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Bungie Devs Say Atmosphere Is ‘Soul-Crushing’ Amid Layoffs, Cuts, and Fear of Total Sony Takeover - IGN

blue velvet

blue velvet

Member
Jim Ryan truly made a huge doodoo buying a developer that hasn't made anything since 2017 for 3 billion dollars. I seriously doubt they put so much thought into it, it was certainly a panic buying after MS was trying to get COD/Activision. 3 billion for a mid ass hell GAAS developer. For that money, Sony could easily revive those IPs they just left to rot or even better build their own studio that focuses on multiplayer games.

There's no guarantee Bungie's next game is going to be a huge success or even profitable, GAAS games are extremely hit or miss. No wonder Jim is leaving after making such a mess.
 
JohnnyFootball

JohnnyFootball

GerAlt-Right. Ciriously.
blue velvet said:
Jim Ryan truly made a huge doodoo buying a developer that hasn't made anything since 2017 for 3 billion dollars. I seriously doubt they put so much thought into it, it was certainly a panic buying after MS was trying to get COD/Activision. 3 billion for a mid ass hell GAAS developer. For that money, Sony could easily revive those IPs they just left to rot or even better build their own studio that focuses on multiplayer games.

There's no guarantee Bungie's next game is going to be a huge success or even profitable, GAAS games are extremely hit or miss. No wonder Jim is leaving after making such a mess.
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The purchase of Bungue was all the more infuriating when you saw how cheap Embracer brought up Square Enix Western Studios with franchises like Tomb Raider, and Deus Ex.

Don't get me wrong, I am not advocating for consolidation, but if I had to choose between Sony acquiring a developer or Microsoft, I would easily choose Sony since I have faith that they would enable their studios to actually utilize the IPs. Microsoft at this time, has not demonstrated any ability to utilize the IPs they have acquired, aside from Gears of War. MS has had Bethesda studios for 3 years and all they've gotten out of that is Redfall and Starfield. One of those was decent and the other was a disaster.
 
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RoboFu

RoboFu

One of the green rats
killing off more studios.. ... Damn it Phil!

But seriously, its probably for the best. There a lot of Talent there that just needs a good captain.
 
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Yoboman

Yoboman

Member
Looks to me like they got rid of some absolute bums and are focusing in on people who want to make fun games

jvGfncZ.jpg


Shocking. If you want to be indispensable to a company then maybe your time should be spent harnessing game development skills, not creating little gay clubs
 
Vlodril

Vlodril

Member
Some people live in an alternate reality. Destiny were mediocre but it made a gazillion money as a series. No one cares about Marathon but it was the most viewed trailer when it came out (on not e3 i think).

Destiny lost me personally when i tried to go back and co-op it with my brother (after finishing the campaign on release) to find that the content was missing. Not sure how the hell users accepted that shit.

That doesn't make them dead or useless suddenly. They need to put their head down and work to get Marathon to the best place possible (and maybe figure out a way to restore cut content on Destiny 2).

Cdpr fucked up pretty badly but they managed to turn it around with some big changes to the company and some hard work.

Now it's Bungie's time. Not sure why a takeover by Sony completely would be a bad thing either.
 
FoxMcChief

FoxMcChief

Gold Member
How did Sony not see this coming? Bungie has been in a downward spiral since the launch of Destiny 2. They banked way too heavily on GaaS.

Maybe Sony was blinded by their GaaS hard on they’ve had for the last year or two.
 
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Baki

Baki

Member
Real DEI is great and a net positive. DEI used as a marketing prop is not helpful and a facade used by leadership to hide behind. I’m not sure which one applies to Bungie.

This article is from the perspective of a few disgruntled employees, so it does not paint an accurate picture of internal morale. Bungie added about 400 new people to the company post Sony acquisition. I don’t think reducing headcount by 100 is unreasonable considering the company missed projections by 45%. Complaining about having bonuses slashed 100% to 80% comes off as entitled when the team collectively missed targets by 45%. Everyone wants the praise and the pay but no one wants to be accountable for the misses. This is one of the problems with hiring too many remote workers quickly, it breaks down company culture.
 
Crayon

Crayon

Member
Well all I know is the players don't seem too happy about the product which speawks volumes. Even then, it's hard to take the words of a disgruntled young tech person these days. Somehow I think the knitting club is lower on the list of problems they got going. btw, some would be shocked at how much money a company can budget towards things like that. Not all the time, but it happens.
 
Pop

Pop

Member
Just what they need is a complete Sony takeover

Bungie is lost, they need some guidance
 
semiconscious

semiconscious

Member
proandrad said:
Honestly articles like these make a left wing hippy like myself want to go full red pill. You work for a video game company, these people act like they are a minimum wage line cook at McDonalds.
Click to expand...
the insidious way that this ideology has managed to attach itself to, infiltrate, & influence the thinking of these various governments, institutions, & private companies has been both very impressive & very disturbing to witness - 10s of thousands of employees basically working what's nothing more than an academia-inspired grift...

does it affect creativity/productivity? i mean, how could it not? otoh, yeah, bungie absolutely has other, & bigger, 'issues' to deal with beyond just this one...
 
