Instead, we get this:

https://www.bungie.net/7/en/News/article/ourpathforward

I'm... not sure it's enough. We'll see, I guess.

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Damn, is it time for the annual “Sorry, we fucked up, we’re listening, we promise this time,” already? Didn’t we already have one of those this year?

Shame they fired their communications team, I’m sure one of them could have come up with something better than this empty horseshit. Literally staying silent would have been better than this.

They definitely had to say something, but of course, what do you even say in a situation as dire as this? I certainly don’t know. I’m not a communications expert. Perhaps it would have been appropriate to include a greater acknowledgement of management’s role in dropping the ball and bringing us into this situation — but then again, I’m not naive enough to believe that Parsons or anyone else in the C-suite would ever sign off on admitting such a thing publicly.

Ultimately, the one and only thing they can do to truly fix this mess is to deliver a world-class finale to The Light and Darkness Saga and then maintain momentum with strong continued post-saga support. Bungie will be relying on the sustained financial success of Destiny 2 in order to complete development of both Marathon and Matter, so they cannot afford to take their eyes off the ball now. It may even require an “all-hands-on-deck” crunch a la Halo 1, Halo 2, Destiny 1, or Destiny 2; as much as Bungie has talked about wanting to move beyond “crunch culture”, inflection points like these really demand their full attention as a studio.

Oh, one other thing, and this is directed at management specifically: If you're not going to take accountability for your own failure to lead, but you are going to acknowledge losing player trust, then at least have the decency to admit that you laid these people off by choice. They didn't just "part ways". You forced them to leave. Perhaps you would not have lost so much player trust if you had any respect at all for player intelligence.

then at least have the decency to admit that you laid these people off by choice. They didn't just "part ways". You forced them to leave. Perhaps you would not have lost so much player trust if you had any respect at all for player intelligence.

That’s why staying silent is better. Unless they actually say that, any statement they put out is lying horseshit, so they might as well just shut the fuck up. The effect is much the same, except the one where they’re silent doesn’t also insult my intelligence.

This pisses me off even more as time continues to pass.

The fact that the dev team was left to take the hit for this lay-off is fucking disgraceful. Why were they the ones who were tasked with writing this message to the community? Shouldn't that task have fallen to upper management?

Where is the leadership?!

No one with a brain has any issue at all with the dev team here. The issue is with upper management and their complete failure to take accountability. The fact of the matter is that Bungie is now in a position where The Final Shape must deliver on the promise of being an S-tier expansion, which will require overtime — and very likely crunch — from the dev team in order to be achieved in the time available to them. Yes, even with the delay.

That is entirely the fault of management. So why aren’t we hearing from them?

Where is the leadership?!

Where is the leadership?!

They’re still busy counting the nearly $4 Billion they stole from Sony, lol.

I dunno where anyone's blood pressure levels are at, but I recommend averting your eyes if that's a going concern for you:

Management said other levers were looked at to avoid layoffs. When employees asked if one lever was executive compensation, they were told no, and that it would not happen at the company.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/paultassi/2023/11/03/new-revelations-about-destiny-2-declines-bungie-layoffs-and-final-s...

This whole situation is just the worst and I hate it.

I’m not naive enough to expect that upper management would actually consider reducing their own salaries. That’s not how it works. I will credit Parsons for waiving his annual bonus, since apparently he did that, but that’s just a show of solidarity and does nothing to address the root problem.

I do expect them to take accountability for their own failures at a bare minimum, though. They should admit to their own culpability here. They should also be making proactive systemic changes to their management culture in order to ensure that this sort of thing never happens again. (For example: Maybe it’s a bad idea to ramp up hiring and start a brand new game project on the basis on one aging MMO’s projected revenue stream, because what if you’re wrong? Oops.) If they don’t, then they deserve whatever comes next. I would expect continued drops in revenue and much higher employee attrition rates. The business world does not reward incompetence.

Yes, I’m sure they have golden parachutes in case anything drastic ever happens, but it’s generally understood that deploying a golden parachute to escape a dying company is career suicide.

Glad I'm not running Bungie. And if I were running Bungie, my first priority would be making sure I have the trust of my remaining employees. The challenge is that we live in a polarized world where self-righteousness is the coin of the realm, and where many actions taken inside the studio become public and inevitably part of a larger narrative that is shaped by people who know only a quarter of the truth, but who have megaphones nonetheless. In such an environment, any apology will tend to be taken at its face as disingenuous, unfortunately. The most important question going forward is, in the midst of this pecking party, can Bungie retain the talent it needs in order to produce content that appeals to and maybe even impresses its fans? I hope so.

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Well, sure. Ultimately, you are right. A CEO must be concerned with the internal affairs of the company he is tasked with running above all else. Outside voices cannot override what he knows to be true within the walls of his own fiefdom.

All we are doing here is commentating based on what we know. This entire situation seems to be the fault of management. I think it is therefore important for management to acknowledge their role in creating this mess. A good faith show of self-awareness may go a long way towards securing the trust of Bungie’s remaining employees.

I don’t see that. I see the standard C-suite “duck and cover” maneuvering that rears its ugly head whenever things go south. Behind closed doors, I suppose it is entirely possible that Parsons has adopted a conciliatory tone and pointed fingers at specific managerial decisions that led us to this situation. I’m not there, so I cannot know.

But I don’t see that.

I see the exact opposite.

I’m not naive enough to expect that upper management would actually consider reducing their own salaries. That’s not how it works. I will credit Parsons for waiving his annual bonus, since apparently he did that, but that’s just a show of solidarity and does nothing to address the root problem.

