Former Destiny 2 and Marathon game director Christopher Barrett has sued Bungie and Sony over allegations that his former employers "deliberately destroyed Barrett’s reputation by falsely, and publicly, insinuating they had 'investigated' Barrett and 'found' he had engaged in sexual misconduct." Barrett says in his suit that the companies engaged in the "brazen scheme" to avoid paying him more than $45 million he was owed under his employment agreement, and to "shift blame for and deflect attention from their massive business failures."
"This case is about Defendants’ textbook scapegoating of Christopher Barrett, who was, until recently, one of the most respected artists in the videogame industry," the lawsuit states. "Defendants deliberately destroyed Barrett’s reputation by falsely, and publicly, insinuating they had 'investigated' Barrett and 'found' he had engaged in sexual misconduct.
"Defendants did not care that none of it was true; they had blatant motivations for their brazen scheme: (i) to avoid paying Barrett the nearly $50 million he is owed under his employment agreement, and (ii) to shift blame for and deflect attention away from their massive business failures. And to achieve those corporate objectives, they were willing to sacrifice Barrett."
A long-time Bungie employee with credits going back to Myth 2 and Halo: Combat Evolved, Barrett was highly regarded among Destiny fans and seen as one of the key drivers behind the Forsaken expansion that was widely viewed as righting the Destiny 2 ship when it launched in 2018. In 2023, he was selected to direct Bungie's Marathon reboot, but a year later he was unexpectedly replaced in the role by former Valorant game director Joe Ziegler.
Barrett updated his X profile to indicate he'd become "executive creative director" at Bungie, but a Bloomberg report in August said he'd been fired in April, a month after his replacement as Marathon director, following an investigation into multiple complaints about inappropriate workplace behavior. Multiple sources told the site that at least eight women had complained about him, and a subsequent investigation found that he had called lower-ranking female employees attractive, asked them to play Truth or Dare, and talked about his wealth and power within Bungie, apparently suggesting that he could help their careers at the company.
In the immediate wake of the allegations, Barrett denied any intentional wrongdoing. "I feel that I have always conducted myself with integrity and been respectful and supportive of my colleagues, many of whom I consider my closest friends," he said in a statement. "I never understood my communications to be unwanted and I would have never thought they could possibly have made anyone feel uncomfortable. If anyone ever felt that way about their interaction with me, I am truly sorry."
Now he's pushing back more forcefully. The lawsuit claims that after a "remarkable ride" over a 25-year career at Bungie, during which he "drove the artistic development of some of the world's most legendary video games franchises," he was removed from his role by Sony, "acting in concert with Bungie," in a "premeditated scheme to terminate Barrett, avoid paying him the tens of millions of dollars he was owed, and make him a scapegoat for Defendants’ business failures and reputational issues."
Barrett claims he was never shown the alleged inappropriate communications during an investigative interview with a member of Sony's legal team, nor was he asked whether he'd engaged in "inappropriate sexual conduct," or had retaliated or discriminated against other employees for rebuffing his advances. Instead, he was "asked questions about run-of-the-mill communications" involving routine workplace interactions.
"Less than three weeks after this interview, Barrett was notified via Microsoft Teams that he had engaged in unspecified 'gross misconduct' and would be terminated for 'Cause'," the lawsuit states. "Defendants refused to explain further and told him that nothing he could say would make a difference, despite never giving him a chance to engage with the allegations in the first place."
The suit further claims that Sony and Bungie followed this up by providing "wildly misleading statements" to Bloomberg insinuating that he had engaged in sexual misconduct: "Defendants did not care if the public was misled. Indeed, that was the point. Barrett’s high standing within the company and the industry made him the perfect scapegoat to conceal Defendants’ significant cultural problems and business failures."
As a result of Sony and Bungie's actions, the lawsuit says Barrett "has been the subject of harassment and public ridicule, has lost friends and professional opportunities, and has seen relationships with family strained. His lifelong dream of launching his own videogame company (once within reach for a respected designer of multiple legendary games) has been crushed. All in the name of advancing Defendants’ selfish corporate interests."
Barrett is seeking $200 million in his lawsuit, including $45,579,627 (plus interest) owed under his employment agreement, another $45.5 million for violation of Washington state's Wage Rebate Act, and "not less than $100 million" in defamation and punitive damages. He's also asking for reinstatement as Franchise Game Director on Marathon, the position he held prior to his dismissal.
Separate from the lawsuit, it really bears stating that $45.5 million is an extraordinary amount of money to be paid to a single developer, even one as highly placed as Barrett. Sony spent lavishly to keep experienced developers around when it acquired Bungie in 2022—roughly $1.2 billion of the $3.6 billion purchase price, in the form of "deferred payments to employee shareholders, conditional upon their continued employment, and other retention incentives," went toward employee retention—but so much going to one guy is astonishing, and it naturally leads to questions about what other senior staff at Bungie might have earned as part of the deal.
I've reached out to Sony and Bungie for comment on the lawsuit, and will update if I receive a reply.
