Sony released its most recent quarterly earnings report this morning, and while it generally was not very positive, there was at least some good news in it for fans of Bungie’s Marathon.
The extraction shooter that launched earlier this year has not performed up to anyone’s expectations when it comes to sales or players, but the game has been reviewed well by both critics and players alike, so PlayStation is not quite ready to pull the plug on the game.
Sony’s chief financial officer Lin Tao said in the earnings call that “earnings from Bungie’s title portfolio did not reach our expectations, so we downwardly revised our business plan and impaired the full amount of the fixed assets related to Bungie except for goodwill.”
Bungie was acquired by Sony in 2022 for $3.7 billion, but this new financial report states a $765 million impairment loss on the purchase, meaning that’s how much assumed sale value the studio has lost since then if Sony were to try and sell it again today. So, the news is not great, unless you’re an avid fan of Marathon specifically, which was given some hope.
“Player reception to Marathon is strong, with the game receiving a Metacritic score of 82 and more than 90 percent of the player reviews on Steam being positive,” Tao said. “Engagement metrics such as retention also remain at a high level.”
Tao also said that moving forward, the company will “aim to improve the performance of the game by working to retain highly engaged core users through the introduction of additional content, further improvements in the gameplay experience and expansion of the user base.” Marathon’s second content season is due to begin some time in June.
Whether Sony truly sees real value in Marathon’s future or it’s just not ready to take the full loss on Bungie’s acquisition is unclear, but the fact is that the game needs to see some improvement when it comes to revenue or else tougher choices may have to be made.
Bungie’s other game, Destiny 2, is a different story entirely. That game recently had a large update postponed indefinitely, and the studio said it will be addressing it and revealing more about it some time in June.
