Former Destiny designer Josh Hamrick confirms on Twitter that after a year at Bethesda Game Studios, he is returning to Bungie, presumably to work on Rise of Iron and Destiny 2.
Last year, there was a lot of hand-wringing within the Destiny community when senior designer Josh Hamrick announced that he was leaving Bungie in favor of a new job at Bethesda. Destiny has certainly had its ups and downs since its launch in 2014 but the community had largely credited Hamrick with many of the online shooter’s best qualities, including a lot of the work around the game’s gunplay and sandbox elements.
But now, it appears that after a year at Bethesda, Hamrick is going home. Hamrick confirmed the news of his return to Bungie on his Twitter and the turn of events is being met with excitement on the Destiny subreddit.
Hamrick’s first stint on Destiny had him working at Bungie from vanilla through The Taken King expansion. Among his greatest hits was the design of the Gjallarhorn, one of the most powerful and best-looking weapons in the original version of the game. With Destiny’s next expansion, Rise of Iron, due out in less than a month, it’s unlikely gamers will see any major work from Hamrick in the near future, but he could certainly play a key role in the development of Destiny 2 in 2017.
As for Bethesda, Hamrick’s decision to leave seems to have been amicable. Hamrick posted a heartfelt message Friday night that seemed to be aimed at his fellow developers at Bethesda Game Studios.
