Sony Interactive Entertainment has announced that it is acquiring Bungie, the makers of the Destiny series, for 3.6 billion USD.
Bungie will remain an “independent and multi-platform studio and publisher“, the PlayStation Blog post reads. So they are not exactly under the PlayStation Studios banner, but still under the PlayStation umbrella.
Destiny 2, which now has cross-saves and cross-play, will remain available on all consoles, and so are any future games IPs. Rather with this acquisition, Bungie wants to expand further to more platforms, including other entertainment mediums like TV and film.
On the post at Bungie.net, Bungie CEO Pete Parsons said: “Like us, SIE believes that game worlds are only the beginning of what our IPs can become. Together, we share a dream of creating and fostering iconic franchises that unite friends around the world, families across generations, and fans across multiple platforms and entertainment mediums.”
So what’s in it for Sony with this deal, then?
In a gamesindustry.biz interview with SIE CEO Jim Ryan on the Bungie deal, Ryan stated that having Bungie on board gives PlayStation Studios access to development experience in making live service games, which Destiny 2 is one, as well as more experience when it comes to developing on multiple platforms.
PlayStation Studios are renowned for their high-quality single-player experiences, but nothing to write home about regarding multiplayer and live services.
Bungie was founded in 1991, making them already a 30-year-old company. In its lifespan, it had been acquired by Microsoft, created the now-ubiquitous Xbox series Halo, gained back independence to work on the Destiny IP with Activision (which recently is being acquired by Microsoft) before they split ways to operate Destiny 2 independently. The Destiny series has also been strongly marketed by Sony in the past.
The acquisitions in the video games industry continue it looks like, and Sony is set to add more game developers under its fold.