Destiny 2’s game director has announced that he will be leaving Bungie

The game director of Destiny 2 has announced that he will be leaving Bungie soon.

In a thread on X, Joe Blackburn stated that he would be departing from the company in February when it performs its ‘end-to-end playtest’ on Destiny 2’s upcoming expansion, The Final Shape.

Describing the playtest as a “ritual” Bungie always performs and that involves “multiple days of consecutive internal playtesting”, Blackburn said: “Heading into this milestone, I’ve gotten to play hundreds of hours of The Final Shape, and what the world-class talent here at Bungie has created has quickly become of the things I’m most proud to have worked on throughout my career.

“This ritual will be especially meaningful to me personally, as it will also serve as a moment to pass the torch of Destiny 2 Game Director to the next era of leadership as I head on a new adventure outside the walls of Bungie.”

Blackburn will be replaced by Tyson Green, who joined Bungie as a level designer on its 1999 PC game Myth II, and went on to work as a designer for most of Bungie’s subsequent games, with key roles including multiplayer design lead on Halo 3 and game design lead on Destiny and Destiny 2.

“If you’ve followed Bungie for any length of time, you’ve heard his name,” Blackburn said. “From Halo PvP to the creation of Exotic weapons in Destiny 1, Tyson has been a critical part of Bungie’s legacy since Myth II.”

Bungie officially delayed The Final Shape in November. Originally given a February 27, 2024 release date, The Final Shape will now launch on June 4.

It was announced last year that Bungie was the latest Sony Interactive Entertainment studio to be hit with layoffs, with Bloomberg claiming roughly 8% of the company’s workforce was affected, amounting to around 100 staff.