Warframe community director and live ops lead Megan Everett has said that “no one is celebrating” the “heartbreaking” news that Sony pulled the plug on Destiny 2 support.
Both sci-fi shooters have had just enough in common to keep them in the same conversation for more than a decade. It’s a friendly competition that carried developers Digital Extremes and Bungie from the 2010s into the 2020s but, when the latter announced it had shuttered all plans for future updates in May, both communities largely decided to lay down arms.
As Destiny players come to grips with the end of what has evolved into a go-to video game for thousands, some members of the Warframe team have chimed in to bid them farewell. Everett elaborated on her feelings during a conversation with Eurogamer.
“Truthfully, it’s heartbreaking. It’s earth-shattering,” she said. “I never thought I’d ever see the day where I’d read an article from Bungie about Destiny 2 essentially shutting down.”
“I’m speaking personally, but I know people would echo it as well. No one is celebrating the fact that this has happened to Destiny, and its players and that story. I know that people have obviously compared us in terms of being ‘direct competitors’ and stuff like that. But I think a game is healthy when you have competitors, and [Destiny’s developers] have done such an amazing job at trying to grow that story regardless of whatever situation they were in.”
The end of Destiny 2 came as a shock to everyone – Bungie included. After the announcement that support was winding down, Forbes reported that much of the studio’s staff was unaware of plans to cease support until the public announcement. It means development on more Destiny content had continued even after the decision was made. The final update, Monument of Triumph, was launched on June 9.
It’s been a tough pill to swallow, and one that’s resulted in Destiny fans signing petitions and flooding livestream chats, seemingly to no avail. Everett is one of many who saw fans flock to Destiny 2’s aid in its final days but, for her, it’s hard not to imagine the outcome if the cavalry had shown up sooner.
“I think what’s unfortunate and sad is they announced this was happening, and suddenly people are showing all this support for them,” she added. “They’ve been getting a lot of negativity for all this time, and it’s like, where was all this love? People need to put the hate away and show the love, because they could have really used that. I know it was there, but it wasn’t as vocal as maybe some of the negativity.”
Other members of Digital Extremes have already offered their thoughts on the end of Destiny 2 support. Warframe creative director and Lotus actor Rebecca Ford was one of the first to share appreciation for Bungie’s impact, calling Destiny a “force of nature” and adding that “there is no Warframe without the legacy of Bungie games.”
Everett said that the community team has seen comparisons between Warframe and Destiny “almost every single day.” The die-hard players who have logged hundreds – if not thousands – of hours into each game will tell you that the two have less in common than many would think. They each have their own strengths and have been appreciated by different players for different reasons.
Now, as the competition dies down, Everett says she would “never say what has happened to Destiny is a good thing.” For Digital Extremes, the existence of a competitor as towering as Destiny seems to have only helped Warframe grow.
“I think having games that are similar enough that the communities can come together and talk about both games, and maybe educate people on those games so people go to both, that’s not a bad thing,” she added. “I’ve said for forever, I never expect anyone to only play Warframe. You would burn out so fast if you did. So having other games that scratch a similar itch is healthy for our genre. Having Destiny was healthy for us.”
For more, you can read what IGN learned when we caught up with the Warframe team to talk more about its latest update, Jade Shadows: Constellations. You can also see how Destiny 2 players did their best to crash servers with the launch of Monument of Triumph.
Michael Cripe is a freelance writer with IGN. He’s best known for his work at sites like The Pitch, The Escapist, and OnlySP. Be sure to give him a follow on Bluesky (@mikecripe.bsky.social) and Twitter (@MikeCripe).
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