Bungie Initiates Internal Investigation Amid Art Theft Allegations

Ah, okay, so here’s the thing. Bungie—yup, the game developers—got themselves in a bit of a pickle with this art theft fiasco for their game, Marathon. Who would’ve thought, right? They actually admitted (kind of bold, if you ask me) on some internal Discord thingy that some of their game art wasn’t theirs. Someone else totally made it.

So, there’s this artist, Fern “4nt1r34l” Hook—cool name, by the way—who went on Twitter. Seriously, who doesn’t air their grievances there these days? Anyway, she pointed out with pictures and all that Bungie totally swiped her designs from 2017. Like a retro heist or something! “Not like they had to hire me,” she admits—or fumes? “But they sure liked my designs enough to pilfer ’em.” Oof, that’s gotta sting.

Bungie, kind of scrambling here, then blurted something about how the person responsible isn’t working with them anymore. Fired? Quit? Who knows? But they’re on top of it, so they say. They did some detective work and were like, “Yeah, turns out an ex-artist sneaked those designs into a texture sheet we used.” Imagine the surprised Pikachu faces!

Now, I don’t know why, but they acted like they hadn’t a clue this could happen. Really? You’re a huge gaming company! Got layers upon layers of checks… or maybe not? They go, “We seriously care about this stuff.” And oh, they’re chatting with Hook to patch things up. Crossing their fingers, I guess.

They’re re-evaluating (or actually evaluating) their art assets now—especially the ones this mysterious ex-artist touched. Stricter checks. Yeah, maybe a little late, but at least it’s something. They ended with a big thanks to everyone who rang the alarm bell. Sort of like giving a toast after the ship hit the iceberg.