While nowhere near as much as the near $70 billion Microsoft spent buying Activision Blizzard, Sony has still dropped a sizable amount of money on acquiring Bungie, the studio behind Destiny 2, specifically $3.6 billion. Now it’s transpired that a fraction of that will be used to make sure none of Bungie’s staff leave.
According to Sony’s recent earnings report for the third quarter of the 2021 fiscal year (which ends on March 31), approximately a third of the $3.6 billion (so $1.2 billion) will be spent on a strategy to incentivize Bungie employees into staying with the studio.
As Sony notes in the report, the majority of Bungie’s shares are owned by employees, so Sony will be providing deferred payments to employee shareholders as well as other benefits. These will be paid over the course of several years even after the acquisition closes and will be recorded as expenses.
What’s more, Sony expects about two thirds of these deferred payments and incentives to be expensed within the first two years following the acquisition’s closure. The deal is expected to finalize in 2023, assuming it is approved by regulators.
It’s somewhat surprising to see Sony drop all this money on Bungie considering it won’t entirely be a first-party studio once the acquisition is complete. Unlike other studios purchased by Sony like Spider-Man developer Insomniac, Bungie will still function as an independent studio with the freedom to release its games on multiple platforms, not just PlayStation.
One analyst has claimed that Sony has overspent on the Bungie acquisition, driven out of desperation no doubt because of Microsoft’s own major acquisitions. Sony certainly sees nothing but benefits to the deal. Aside from acquiring Bungie’s IPs like Destiny, Sony also seeks Bungie’s expertise on live-service games. This is an area Sony is clearly very keen to thrive in, with the company already confirming plans to have 10 live-service PlayStation titles out by 2026.
Those aren’t the only plans Sony has for Bungie either. With it looking to bring its video game properties to television and film, as demonstrated with projects like the Uncharted movie and The Last of Us TV show, it hopes to adapt Bungie’s IPs for the silver screen. The obvious choice is Destiny, but Bungie does have a few other franchises to call its own, like the fantasy tactics series Myth and 2001 shooter Oni. Although if any of them is going to get a movie first, it will undoubtedly be Destiny given its relevance and popularity.
Source: Sony