There has been buzz as of late surrounding the future of Bungie, Destiny 2 and the franchise at large, due to quiet from Bungie and Sony. With the stakes seemingly higher than ever, speculation is running rampant—one question remains, what’s next?
I’m not quite sure where to begin here. Like many players Destiny brought me many years of joy, friendships, opportunities and encouraged me to make a career pivot into writing, what I felt born to do. But post-final shape did something which I felt was unexpected.
Destiny is still here.
You’ll often catch lively conversations on Reddit, Twitch, and even YouTube about how the game is ”dead,” However, in reality, online expressions from creators don’t entirely dictate the overall success of the game. Community sentiment plays a significant role, but it’s just one piece of the puzzle!
I’m not going to pretend everything is okay with Destiny and it isn’t. When I look back to 2024, or 2025, something stood out to me with Bungie’s development cycle, and leadership. The Portal. Not only did it arrive at incredible speed, it only reflected half of the picture. No one asked for it. It was here I began to realize my thoughts/opinions weren’t as valued as they had been in the past.
Something I’m sure many players, and ex-bungie devs-alikes felt as they quietly jettison after the Final Shape. The truth is, only a very small 5-10% of game studios make the call on direction. I’m hoping and praying the development team get to share their fruits of labour and tell unbelievable stories that take players along with them on the journey.
Destiny 3’s Next Big Story
Currently, Destiny’s story sits within the “Fate Saga.” The Witness is gone, and Guardians have moved out of what became the Traveler’s garden within the Sol system to see what The Nine have been up to in secret within the Jovians (Jupiter’s solar system).
For Destiny 3 to launch with a bang, we need big stakes, and we need to understand the four dimensions within Destiny and who occupies them. Similar to the MCU’s Quantum Realm, Destiny’s universe has the Ascendant Plane, a netherworld of sub-space, if you prefer, that acts as a space between realities or a reverse space. It is not much different from how Ahamkara use the Anthem Anatheme.
In Destiny’s lore, this place holds within it a city of the Awoken, who regularly navigate through it for reasons that have never been made clear.
There are also planets like Torobatl, the Cabal home world, or Riis—home of the Eliksni people. See what I’m getting at here? The potential new worlds to tell great stories in are massive.
Renegade’s story has just concluded with VI (six), one of The Nine members of celestial bodies, backing the Barant Imperium, a runaway faction of Empress Caiatl’s soldiers who thought she’d gone soft after aligning with humanity of the Last City. This also led to the appearance of “Dregen Bael,” a half-baked human “Dark Guardian” who emerged from the suburbs of the city, disgruntled by how the Vanguard had been handling things on behalf of the people.
The campaign ended with Eido—of House Light—and Aunor Mahal, a Warlock of the Praxic Order, sharing redacted data on the death of three “The Spirit of Earth,” they called it. Now, Guardians must fulfill Three’s dying wish to “Bind the Nine.” Understanding what this means will be important if we want to stop universal extinction.
Running alongside this are pieces of history and lore about Lodi and the era his version of Old Chicago comes from. At this point, it is very clear he knows more than he is willing to share with us due to certain DOA (Department of External Observations) protocols.
There are many pieces to this puzzle, both in lore and in how Bungie navigates their next big transition.
The Cosmodrome Experience (New Player Experience)
D1 veteran players share stories about their first moments of waking up amongst the rust-infused wreckage of the collapsed highway roads, leading into the Cosmodrome. Lore gives bits and pieces of what it was like on Earth in those last moments before the conclusion brought by the Collapse.
If you ever find yourself with some extra time try reading the lore from: Last Days on Kraken Mare & Marasenna I think many stories like these could provide a good onboarding point for a potential Destiny 3. Unlike the first instalment Destiny 2 new players were brought into the game, narrative and wider-world of Destiny through the Red War campaign.
From a games’ development perspective, I think the key to gaining new players and retaining them will be how players are onboarded into Destiny the game, story and current events. Long term player frictions in past has come from:
- No distinction between new/or returning players and being forced into latest content.
- Knowing/finding out what is need to know in Destiny
- Communication & Community solidarity (Communication, events and more).
Some conversations within the community seem to focus on the differences between “casual players,” or “hard core players,” but historically gameplay had something for everyone. Crucible content for players interested in showing their chops on the battles field and PVE for Guardians with interest in pushing back darkness into a new frontier.
