Last year during the Game Developers Conference, Bungie creative director Joseph Staten hinted that the studio might be building an online persistent world, saying "wouldn’t it be great if we could make a world that was always there for you?" Now an ex-Bungee contractor has stepped forth to confirm the game's existence.
According to the source, the unannounced title will be a Sci-Fi-based massively multiplayer online first-person shooter. The project itself is dubbed as "Tiger" but currently goes by the name of Destiny, the studio's original post-Halo franchise. It will reportedly use a new Bungie-developed graphics engine and feature "unique online connectivity and matchmaking technology."
The source indicated that Destiny will be like "World of Warcraft in space."
Naturally Bungie has not commented on the MMO information. However, the ex-contractor claims to be one of thirty terminated contractors who recently cited claims of "budgetary concerns" and unfair treatment against the studio. The alleged terminated contractors included producers, artists, programmers, security, and most of the IT staff.
"We were given no warning and were actually told there was a 'full-time employee only meeting' and that we had to leave the building early, only to find out once we left that our email accounts were killed," the contractor claimed.
Bungie retaliated against the allegations, saying that it was never asked to lay off any employees or contract employees by Activision Blizzard, for any reason. "The talented professionals who grace our offices day in and day out are the lifeblood of Bungie--our most cherished commodity--and the unsubstantiated rumors posted today are in direct opposition to the culture and values that we believe make Bungie an exceptional place to work, and to call home," the developer stated.
Bungie added that it has not experienced layoffs or group firings of any kind.
With that said, current news regarding the Destiny MMO may be completely fabricated, feeding off previous hints thrown out by Bungie's Joseph Staten, Activision's COO Thomas Tippl and Microsoft Game Studios VP Phil Spencer.
Last week Activision CEO Eric Hirshberg said the unannounced Bungie game will present a "new universe" for gamers to explore, but don't expect it to arrive on store shelves this year.
