Bungie's Marathon reboot gets new director as part of creative leadership shakeup

Bungie is reportedly in the midst of a creative leadership shakeup that has resulted in the studio replacing game directors on its PvP reimagining of classic 90s shooter series Marathon, with former Valorant game director Joe Ziegler now confirmed to be in the role.

Bungie designer Christopher Barrett was previously leading the project – described as a “sci-fi PvP extraction shooter” – but when reports began circulating that he was no longer in the role, Joe Ziegler took to social media to confirm he was now in the game director's chair.

“For the last nine Months I've been working on Marathon as the game director,” Ziegler wrote in a post on Twitter/X. “We're still baking, but I'm excited to share with you more info on the game as we get closer and closer to bringing it to all of you.”

According to IGN's sources, Ziegler's appointment is part of a creative leader shakeup at Bungie, which comes amid “ongoing anxiety” following last year's layoffs at the studio. Those layoffs saw 100 Bungie employees lose their jobs in what Bungie boss Pete Parsons later described as a “sad day” for the studio – a statement called tone deaf at the time.

Bungie's layoffs reportedly followed dwindling Destiny 2 player numbers, alongside disappointing pre-order numbers for this year's The Final Shape expansion. Shortly after confirming the job cuts, Bungie announced it was delaying The Final Shape's release by four months, while Marathon – the studio's next big live-service gambit – was delayed into 2025.