Bungie isn’t related to Activision anymore, and it might bring some interesting results…

Bungie‘s statement revealed that Destiny’s publishing rights have moved from Activision (Activision Blizzard, to be exact) to the developers, which means the Destiny IP will be entirely in the devs’ hands. Activision‘s statement mentions that they „will increase their focus on owned IP projects.” (In other words, they will begin focusing more on Call of Duty again.)

Cowen & Company, an analyst firm, says that Bungie will self-publish Destiny 3, and it will happen in 2020, which would be reasonable – Destiny came out in 2014, followed by its sequel in 2017. A three-year plan would mean the third instalment follows next year. (However, Activision and Bungie initially signed for a bi-annual release schedule in 2010.) The firm thinks Bungie paid Activision for the rights, but not a lot of money – with Activision out of the picture, there won’t be „two cooks to spoil the broth.” The publisher cannot influence the devs anymore about how to work on the game. Destiny 2 was seemingly more aimed at the casual players, and while the Forsaken expansion turned things around, it didn’t bring back many players. Blizzard wrote on Twitter that despite the split, Destiny 2 will remain exclusive to Battle.net on PC (similarly to Call of Duty: Black Ops IIII).

So Bungie starts to walk its own way, which resulted in Activision Blizzard‘s stocks drop by 7% already on the New York Stock Exchange. Destiny 2’s update plans are not affected – the developers plan to reveal more details about it today. The publisher can now expect a significant loss of revenue via the split, that’s for sure…

Source: Gematsu, GameSpot, GameSpot, GameSpot, GameSpot