Destiny 2 Ends as Marathon Becomes Bungie and Sony's Last Live-Service Hope

Monument of Triumph, Destiny 2's final-ever content update, launched on June 9, 2026, drawing peak concurrent Steam players of 167,867 — levels not seen in nearly two years and far above the sub-40,000 peaks the game had been posting since the start of the year. The update was sweeping in scope, restoring vaulted content, reversing unpopular design decisions, and including material originally planned for a cancelled expansion. Meanwhile, Marathon — Bungie's extraction shooter launched in March — saw its 24-hour Steam peak fall to around 16,000–17,986 players, trending toward its all-time low of 10,921. Former Bungie community manager Liana Ruppert pushed back on direct comparisons, arguing Marathon was never designed to match Destiny 2's scale and is more analogous to Escape from Tarkov, and that Bungie's financial difficulties predated Sony's $3.7 billion acquisition, which she described as an 'emergency' move to prevent the studio from closing. Sony has publicly backed Marathon despite taking hundreds of millions in impairment losses against Bungie, but the game's underperformance — including a free trial period that failed to sustain momentum — has raised fears of further layoffs and questions about Bungie's long-term future. Bungie is now experimenting with PvE modes and other changes to broaden Marathon's appeal, but analysts note the game was never intended to carry the weight now placed on it.