Reducing executive pay by any reasonable amount would exactly be "just a show of solidarity." The optics are bad enough that they should have considered it, but if we're talking dollars and cents then lopping off huge swaths of workers all the way from grunt (which still pays very well in tech) to senior levels eclipses hypothetical C-suite cuts many times over. Especially when you include their benefits.

And if you cut executive pay by an unreasonable amount, not only would you still be in a huge financial hole but the executives would only be temporarily inconvenienced before finding a much better paying job down the (literal or figurative) street.

Sadly, it just doesn’t work that way. The C-suite never slashes their own cut by choice. Unless you’re looking at Nintendo, it’s never happened in this industry to my knowledge.

Sadly, it just doesn’t work that way. The C-suite never slashes their own cut by choice. Unless you’re looking at Nintendo, it’s never happened in this industry to my knowledge.

Japan has their own culture around executive responsibility where failures are treated... harshly. And that's really the only way to support such a system: overwhelming cultural forces ingrained in everyone since birth. You could write an employment agreement for a C-suite position in Bellevue which says "if sales are disappointing, you will commit seppuku," but your pool of candidates will be quite small.

You can still get your karmic justice without giving the C-suite a phony 10% haircut by trusting that their resume now has a black mark. "I was Chief X Officer at Bungie during a disastrous period when we grossly underperformed and had to lay off vast swaths of our workforce, torching goodwill among our fans and garnering weeks of humiliating press coverage" doesn't exactly sparkle.

Yes, I’m sure they have golden parachutes in case anything drastic ever happens, but it’s generally understood that deploying a golden parachute to escape a dying company is career suicide.

Is it, though...? And I don't see why executives can't cut their salaries to help retain some employees. It's not illegal or anything. They can do that. They just choose not to.

”I was Chief X Officer at Bungie during a disastrous period when we grossly underperformed and had to lay off vast swaths of our workforce, torching goodwill among our fans and garnering weeks of humiliating press coverage" doesn't exactly sparkle.

No, but, “I grew Bungie to the point where it was bought for $4 Billion” probably still does. I’d be surprised if any job he would be looking for cares about literally anything wise, especially when the rest of the industry is also laying off just as much as their workforce.

No, but, “I grew Bungie to the point where it was bought for $4 Billion” probably still does.

But what does the future hold? What did they give up to get there? I'm going to call it and say Bungie never again has a game that's as big a hit as Halo, or even Destiny. They might manage to do okay financially, but it won't be on that level. But more importantly: I just don't see them making anything as interesting, creative, or groundbreaking moving forward. What good is a 4 billion dollar sale for the people playing if they aren't going to get videogame art?

Do you think the Bungie of today is capable of something like Dark Souls? Nier Automata? Death Stranding? Disco Elysium? FF7 Remake? Tears of the Kingdom? Baldur's Gate 3?

When Bungie got bought in 2000, I wrote them off but came back when I saw what they made. This time, I don't foresee that happening.

No, but, “I grew Bungie to the point where it was bought for $4 Billion” probably still does.

But what does the future hold? What did they give up to get there? I'm going to call it and say Bungie never again has a game that's as big a hit as Halo, or even Destiny. They might manage to do okay financially, but it won't be on that level. But more importantly: I just don't see them making anything as interesting, creative, or groundbreaking moving forward. What good is a 4 billion dollar sale for the people playing if they aren't going to get videogame art?

Do you think the Bungie of today is capable of something like Dark Souls? Nier Automata? Death Stranding? Disco Elysium? FF7 Remake? Tears of the Kingdom? Baldur's Gate 3?

When Bungie got bought in 2000, I wrote them off but came back when I saw what they made. This time, I don't foresee that happening.

I don't disagree with that. I'm saying it doesn't matter to the people at the top who got the 4 billion dollars. They won, whatever happens now is irrelevant. The goal of leadership of Bungie isn't to make good video games, it's to make as much money as possible. They already got 4 billion, anything that keeps coming is just gravy. Sony really got ripped off.

I don't disagree with that. I'm saying it doesn't matter to the people at the top who got the 4 billion dollars.

Correct. But it matters to US, and it matters to the arts culture of video games.

Yes, I’m sure they have golden parachutes in case anything drastic ever happens, but it’s generally understood that deploying a golden parachute to escape a dying company is career suicide.

Did you know Golden Parachutes were initially designed as an anti-takeover strategy? As in, if you buy the company and force out the executives, you'll have to pay out EVEN MORE. It was supposed to make a takeover less attractive.

Look how that ended up.

No, but, “I grew Bungie to the point where it was bought for $4 Billion” probably still does.

But what does the future hold? What did they give up to get there? I'm going to call it and say Bungie never again has a game that's as big a hit as Halo, or even Destiny.

On paper you might be proved wrong, but otherwise, this is a bit like saying there won't be another band like the Beatles, and that is correct--they're can't be, because that point in history will never be again.

They might manage to do okay financially, but it won't be on that level. But more importantly: I just don't see them making anything as interesting, creative, or groundbreaking moving forward. What good is a 4 billion dollar sale for the people playing if they aren't going to get videogame art?

Maybe. I think we've been in an age of refinement for a very long time. AI will probably be behind the next big leap, and I think, at this point, predicting the source for that is like picking out the next great singer out of the maternity ward.

Do you think the Bungie of today is capable of something like Dark Souls? Nier Automata? Death Stranding? Disco Elysium? FF7 Remake? Tears of the Kingdom? Baldur's Gate 3?

Could the makers of those games create Destiny or Destiny 2? Those games are likely better games on the video game art scale. On the other head, for game feel? For visual and aural design? Bungie still reigns supreme to me, but I say that not having played (or finished) those games.

When Bungie got bought in 2000, I wrote them off but came back when I saw what they made. This time, I don't foresee that happening.

I bet you'll at least come back to criticize those who come back. :-)