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Destiny 2 developer Bungie has been hit with another round of layoffs today as the studio announced it was letting go of 220 more employees. This latest round of layoffs for Bungie comes just after the studio cut around 100 employees in October of last year.
The announcement was made on the official Bungie website on the morning of July 31, with Bungie stating that the layoffs would be about 17% of its staff. According to Bungie CEO Pete Parsons, who addressed the community and Bungie’s employees in the announcement, Bungie made this decision due to increasing costs, an economic slowdown, and a sharp industry downturn.
In addition to the reduction in staff, Parsons states that around 155 of its employees will be integrating with Sony Interactive Entertainment. This process will happen over the next few quarters Parsons says. And that by moving these employees over to various PlayStation teams, it allowed Bungie to lessen the amount of people that would be impacted by the layoffs.
Parsons also notes that the layoffs impact every level of the company including most of Bungie’s executive and leader roles. Layoffs have unfortunately become an increasing industry norm over the last couple of years. With Bungie owner PlayStation having laid off 900 of its own employees across studios back in February.
Bungie CEO says steps taken weren’t enough to avoid the layoffs
Bungie’s woes with financial challenges over the past few years are no secret by now to the players of Destiny 2. Less than favorable results for its last expansion, Lightfall, led the community to wonder what the future held for one of gaming’s most beloved studios. Things took a significant upturn after the launch of The Final Shape this year. An expansion that was critically acclaimed and extremely well-received.
But it apparently wasn’t enough to help Bungie’s financial situation. At least not to the degree that Bungie leadership was hoping. “Even with exhaustive efforts undertaken across our leadership and product teams to resolve our financial challenges, these steps were simply not enough,” Parsons says.
That statement may well be true. However, that statement seems to ring a little tone-deaf to some in the community. Multiple people have highlighted Parsons’ numerous classic vehicle acquisitions over the past year. Multiple posts on X are pointing out that Parsons has won multiple bids for several cars, trucks, and bikes since late 2022 totaling around $2.4 million.
Bungie is spinning off a new game and creating a new studio within SIE
Amidst all the changes, Bungie is also spinning off one of its incubation projects. The project isn’t mentioned by name since it hasn’t been announced. But it’s a new science-fantasy action game. The project will be headed to a newly created studio within PlayStation Studios to “continue its promising development” Parsons says.
This likely means that some or all of the Bungie employees who are being integrated into SIE are moving to this new studio to continue working on the project.