Bungie

History

Founded in 1991, this Washington-based developer is the most unique first-party studio for a variety of reasons:

• Microsoft used to own Bungie when they created Xbox's flagship IP 'Halo'.
• Sony acquired Bungie in 2022, but they're the only first-party developer not part of PS Studios. They're an independent Sony subsidiary.
• Bungie are the only first-party developer who can port their games to competing platforms like Xbox.

Why does Bungie have more freedom than all of PS Studios? Desperation. Sony saw the money live-service games like Destiny were making, but had no in-house knowledge to make their own. To get Bungie to sell, Sony overpaid at $3.6 billion and accepted all their terms.

Bungie was meant to advise PS Studios on their live-service games while simultaneously raking in revenue from Destiny 2, but it turns out that the emperor has no clothes. D2 has been severely underperforming since the acquisition.

Since 2023, there's been many rounds of layoffs, Sony taking board seats, a migration of Bungie employers to other PS Studios, and a whole incubation team spun out into a new developer under PS Studios, (the MOBA Project Gummybears). Essentially, Sony are recouping what they can from Bungie once it became clear they wouldn't see ROI through their live-service expertise.

My Analysis & Predictions

On PS5, Bungie has only released a port of Destiny 2 in 2020. Although its final paid expansion, 2024's The Final Shape, was critically acclaimed, its underwhelming sales led to the hollowing out of Bungie and further integration into PS Studios.

Bungie also revealed Marathon, a live-service extraction shooter, in 2023. It then took until March 2025 to be showcased, with many playtests going on before releasing in September 2025.

To call Marathon important for Bungie is an understatement. For Bungie to keep any remaining autonomy, it must do well commercially and help justify the $3.6 billion acquisition. However, the lukewarm response so far suggests its not good enough to justify its $40 price tag.

I therefore predict that while Marathon won't reach Concord levels of failure, it won't prevent Sony from further making changes to Bungie and recoup as much as it can from a failed acquisition.

Some Examples Of Stolen Marathon Art Assets

PS5 Games