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Krieger

Krieger

Member
Bungie are the idiots who wanted to use that Latinx bullshit, right? Fuck'em, fire the whole board of directors and anyone who colors their hair.
 
Orbital2060

Orbital2060

Member
JohnnyFootball said:
The purchase of Bungue was all the more infuriating when you saw how cheap Embracer brought up Square Enix Western Studios with franchises like Tomb Raider, and Deus Ex.

Don't get me wrong, I am not advocating for consolidation, but if I had to choose between Sony acquiring a developer or Microsoft, I would easily choose Sony since I have faith that they would enable their studios to actually utilize the IPs. Microsoft at this time, has not demonstrated any ability to utilize the IPs they have acquired, aside from Gears of War. MS has had Bethesda studios for 3 years and all they've gotten out of that is Redfall and Starfield. One of those was decent and the other was a disaster.
Click to expand...
Doom Eternal and Deathloop, too. And these are games that were in the making before Xbox acquired them. So quite the premature assessment.
 
DenchDeckard

DenchDeckard

Moderated wildly
So bungie management are shit. Aren't willing to take pay cuts etc to save the company but would rather let it rot slowly until Sony does a takeover.

What stops all the talent from leaving then if it ends up being a miserable place to work....

Ironic if Sony are the company to close bungie due to bungies own miss management.

I think Sony can turn them around so hopefully they step in soon and get rid of the higher ups that are so full of themselves
 
calistan

calistan

Member
tmlDan said:
They don't get paid for arts and crafts, they need to act like adults and make games or else they will have no jobs. I don't care about the devs if they don't produce quality content, they really do love playing the blame game.
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It's not about the arts and crafts, that's just an easy point for people to jump all over. (Ha ha, look at the purple-haired loonies crying because they can't do their knitting at work.)

The problem is that they've had a lot of layoffs under their current benevolent leadership, but there will be significantly more to come if Sony steps in. They're even less likely to make a great product in a climate of fear.

That said, I don't really care about them either - they haven't made anything worthwhile in ages, I won't mourn their demise. Pretty hard to see a way back for them if this is how their workforce really feels.
 
GHG

GHG

Member
Nihilum said:
Sounds a lot like Microsoft, bought a company but no idea how to run it.
Click to expand...

The whole point was to let them continue to run themselves.

If it were any other way then the employees wouldn't "fear" a Sony takeover.

Maybe they should stop worrying about free lunches, genders, diversity quotas and get to work. That way there would be nothing to worry about.
 
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proandrad

proandrad

Member
semiconscious said:
the insidious way that this ideology has managed to attach itself to, infiltrate, & influence the thinking of these various governments, institutions, & private companies has been both very impressive & very disturbing to witness - 10s of thousands of employees basically working what's nothing more than an academia-inspired grift...

does it affect creativity/productivity? i mean, how could it not? otoh, yeah, bungie absolutely has other, & bigger, 'issues' to deal with beyond just this one...
Click to expand...

Ok man, it’s also not that serious. It’s just a bunch crybabies sad the gravy train is coming to an end.
 
ByWatterson

ByWatterson

Member
Good.

I genuinely want a Destiny-world, third-person cinematic adventure. Put that shit in the Formula Machine and give it to me.
 
Mossybrew

Mossybrew

Gold Member
Also these computer touchers need to go work at WalMart for a month if they want to know what a soul-crushing job actually is.
 
Yoboman

Yoboman

Member
calistan said:
It's not about the arts and crafts, that's just an easy point for people to jump all over. (Ha ha, look at the purple-haired loonies crying because they can't do their knitting at work.)

The problem is that they've had a lot of layoffs under their current benevolent leadership, but there will be significantly more to come if Sony steps in. They're even less likely to make a great product in a climate of fear.

That said, I don't really care about them either - they haven't made anything worthwhile in ages, I won't mourn their demise. Pretty hard to see a way back for them if this is how their workforce really feels.
Click to expand...
There is something more fundamentally wrong if cutting back on knitting and gay dating clubs in a period where they all need to come together to turn things around is considered instilling fear
 
JohnnyFootball

JohnnyFootball

GerAlt-Right. Ciriously.
Orbital2060 said:
Doom Eternal and Deathloop, too. And these are games that were in the making before Xbox acquired them. So quite the premature assessment.
Click to expand...
Deathloop came out on PS5 first and Sony had a heavy hand in funding that. But sure, you can count it if it makes you feel better.
Doom Eternal came out in March of 2020. Bethesda was announced as acquired in Fall 2020 and completed in March of 2021

I have no clue how anyone with a functioning brain can argue that Doom Eternal is relevant when all you had to do was look at a calendar.
 
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GHG

GHG

Member
Why Sony didn't do due diligence to ensure they weren't acquiring a business full of unhinged wokies I will never know.

3+ billion down the drain.
 
Ogbert

Ogbert

Member
I just don’t buy this drivel about layoffs.

It happens. Get over it. We usually have one round a year.
 
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