It’s no secret that Bungie, developer of the Destiny franchise, has other projects in the works. It signed with NetEase for a new IP, which is believed to be Matter since it was trademarked around the same time. The studio also expressed interesting in releasing non-Destiny IP by 2025.
Plans seem to be ramping up for that project. In February 2020, Bungie began hiring for an Incubation Art Director on new IP that was “something comedic with lighthearted and whimsical characters.” In another job listing, this time for an Incubation Investment Designer, the developer describes working “in tandem with our sandbox and economy teams to build and distribute items to our players. Living inside a giant database of hundreds of baubles, weapons, and armor is nothing new to you. And neither is building a system to cleverly distribute those items in a necromancer’s dungeon.”
Indications that this could be another loot RPG are further revealed one of the responsibilities being to “Design, build, and tune a wide variety of pursuit and loot systems.” Applicants will also have to “Design for an overarching game economy and the constraints it presents”. All of this will sound very similar to Destiny fans, though this new IP may not necessarily be a first person shooter.
There’s also no indication as to whether this project is different from Matter or something else entirely. While the words “necromancer’s dungeon” may lead one to believe that it’s a medieval fantasy setting, these kinds of elements are also present in the Destiny universe which is decidedly sci-fi. As such, we’ll have to wait for an official announcement and reveal from Bungie. But that’s going to be a long way off.
In the meantime, Bungie is gearing up to showcase the next season of Destiny 2 (which is called Season of Arrivals) along with the next “chapter”. Stay tuned for more details later today.