Bungie’s ‘Destiny’ Is An FPS MMO, Claims Fired Contractor [UPDATE]


An anonymous source, who claims to have recently been let go by Bungie, has suggested their latest game – named ‘Destiny’ and codenamed ‘Tiger’ – mixes FPS elements into an MMO with a Sci-Fi setting. According to the source, he and roughly 30 other contractors were let go yesterday citing “budgetary concerns” from their “publisher”. The game is set to be published by Activision Blizzard. Bungie has updated their site denying their publisher asked them to let go of any staff.

According to the source, every non-full time member of staff was let go with little to no notice.

I and about 30 other people were let go for no reason recently after Bungie decided to let go every employee who wasn’t full-time employed, this included producers, artists, programmers, most of the IT staff, and security. We were given no warning and were actually told there was a “full-time employee only meeting” and that we had to leave the building early, only to find out once we left that our email accounts were killed.

The source claims contractors were given little time to leave the premises, with some not allowed to return to pick up personal belongings.

Bungie told our agencies that it was “performance related” – but one of our fellow fired-employees was an IT contractor, and showed us an email he received before his account was killed, citing “project sensitivity” and “budgetary concerns from our publisher” budgetary concerns is laughable considering the scraps we were paid.

The source stated that the claim contractors were released as a result of ‘poor performance’ were unfounded. He suggested some had in fact previously been rewarded for their hard work.

Bungie can’t get away with firing 30+ people, leaving them stuck surprised and having to find new work to feed their families, unable to get unemployment benefits because of the false ‘performance related’ remarks. One of the IT contractors let go actually had just won an award for his performance that afternoon.

A representative for Activision Blizzard declined to comment, stating they don’t respond to rumour and speculation.

5.55pm
Bungie has responded on their website stating the following.

This evening, Kotaku Australia published a blog entry to their website claiming that Bungie recently terminated as many as thirty contract employees without notice or justification, effectively eliminating all non full time staff at the request of our publisher, Activision-Blizzard.

The claim is false.

Bungie has never been asked to lay off any employees or contract employees by our publisher, Activision-Blizzard, for any reason. The talented professionals who grace our offices day in and day out are the lifeblood of Bungie – our most cherished commodity – and the unsubstantiated rumors posted today are in direct opposition to the culture and values that we believe make Bungie an exceptional place to work, and to call home.


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