Report: Destiny sequel delayed from destined release

By Mike Epstein January 22, 2016

destiny 2 delayed report destinyattack — Image used with permission by copyright holder

The upcoming sequel to Destiny has been delayed from its projected release date in September, 2016, according to a report from Kotaku Friday.

Though Activision has never officially announced a Destiny sequel or its release date, documents outlining the publisher’s 10-year plan for the franchise were released during a 2012 lawsuit between Activision and former Infinity Ward developers. According to that plan, Bungie would deliver four Destiny games biennially, and an expansion pack in year between releases. Destiny was released in 2014, Destiny: The Taken King was released in 2015. “Destiny 2” should be released in 2016.

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This should not come as a surprise to Destiny fans: As the report points out, the game’s development and planning has been plagued by design overhauls that have drastically changed the game’s business model and content. According to another report from Kotaku last year, the developer re-wrote the game’s narrative during the summer of 2013, less than a year before the game shipped.

On the other hand, Bungie has warned fans that the timeline fans they’ve held on to since 2012 does not reflect their development cycle. In September, 2015, Bungie community manager Eric Osborne said the ten-year plan was strictly a legal document that was not directly applied to the game’s development cycle.

“It has nothing to do with the development of the game proper, Osborne told Edge. “To think that somehow, before Destiny had shipped, we had some ten-year plan written down somewhere? It’s comical.”

According to Eurogamer, Bungie has ditched the 2016 DLC release calendar for Destiny in order to free up more resources to work on the new game.

Meanwhile, Bungie announced plans to launch a Valentine’s Day-themed event in Destiny next month called “Crimson Days” Thursday on Reddit. Bungie said it would announce a “larger game update,” which will come out some time “after February.”

It’s unclear whether or not Destiny 2 will still be released in 2016.

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Michael is a New York-based tech and culture reporter, and a graduate of Northwestwern University’s Medill School of…

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Bungie plots Destiny 2: The Final Shape overhaul in wake of mass layoffs

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Destiny 2 developer Bungie has broken its silence after laying off around 100 staff members earlier this week. The studio posted a blog update that acknowledged the move and teased a major change in plans for Destiny 2's next big DLC, The Final Shape.

On Monday, October 30, Bungie laid off a sizable chunk of its staff in departments including community, QA, audio, and more. According to a report from IGN, Bungie CEO Pete Parsons cited Destiny 2's declining performance in 2023 as a cause. A report from Bloomberg noted that Bungie's upcoming projects were internally delayed as part of the move, with The Final Shape quietly moving to June 2024.

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Destiny 2 studio Bungie hit by layoffs, internal game delays

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Amid a wave of layoffs at Destiny developer and Sony subsidiary Bungie this week, Destiny 2: The Final Shape and Marathon have both reportedly been delayed.
On Monday morning, tweets from developers revealed that Bungie, which was acquired by Sony in January 2022, was suffering layoffs. This was followed up by a report from Bloomberg that went into more detail about the layoffs and their impact on Bungie's future games. Sony and Bungie have not officially commented on the delays yet, although the Bloomberg article mentions that Bungie CEO Pete Parsons will hold a team meeting later today to discuss the layoffs further. This all follows contractor layoffs at Sony studio Naughty Dog earlier this month, which happened as that studio struggles to develop and release a The Last of Us multiplayer game.

Bloomberg suggests that these layoffs, like others at Sony this year, are tied to internal game delays. While Destiny 2: The Final Shape is publicly slated to come out in February 2024, Bungie reportedly told staff that it's now going to come out in June 2024. Meanwhile, we learned that Bungie's revival of Marathon was apparently targeting a 2024 launch -- although no release window was given officially -- but will now come out sometime in 2025. These delays make the PlayStation 5's 2024 game lineup look pretty sparse right now outside of Final Fantasy VII Rebirth, and it suggests that Destiny 2's next season will be one of its longest.
As of now, Sony and Bungie have not publicly commented on the layoffs or delays, but we will update this post when they do say more about it.

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Mortal Kombat 1 already teased a sequel. Here are 5 key takeaways from the ending

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This article contains spoilers for Mortal Kombat 1.
Mortal Kombat 1’s story mode has a bombastic conclusion.
Thousands of characters from a multiverse of timelines face off against each other as Liu Kang and Shang Tsung from Mortal Kombat 11: Aftermath’s ending have their final battle. It has a fairly definitive conclusion, with Liu Kang winning and the multiverse continuing to exist, mostly in peace. When it comes to what’s next for the “new era” Liu Kang created, NetherRealm Studios does leave some plot points, especially in the canon Tower character endings, to potentially follow up in a sequel.
Some of the threads that NetherRealm can follow up on are character-specific, like Reptile looking for who was murdering Zaterrans who could turn human or Jax and Kenshi joining an Outworld-focused division of the FBI. Five narrative beats, in particular, could potentially set up the main conflicts of the game’s inevitable sequel. If a follow-up to Mortal Kombat 1’s story does come around, these are some developments that you should expect it to follow up on.
Lord Havik is coming for Liu Kang’s new era

Throughout Mortal Kombat 1, Havik is a minor player in Liu Kang’s new era, serving as a grunt for Shang Tsung before getting part of his face melted off by Scorpion. It looks like this character introduced in Mortal Kombat: Deception will play a much more significant role in a Mortal Kombat 1 sequel, though. A post-credit scene in the game shows a Titan version of Havik, who likely is the master of his own timeline, walk in the aftermath of Mortal Kombat 1’s final battle.
After killing a Jax variant, he waxes poetic to evil-looking versions of Kenshi, Tanya, and Quan-Chi about how glorious it was to see warriors from across timelines all fighting in one place and how it ended too quickly. He concludes by saying: “Next time, it won’t.” It’s safe to assume that this version of the character, referred to in-game as “Lord Havik,” will be the next multiversal threat to Mortal Kombat’s timelines. He will surely create lots of chaos for the heroes.
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