In my opinion these are some of the themes that really bring Destiny to life.
Community Fireside Chat
What does it look like to build business principles that lead the way, take responsibility, but demonstrate care and compassion for their community. I’m sure you’ve heard, or read me say this before. Without a people-focused business plan? Customers won’t resonate with their products, because they cannot see themselves in it.
Game development is the one art form that combines multiple Creative practices and industries all at once. It’s a knifes edge process with the potential to go really well, or very, very bad quickly.
What could Bungie do to fix it?
Giving Bungie as a team time to work without interruption is really important. But honest communication becomes more and more critical the larger the company. The team knows this already.
It’s difficult to do your job if you aren’t being allowed to do it. Community managers like @dmg04 have to deal with this kind of pressure all the time. I can only imagine how stressful that is. When a smaller studio is bought there are three key areas that need to come into alignment for production to continue and move ahead without disruptions:
- Legal & Financial Integration – Contracts updated, ownership transferred, financial terms locked in.
- Operational alignment – Reporting structures, budgets, and strategy synced between the two companies.
- Employee & Leadership transitions – retention bonuses, new roles, and leadership reshuffles put in place.
This would mean Bungie needs to enter a transition period where the franchise needs reinvention, modernization, or a clear long-term vision to achieve success.
Expanding Destiny’s Universe
Personally I felt for a long time that Destiny sits in a unique space within the game’s industry, in fact there are very few titles that come close like; Digital Extreme’s Warframe. Which by the way is free-to-play game. I don’t mean that in a way of comparison, but observationally their game dev cycle, community management and business principles are just unmatched in my opinion.
Now, at this point we have no idea what’s been going on at Bungie. For all we know Destiny 3 has already been in production for a long time. If this turns out to be true? Then the Destiny community will be in for quite a ride on June 9th.
I don’t find joy in seeing any business with good people fail, much less game studios. Whiles jobs come and go. I can’t help feeling some level of compassion for the people I’d like to call friends and fellow creatives working over there.
I have lived through this and I understand how it feels.
How Could Things Change For The Better?
Destiny is in a pivotal position. No major announcements have been made, no road map, no indication of what’s going on at Bungie or what we can expect in the future. The last time this happened it was just before we learned about the original version of Lightfall before the Sony acquisition.
Over the last two weeks, content creators in the community have discussed the resurgence of Destiny 1, noting how good D1 was, and that we had it just right during Year 2 of Destiny 2.
I have been able to shake ideas, and thoughts shared over the last ten days. In that light I’d like to share my ideas for how imagine Bungie could shake things up:
- The Content Bridge (TCB) — This could work in a few ways
- Update Destiny 1 enough to the level Destiny 2 currently in. Why? For the last 10+ years one of the biggest challenges has been on-boarding new players. TCB would work to bridge the gameplay, narrative and core Destiny experience by on-boarding new players through D1 only, and then transitioning them from D1 to D2.
- Update Destiny 1 enough to the level Destiny 2 currently in. Why? For the last 10+ years one of the biggest challenges has been on-boarding new players. TCB would work to bridge the gameplay, narrative and core Destiny experience by on-boarding new players through D1 only, and then transitioning them from D1 to D2.
- Sunsetting D2 — Bungie would close shop on Destiny 2 and invest in brining D1 up to current standard, or potentially higher (UE5). The idea behind this is simple. D1 is a game using minimal resources to keep it going. It doesn’t quite make sense for resources to be poured into three products and have them all running subpar. At this point it would be fair to say that Destiny 1 has been running on autopilot without significant updates.
- Binding The Nine — Destiny’s story revolves around binding The Nine, its exact meaning unclear. It involves containing all members in one vessel. The precursors partially succeeded but faced dissent, turning their unified consciousness into disagreement.
What if the system really did collapse, and on the brink of utter destruction, the Last City would flee for the outer regions of space while the Guardian become a vessel to bind all The Nine within.
Destiny 3 Penumbral
Welcome to Penumbral my Destiny 3 relaunch. This fan made title focuses on going back. Before the Vex, before the Black Garden, before the Gardener & Winnower, before our universe.
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“No matter what you are facing at this moment in time, you can do all things! Stay safe, and God speed!”