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[Kotaku] The Messy, True Story Behind The Making Of Destiny

D

dex3108

Member
And we finally know something more

http://kotaku.com/the-messy-true-st...m_source=Kotaku_Twitter&utm_medium=Socialflow

In the summer of 2013, months before they were supposed to ship their next video game, the game developers at Bungie went into panic mode.

The storied studio, best known for creating the multi-million-selling Halo series, had spent the previous three years working on something they hoped would be revolutionary. Destiny, as they called it, was to be a cross between a traditional shooter like Halo and a massive multiplayer game like World of Warcraft. It was going to become a cultural touchstone. “We want people to put the Destiny universe on the same shelf they put Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter or Star Wars,” Bungie COO Pete Parsons said in an interview two years ago. Reports suggested that the publisher Activision had committed to a ten-year deal worth $500 million to make that happen.

Two years ago, something went wrong. Destiny’s writing team, led by the well-respected Bungie veteran Joe Staten, had been working on the game for several years. They’d put together what they called the ‘supercut’—a two-hour video comprising the game’s cinematics and major story beats. In July, they showed it to the studio’s leadership. That’s when things went off the rails, according to six people who worked on Destiny. Senior staff at Bungie were unhappy with how the supercut had turned out. They decided it was too campy and linear, sources say, and they quickly decided to scrap Staten’s version of the story and start from scratch.
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It’s not uncommon for a game’s scope to reduce during development, but Bungie had a unique problem. People who worked on this project say that one of Bungie’s fundamental issues over the past few years has been the game’s engine, which the studio built from scratch alongside Destiny. Four sources pointed to Destiny’s technology—the tools they use to design levels, render graphics, and create content—as an inhibiting factor in the game’s development.

“Let’s say a designer wants to go in and move a resource node two inches,” said one person familiar with the engine. “They go into the editor. First they have to load their map overnight. It takes eight hours to input their map overnight. They get [into the office] in the morning. If their importer didn’t fail, they open the map. It takes about 20 minutes to open. They go in and they move that node two feet. And then they’d do a 15-20 minute compile. Just to do a half-second change.”

...

“A lot of the problems that came up in Destiny 1, and that happened in development of The Taken King, are results of having an unwavering schedule and unwieldy tools,” said a source. “Bungie is ravenously appreciative of the people that play their games, and they listen, they listen so clearly. But because the tools are shit, and because no one can reach consensus on how to fix the game in the time that’s allotted, you get a lot of sort of paralysis.”
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J

jbug617

Banned
Probably the reason why Staten left

In the summer of 2013, just over a year before Destiny came out, the story got a full reboot, according to six people who were there. Bungie ditched everything Joe Staten and his team had written, reworking Destiny’s entire structure as they scrapped plot threads, overhauled characters, and rewrote most of the dialogue. The decision was made against Staten’s wishes, sources say. Destiny project lead Jason Jones and the rest of senior leadership were unhappy with the writing team’s supercut, and their reaction was to scrap it all.
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Whompa02

Whompa02

Member
holy damn...that must be heartbreaking.

Too campy? Their ads are all super campy...what a shame. Hypocritical.

I returned that game less than a week of owning it...extraordinarily underwhelming.

The sad thing is, Halo started pretty campy too...they didn't see that they had something good going, and instead forced a rewrite. Real sad to hear that.
 
B

Banderdash

Member
giphy.gif
 
U

ultron87

Member
Interesting to hear that the microtransaction stuff originated from Bungie and was proposed to Activision instead of the other way around.

The grind of this process led Bungie to approach Activision with another proposition that would alter the ambitious release schedule they’d previously agreed to: They had released two DLC packs, The Dark Below and House of Wolves, and they had released one expansion, the codenamed Comet that was properly titled The Taken King. What if, instead of releasing two more DLC packs after The Taken King, they tried something new? What if they sold cosmetic items in the Tower? And then put out a dripfeed of free content to keep people playing in the months before “Destiny 2”—or whatever they wind up calling it—in the fall of 2016?
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J

Jobbs

Banned
Does explain a lot. I played through the game at release, finished what was the final story mission, said "that's it?" and had a hearty laugh. Never really played again (in earnest).
 
J

Jachaos

Member
Som the guy was writing a Star Wars/Halo-style story, Activision wanted Destiny to be mentioned with those names and then they decided against it? Yep, that's stupid.
 
F

Finaj

Member
Wait, they thought Staten's story was too campy and linear? What do they consider the final product's story to be then?
 
iNvid02

iNvid02

Member
i dont really care about destiny, but yeah i gotta read this

edit: wow, they really did stitch it back together in a frankenstein manner.
 
M

maxiell

Member
It’s also clear that Destiny is one of the best-looking video games ever made.
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What now?

From the rumors we had, Staten's story sounded like a disaster. Jones was right to focus on the gameplay, ship what they had and try to start over in Destiny 2.
 
A

antennaehead

Member
Great article.

One particular bit that caught my attention:

That entire last Mars chunk was later cut and passed to Activision subsidiary High Moon Studios to develop for Destiny’s full-sized 2016 sequel, a source said
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Does this mean that Destiny 2 will not be developed by Bungie?
 
F

Familienoberhauptvogel

Banned
Honestly could it possibly have been worse than what we got in the final cut?

Why would you scrap a bad story when you don't have the leniency to make a better one and why would the leadership not come to the conclusion sooner.
 
S

Seven4sses

Member
Damn, Bungie. I really wanted to like Destiny, but with what little you had, it just couldn't happen. This is all kinds of fucked up.
 
D

DNAbro

Member
When Jason posted on twitter about a story you've been working on year for I knew it had to be what happened to Destiny. Fantastic read and great insight.
 
S

Scientist Supreme!

Banned
I always feel like "bad" for reading stuff like this because I doubt the people involved would want there business out there but I would be lying if I wasn't kinda curious.
 
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