Bungie has won a lawsuit against a Destiny 2 player for harassing a developer’s community manager and his wife, and he’s now paying heavily.
As an employee of a development studio, you often have to put up with angry words. In the case of a Destiny 2 community manager, the employer Bungie burst and the player in question was sued. With success, because the player has now been sentenced to 500,000 US dollars in damages for insult and threats.
According to the court report, the defendant left behind a “disgusting [und] “bigoted” voice message for the employee on their home phone after publishing one of the company’s “My Destiny 2 Story” posts promoting artwork by a black Destiny 2 fan.
The report also describes how the suspect repeatedly left “threatening” and “racist” text and voice messages to the community manager and his wife over a period of several hours. The situation escalated further when the accused ordered a “virtually inedible, smelly pizza” via an anonymous number to intimidate the couple and demanded payment on delivery, hoping to “reduce the likelihood of a conflict between the couple [Ehepaar] and to increase the delivery driver”.
Bungie didn’t hesitate to protect the employee and hired private investigators to track down the suspect. The company also organized protection for the couple. The incident also impacted Bungie’s other employees, as the developer was “forced to shield other employees” and lost a “dedicated veteran”. While the case was successful in its own right, he also encouraged the court to set the case as a precedent, which will help future victims of cyberstalking and phone harassment in at least the Washington area.
Bungie’s tough approach has garnered a lot of praise from other developers. The procedure is an example of how to deal with such incidents. Bungie has also paved the way for future lawsuits, or as JC Lau of Probably Monsters puts it clearly: “If you’re a piece of shit and consider harassing real people just because they’re trying to make video games, the legal precedent of being sued by the studio for half a million dollars might make you think twice. This is a huge win for developers in the industry.”
Bungie released the first dungeon of the year Destiny 2: Lightfall. Spirits of the Deep challenges the Guardians to descend into the depths of Titan’s methane sea to face the Radiant Host and learn what was lost beneath the waves. New treasures await the intrepid, including a new armor set and a new exotic strand tracer rifle.
