What’s cooking?: Former Valorant game director joins Bungie

Joe Ziegler, the former director of Valorant, has joined forces with Bungie after working on Riot Games’ multiplayer shooter for eight years.

Joe Ziegler, former Valorant game director, has announced his next career move following his recent departure from Riot Games. He is joining Bungie as a game director, according to his LinkedIn profile. However, it didn’t specify what he will be working on with the studio. The project doesn’t seem to be associated with Destiny 2, but rather with a fresh project the studio is engaged in. It’s likely that he’ll be working on the hotly rumored but as of yet unconfirmed third-person shooter spin-off using Destiny 2’s Tiger Engine, given his success with Valorant.

 

It was Ziegler’s original vision that led to Valorant, which was released in 2020 and reached over 14 million users in its first year. It was Ziegler’s goal to create a tactical shooter that would appeal to both new players and professional players, all while introducing the studio’s working knowledge of live service games. 

After working on Valorant for around eight years, helping to design the game and guiding its course after its debut, Ziegler announced that he would be leaving his position as game director in 2021. It was originally planned that he would remain at Riot to work on an unnamed project, but after assisting with that project for a year, he is joining Bungie for a new adventure. 

Is Bungie working on a new third-person shooting game?

Given his success turning Valorant into one of the best competitive FPS games, Ziegler will probably be working on the studio’s new IP Codenamed “Matter,” which is rumored to be an action title. Bungie has been posting a lot of job openings for new projects on its website over the last couple of years. According to the description of the job posts, the new project could be a hero-based shooter like Overwatch or Valorant, potentially based on the old Destiny universe with its interesting characters.

Ziegler’s signing by Bungie further indicates that the project the studio has been reportedly working on is advancing through the development process. Since Bungie and Ziegler have not yet made any formal statements regarding the game, it is unclear which game he will be working on, though there are several projects to that he could contribute his expertise given his background in hero shooters. Bungie is currently working on Lightfall, the upcoming expansion for Destiny 2. Lightfall, which will be released on February 28, 2023, is set in a futuristic new setting and have a new subclass. 

Header: Riot Games/ Valorant