Bungie discusses the future of Destiny and the studio
In an interview with TotalXbox, Destiny director of production Jonty Barnes has explained what the future holds for the new series and what Bungie plans to do after release.
Speaking in the interview Barnes noted how Destiny is a huge investment for both developer and publisher. They are working on making a huge series with multiple instalments but the director refused to be drawn on exactly how many games would feature in the series. “So what I’ll say to you is: we said that we were a ten-year game, and both Activision and Bungie have committed to being wholly behind the large effort,” explained Barnes. “And it’s a large investment for both sides. I don’t think there’s any set date – ten years is just representing the go-forward presence and the way that we think about doing things.
He also spoke about the relationship with Activision, which appears to be a very enjoyable collaboration. “[As you can see] by our outward-facing relationship with Activision – it’s been a great collaboration,” said the director. “I mean that whole-heartedly from having to manage the relationship myself quite a bit personally as a production director. I mean, I think they’re just very smart – they understand the games industry. I’ve worked with a lot of publishers over the years, obviously as it’s my twenty-fifth year, and I was certainly impressed with the expertise that they had and the amount of gamers that exist within the organisation.”
Barnes later said that Bungie are unlikely to be working on any other projects in the near future due to the scale of Destiny and what they hope to achieve with the franchise. The director elaborated: “I think it’s very hard to imagine anything detracting from our focus on Destiny right now. I think we’ve got really ambitious plans going forward, we’ve really built a foundation for the universe and we have really elaborate plans to build upon it.”
The developer also moved to prevent any fears about problems Destiny could face at launch. A common occurrence in big games in recent times has been in problems with online components immediately after launch. Battlefield 4 was one such example from last year. But Barnes explained that Bungie will be taking extra care as millions of people jump online to play Destiny. “Everyone’s going to be around for launch,” said Barnes. “We want to be there and make sure everything works well and we give the great player experience that we intend.”
Destiny is Bungie’s first game since their separation from Microsoft and the first non-Halo game they have worked on since 2001. The game is set to launch globally September 9 and will be available for the Xbox One, Xbox 360, PlayStation 4 and PlayStation 3.