be extremely difficult to even know where to start with Destiny, not that I have any particular urge to.
I think Bungie has/had an extremely talented group of people under horrible management. Their desire for autonomy may be what actually holds them back, because at this point I just have to assume the greatest enemy to Bungie is Bungie's leadership.
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I'm with you here.
I was talking to my sister about this (they play as well) and I told them that I went from being hopeful about TFS to... feeling discouraged. Part of me wants to quit it all together (and I've done so for other games for a LOT less) and the other part of me still wants to hold on to the idea that Bungie can and will turn this around somehow. I could be naive, foolish, or just huffing a cabal's worth of Copium, but damn, I still believe in the very talented team they have. I don't believe in their upper management, however.
I gave 9 years to this game. Even through all the ups and downs (and downs) I stuck with it. I actually feel guilty about thinking about quitting, and maybe that's what Bungie wanted from me (I'm not a whale in the sense they would want me to be, I'm just loyal) but I gotta see this through.
I know what would INSTANTLY make me feel better about Bungie's future: Pete Parsons stepping down.
I feel like I never hear anything positive about Destiny. It's as if those who still play it don't even like the game anymore but the habit has been formed so they continue regardless.
People say this yet Trials of Osiris is one of the most cutthroat PvP modes around nowadays. It's always had a population problem because it's so hardcore and there's barely any incentive for casuals, the skilled players just eat everyone up.
I can assure you that a part of the community is like that (And they post on Reddit lol)
The highs are still amazing and the game for me at this point is just a vehicle to catch-up with my buddies. It gives us a reason to get together and hangout. Anyone with a busy schedule whether be it kids or life can appreciate it.
The Walking Dead is like that and it has I don't even know how much spin offs.
I mean that's a good opinion to have and it's yours. But people calling Bungie and Destiny "rubbish" when it's one (if only) of the most succesful GaaS for 9 years means it's an opinion against a successful model.
You cannot convince me that the game has been fundamentally running on the Whales fumes for nine years when the store has been cosmetic for 90% of the time.
As a old league of legends player who had to contact riot to ban me and block my account because I could not stop playing, I can say that it's literally addiction
There's a bit of a level of baseline anger all the time, for reasons I won't get into, but you can probably assume, based on what you've read in these articles.
One clarifying point — I never called Bungie rubbish (outside of its leadership). Heck, I didn't even call Destiny rubbish. I called the content — that is missions, quests, world layout, etc. rubbish (outside of the raids). Especially compared to their previous series — Halo.
Idk how Bungie gets those numbers back up
Your final season leading up to final shape is now extended to an amount of time that has zero story ramifications.
Once the Final Shape releases and the first raid is out, and the story is wrapped up, there has to be a reason to keep playing besides
"a new kell has risen in House Stagnation"
"Calus Loyalist have taken over a Bath House in Neumona"
"Someone is pulling the strings of the taken again "
Your final season leading up to final shape is now extended to an amount of time that has zero story ramifications.
Once the Final Shape releases and the first raid is out, and the story is wrapped up, there has to be a reason to keep playing besides
"a new kell has risen in House Stagnation"
"Calus Loyalist have taken over a Bath House in Neumona"
"Someone is pulling the strings of the taken again "
I do not know why you are taking segments of posts like there is no body to anything else.
Bungie released Destiny and people were shocked as to where the content was, what was the story?
It took up to the third expansion for them to get it right, then it was downhill.
They launched Destiny 2 in a worse state than the original game, and it took them up to the third expansion to get it right again. All that while, they continued messing up and apologizing.
They couldn't pay me to fall for Destiny again, im still pissed they couldn't even get the character transfer right.
vs
I somewhat liked 1 despite being disappointed with it, had hope 2 would fix it and immediately get greeted by that.
Honestly they have so much talent I wish was being nurtured better.
I feel this so hard. My handsome Destiny 1 guy went through the Bungie-mangler and came out looking like a Silent Hill mannequin.
I do wonder how much of Destiny 2's current struggles can be attributed to the positively kookoo bananas new player experience where you're starting in the middle of the story with a few cutscenes and missions to catch you up. I know they want people to be invested in the characters, but at this point it resembles a kid telling an extremely long an elaborate story with his favorite action figures, but he's gotten so far in that he can't really tell you the overall premise or the exact events that lead to the current story arc. Alternatively, it's like Black Clover or Fairy Tail if you only had access to a few volumes of the manga and had to figure out the finale based on that.
