Sony Interactive Entertainment has announced that they have finalized an agreement to acquire Bungie. This is the development studio best known for creating iconic franchises like Halo and Destiny.
Sony will pay $3.6 million to acquire Bungie. Once the deal is closed, "Bungie will operate as an independent subsidiary" of Sony Interactive Entertainment. This means that the company will be led by a board consisting of Pete Parsons, current CEO and president of Bungie, and by the rest of the current team management.
An important point is that this news does not mean that Bungie games will become exclusive. In fact, Sony assured that the studio will remain a multi-platform company that will have the option to distribute its own games to "reach gamers wherever they choose to play."
"We've had a strong partnership with Bungie since the inception of the Destiny franchise and I couldn't be more pleased to officially welcome the studio to the PlayStation family," said Jim Ryan, president and CEO of Sony Interactive Entertainment. "This is an important step in our strategy to expand the reach of PlayStation to a much larger audience. We know how important the Bungie community is to the studio and we're excited to continue supporting them as they remain independent and continue to grow."
In a statement, Ryan reiterated that this alliance will serve to bring new experiences to the PlayStation community and the community that "Bungie has built." Thus, everything indicates that future content for Destiny, as well as the new Bungie franchise, will be games that will remain on Xbox and PC.
What could this mean for Halo and Destiny players?
Bungie clarified that Destiny 2 would not undergo any changes, and there will be no exclusive content on PlayStation either now or until the planned end of the game in 2024. In addition, they specified that all future Bungie games after Destiny 2 will be cross-platform.
So how does this deal affect you as a Destiny 2 player and fan? For the moment, absolutely nothing. But what about Halo fans? There have been strong rumors about the classic shooter coming to the Playstation Store even before the deal happened. Now that Sony owns Bungie, one can see why this has become relevant again.
Unfortunately, this does not mean you'll be able to play Halo on your Playstation, as even though Bungie created the Halo franchise and made the first handful of games, rights to the franchise still belong to Microsoft.
But it's not all bad news, as this means that new exclusives and IP's from the studio will be coming to the Playstation soon, so fans can look formward to that. You never know, we might just get the new hot shooter in the next years.
