Bungie

Bungie started in Chicago in May 1991, when University of Chicago student Alex Seropian founded Bungie Software Products Corporation to publish Operation: Desert Storm. He had already released Gnop! for free, which the studio counts as its first game. In an artificial intelligence class he met programmer Jason Jones, and together they released Minotaur: The Labyrinths of Crete (1992); both are regarded as co-founders. They made games for the Macintosh and assembled the boxes by hand in Seropian's apartment.

Its first commercial success was Pathways into Darkness (1993), a first-person shooter. Marathon (1994) followed, then Marathon 2: Durandal (1995), which was also ported to Windows 95, and Marathon Infinity. Bungie then changed genre with the strategy game Myth: The Fallen Lords (1997), its first simultaneous Mac and Windows release. That year it opened Bungie West in San Jose, California, which made Oni (2001). In 1999 it unveiled Halo: Combat Evolved at Macworld Expo.

Microsoft announced it had bought Bungie on 19 June 2000, and Halo became a first-person shooter exclusive to Xbox, while the rights to Myth and Oni went to Take-Two Interactive. Halo (2001) became the console's flagship series, followed by Halo 2 (2004) and Halo 3 (2007). In October 2007 Bungie split from Microsoft and became independent again, though Microsoft kept Halo. It still made Halo 3: ODST (2009) and Halo: Reach (2010), its last game in the series.

In 2010 it signed a ten-year publishing deal with Activision that produced Destiny (2014) and Destiny 2 (2017); in 2019 it ended the deal and kept Destiny. Sony Interactive Entertainment completed its purchase in July 2022, and layoffs followed in 2023, 2024 and 2026. In August 2025 Justin Truman replaced Pete Parsons as chief executive. Based in Bellevue, Washington, Bungie released the extraction shooter Marathon in 2026, and in September it announced more content for Destiny 2 and new ways to play Marathon.