I understand that a lot of people don't necessarily care much about the story, but Destiny 2 also has so many mechanics, systems, and currencies now that it's pretty hostile to learn it from a mechanical perspective too.
I understand that a lot of people don't necessarily care much about the story, but Destiny 2 also has so many mechanics, systems, and currencies now that it's pretty hostile to learn it from a mechanical perspective too.
I can feel your anger through your posts. I am so sorry that this happened to you and everyone else.
I sincerely wish you well in your recovery and my wish is that things work out for you and everyone. ❤️
They got their hooks in you deep. Sunk cost fallacy. Once you uninstall and never look back you'll realize how much time you could've spent on new game experiences you actually enjoy instead of grinding out the same bounties in the same zones
The seasons have had really strong story moments, too, that've kept me going week-by-week. Season Of Dawn where you rescued Saint, Season Of The Chosen where Crow saves Zavala, and Season Of The Splicer with Saint's "You are my people!!" in the final mission and Season Of The Seraph's where Rasputin sacrificed himself, those last two ones both had me crying. It's been a lot more than grinding out the same bounties in the same zones that's been bringing me back.
Aside from those finales of those seasons, there have just been good character moments interspersed throughout, both in cutscenes and in the lore books in-game. I want to see how this whole game I've been playing over the last 9 years (well almost 9 years; they kinda lost me during Rise Of Iron but I came back for D2) has led up to this conclusion with The Final Shape, and my outlook on D2 having a satisfying conclusion to this whole saga was bright, mainly because Season Of The Witch has had such phenom story beats and mechanics throughout. All the way up until these mass-firings which have left me gobsmacked.
You might be right, but I'll be honest: it's the experiences with people and the gun play that keeps me coming back.
I have VERY fond memories of this game and I'll keep it 100: I'm not ready to let them go. Not yet. Could be SCF, could be copium, but while I see an end coming, I don't want it to end like this.
statement on path forward
Bungie.net
www.bungie.net
A blue engram that decrypted into a green helmet. At least it's SOMETHING. 🙄
Only line missing was "We are doing more with less as we are passionate about The Final Shape"
Now those people we love and respect are gone, less of us are going to make the game better than we'd planned to before.
Not stepping one foot on that bridge.
Not stepping one foot on that bridge.
You know in a day and age where companies put out half-baked apology statements, I'm happy to see Bungie just sidestepped the concept of "admitting fault" and "showing empathy" and "trying to rebuild trust" and just skipped to the part where they tried to get more people to preorder the next FOMO expac. Good job bungie for being consistent! /s
650 employees working on Final Shape and beyond. Hope it turns out well but we've heard this type of messaging from Bungie for a decade now lol.
There wasn't anything they could say in that post that would make people feel better. They're still reeling from this week's events, and I'm sure that whatever plans were in the pipeline are now in complete flux as they reassess the game and figure out what exactly they're going to do from here on.
At the very least, the parts they touched on - acknowledgement that they've lost the community's trust, diving into feedback for Lightfall and its seasons, needing to make sure The Final Shape is among Bungie's all-time best games, etc. - are a bit reassuring for me in the short-term. Ultimately, more needs to be said and shown from them, but... again, I don't think that's possible at this exact moment in time. Not when employees are still dealing with the fallout from Monday, and when they're probably upending their existing plans for the game in favor of something that will hopefully be better.
Just have to wait and see what they say in the coming weeks. It sucks, but that's just how it is. What matters is that the employees are taken care of.
EIDT: Christ, they weren't advertising the expansion in this post. They were emphasizing that it needs to be great if they want to regain trust, which is true. Some of y'all are too fucking cynical.
At the very least, the parts they touched on - acknowledgement that they've lost the community's trust, diving into feedback for Lightfall and its seasons, needing to make sure The Final Shape is among Bungie's all-time best games, etc. - are a bit reassuring for me in the short-term. Ultimately, more needs to be said and shown from them, but... again, I don't think that's possible at this exact moment in time. Not when employees are still dealing with the fallout from Monday, and when they're probably upending their existing plans for the game in favor of something that will hopefully be better.
Just have to wait and see what they say in the coming weeks. It sucks, but that's just how it is. What matters is that the employees are taken care of.
EIDT: Christ, they weren't advertising the expansion in this post. They were emphasizing that it needs to be great if they want to regain trust, which is true. Some of y'all are too fucking cynical.
