It seems as though more and more in-the-know people are weighing in on the deeply unfortunate situation at Bungie. Following on from the news that the studio has shed 220 of its employees — with another 155 being integrated into positions at PlayStation — the Destiny developer has now been accused of overselling itself to Sony — back when the Japanese giant acquired the company in 2022 — and promising a kind of commercial success that simply wasn't realistic.
"I think Sony overpaid for Bungie," an ex-Bungie source told Game File (paywall with a free trial). "I think Bungie sold things they were just not able to deliver," they added.
It's a damning quote when you consider the $3.6 billion buyout fee, on top of how Bungie has seemingly handled its business since the acquisition. It gets even crazier, though, with one source stating that the alternative to a sale could well have been "insolvency".
The question, then, is whether Sony saw all of this coming. It's not a great look for former boss Jim Ryan and his entourage if the firm did indeed overpay for a developer that would, just two years later, find itself in a financially questionable state.
In any case, these quotes remain eye-opening, and this isn't the first time that claims of overpayment have been made. Almost immediately after the deal was first announced, outspoken analyst Michael Pachter said that Sony "vastly overpaid" for Bungie "in desperation". Most Push Square readers agreed with him, by the way, as per a public poll at the bottom of that linked article.