November 1, 2023

Destiny 2 Fans Refund Next DLC to Support Bungie Employees

The last few days have been adamant and disturbing for the Destiny 2 Community. There has been some unfortunate news about layoffs inside Bungie and information about The Final Shape delay until June. However, what mainly affected most of the community was the former info, as more than 100 people suffered, among them many talented individuals, such as composer Michael Salvatori. Yet, the final straw was the following news.

IGN published more details about the layoffs and what was said in the studio. Among all that, fans noticed a phrase by Pete Parsons stating that one of the main reasons for the dismissals was the “underperformance of Destiny 2 over the last year” with “lower-than-expected pre-orders” for The Final Shape DLC. Naturally, this phrase was interpreted as “Fans are to blame for what happened to these poor people, not us,” which sparked a massive wave of criticism:

Bungie: If you had pre-ordered/bought from us more, they wouldn't have lost their jobs.

Maybe if you had listened to your staff, who begged you to make necessary changes instead of telling them you can't ship a product because it's "overdelivery," this might not have happened.
— Destiny Bulletin (@DestinyBulletn) October 31, 2023

Remember this ?
Tipping point… pic.twitter.com/viFyc21t1t
— Re:Nato 2303 (@Nato2303) November 1, 2023

Some fans went further and began to cancel their TFS pre-orders outright. These are long-time studio supporters since the first game, but the management’s actions caused them to turn away. According to IGN news reports, the higher-ups are ignoring player feedback and blaming the sales decline on employees who have consistently voiced player feelings to them. For the fan base, this was the final straw:

Ive never cancelled a destiny Expansion pre-order even when i hated what destiny 2 was at some points. But holy fucking the way the higher ups at bungie just basically killed the company and are blaming the employees like holy fucking balls man. Would rather spend money on gacha pic.twitter.com/e5cv0pCCki
— Ritsuka (@MagicalFatDude) November 1, 2023

Will you be keeping or cancelling your Destiny 2 The Final Shape pre-order?
— The Destiny Show (@thedestinyshow) October 30, 2023

The mood on Reddit is no better. Lots of people are calling fans to cancel their pre-orders, while others discuss how they don’t even feel like getting TFS despite having played thousands of hours into it. Moreover, some players have noticed that even if they cancel the pre-order, they will still receive all the items associated with it, which won’t be removed from their account:

i kinda feel uncomfortable pre-ordering Final Shape now…
byu/Astralith2004 indestiny2

Reminder: If you refund/cancel your pre-order you still keep the rewards
byu/Piyaniist indestiny2

Although the community previously did not consider expansion sales to have any impact, they now believe otherwise. It remains uncertain when Bungie will respond to the latest news and how they will attempt to justify the management’s actions. The studio has laid off many people who wrote TWiDs, so it’s unknown whether an article will even appear this week. However, one thing remains clear — the studio has lost the public’s affection and cannot win it back.

Thanks for Reading! Owl is Flying Away.