Destiny fans are lamenting the future of Bungie’s sci-fi shooter franchise, following a threadbare update this week, released while the developer focuses on supporting Marathon.
Destiny 2 Update 9.5.5.5 arrived on Wednesday, and its full patch notes read as follows:
And that’s it. Now, to be fair, there was no expectation that this week would bring a vast well of new Destiny 2 content to keep players occupied. Destiny players are also well aware of the fact Bungie is currently busy trying to make Marathon a success. But, as one fan put it in response: “I expected nothing and still got disappointed.”
Last month, Bungie announced via social media that it was delaying its next major Destiny 2 game update, Shadow and Order, by a full three months — from March until June — something it blamed on the need to make “large revisions” to its content.
At the time it announced that delay, Bungie avoided mentioning its simultaneous launch of Marathon, which would have arrived within the same release window — presumably to avoid the suggestion that one project was sapping resources from the other. But Destiny fans have found it hard to imagine a world where, had Bungie not been also focused on shipping Marathon, its revisions to Shadow and Order would not need to take as long.
Indeed, in its statement on the delay, Bungie seemed to go as far as it could to signal that things would be quieter for Destiny over the coming months, with basic maintenance and balance updates likely the only changes that players would see. The studio then thanked fans for their “continued patience and support,” before affirming that it would release more information on the update “closer to launch.”
For many players, the news felt like Bungie effectively moving its public focus on Destiny to the back burner until the summer months — something this week’s latest update has only cemented in fans’ minds, resulting in a mix of frustration and dark humor.
“Almost 3 hours of downtime for… this,” noted one fan, in a lengthy thread of complaints on reddit. “A single fix.”
“I’m curious – how many patches have only ever been one patch note?” questioned one fan. “Even dating back to Destiny 1, I feel like that has to be a rare sight. Not even dogging on the game/studio – genuine curiosity.”
“There’s literally no one working on this game anymore,” wrote another fan. “Dev team is genuinely one part timer huh,” added a second. “So effectively they’ve dropped Destiny entirely to work on Marathon? Sigh, could of at least released the DLC you announced first,” said a third.
“Next [blog] will literally just say ‘please play Marathon’,” reads another comment. “You can only laugh about it and then cry about what has become of the best live service game ever,” reads yet another.
IGN has contacted Bungie owner Sony for more detail on its content plans and resources available to work on Destiny, but did not receive a response. In the meantime, it remains a tough time for the developer and the nine-year-old Destiny 2, while there have also been mixed reports on Marathon’s initial launch performance so far.
Last year, Sony said Bungie had failed to meet its sales and user engagement expectations, following a notable drop in Destiny 2 player numbers. The damage was bad enough that Sony said it had been forced to record a 31.5 billion yen (around $204.2 million) impairment charge as a result of Destiny 2’s underperformance. That was significant enough to drag down profits at Sony’s Game & Network Services Segment, which includes Sony Interactive Entertainment.
“For years now, Destiny has been on this steady hardening of the core [audience],” Destiny 2 game director Tyson Green told IGN back in November. “More and more core players are staying and playing the game, but relatively few [new] people come into the game. There’s a tightening and contraction, and this presents problems for a game that you’re trying to maintain as a live service, especially when you want to keep serving those core players with great, compelling expansions.” Exactly when these might arrive, however, remains to be seen.
Tom Phillips is IGN’s News Editor. You can reach Tom at tom_phillips@ign.com or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