"IMO" ?
Bungie.net
If you still had a social media team you would have done a better job at this. Silence would have been enough. Telesto is broken we patched it would have been enough.
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I guess my problem is the post presents it as if the reason they've lost the community's trust is because Lightfall was disappointing and the seasonal model has gotten a bit stale, when that, to me at least, is more of a temporary stumbling block than anything (the current season is one of the best they've done imo, and the changes they had already discussed for the future seem like they were already on the right track to get things to a good place, even if it's been a slower process than most would like), and the actual huge loss of trust has been from this week's layoffs, which the post barely adresses.
Basically this just reads to me like a longer version of that "right people" quote from Parsons.
Yeah, it's same old. I don't think they are run very well, they may at their core pull things out the bag and do good things sometimes but if they keep making the same mistakes, I don't think asking for trust and next time it will be better cuts it anymore especially as on top of these things, they just gouging their player base, respect I don't think so. Good people there, yes, big decision makers, no. Bungee are running like they've always been and it makes a mockery of fans.
The context here for those with cynical responses is having read countless Bungie "we hear you" blog posts in this same template.
If it doesn't work, the fault is entirely with the company making the statement. You can only say the same thing so many times before people start having their own reads on what's being said.
Some of us have been to this song and dance countless times before and know this is the usual pr thing they do when they fuck up over and over again.
"We are listening"
"We are taking your feedback seriously"
"We are going to start a strike team for listening and we will make a blog post about it but the listening won't be displayed in game"
Legit the only good thing Bungie has done well in the last few years is donating money to charity.
I have so many thoughts on Bungie and Destiny right now.
First, the layoffs are super not cool. The video game industry is such a revolving door of employment and uncertainty, I feel for anyone now looking for work and those that are constantly in fear for their current jobs. Where I live, there are a couple video game companies, and every now and then my wife forwards me a job opening that fits my area and I tell her I'd NEVER work for a video game company. Zero job security. I can't live in fear like that.
As for Destiny... I just finished Spider-man 2 and am in-between games, so now would be the perfect time for Bungie to announce something cool to get me to jump back in. This is not that news. Now, it would just feel depressing to launch the game. Should I get RoboCop instead?
And third... if Bungie mismanaged Destiny to the point where they were 45% below financial expectations... how are they the experts Sony bought to manage their GaaS plans? I have to wonder how bad The Last of Us Factions actually was. My thoughts are that Naughty Dog knows how to make a fun game, so Factions is probably fun in whatever state it's in right now. The problem was milking it for more money, right? And it was Bungie's call that it wasn't going to bring in constant money, but Destiny is also underperforming? I kinda want Naughty Dog to just ignore them and go full steam ahead with Factions. Maybe I just want more Last of Us and will take literally anything at this point. Yeah, that's probably it. JUST GIVE ME FACTIONS, PLAYSTATION!!!!
First, the layoffs are super not cool. The video game industry is such a revolving door of employment and uncertainty, I feel for anyone now looking for work and those that are constantly in fear for their current jobs. Where I live, there are a couple video game companies, and every now and then my wife forwards me a job opening that fits my area and I tell her I'd NEVER work for a video game company. Zero job security. I can't live in fear like that.
As for Destiny... I just finished Spider-man 2 and am in-between games, so now would be the perfect time for Bungie to announce something cool to get me to jump back in. This is not that news. Now, it would just feel depressing to launch the game. Should I get RoboCop instead?
And third... if Bungie mismanaged Destiny to the point where they were 45% below financial expectations... how are they the experts Sony bought to manage their GaaS plans? I have to wonder how bad The Last of Us Factions actually was. My thoughts are that Naughty Dog knows how to make a fun game, so Factions is probably fun in whatever state it's in right now. The problem was milking it for more money, right? And it was Bungie's call that it wasn't going to bring in constant money, but Destiny is also underperforming? I kinda want Naughty Dog to just ignore them and go full steam ahead with Factions. Maybe I just want more Last of Us and will take literally anything at this point. Yeah, that's probably it. JUST GIVE ME FACTIONS, PLAYSTATION!!!!
There have been like dozens of instances in Destiny's lifespan where it looked like Bungie's shittiness was going to pop the bubble of core faithful players. It's poetic to see that it finally just happened out of nowhere instead of with some big new shitty thing that they're doing to their audience. And maybe it won't stick. Maybe the usual platitudes will work as they have so many times before.