How Activision is influencing Bungie's Destiny

"From the developers of Halo and the publisher of Call of Duty."

That's a tagline you're going to see a lot of in the coming months, as Activision begins revving up the marketing machine for Bungie's next game, Destiny. But what does it mean to be from "the publisher of Call of Duty?" Does that really affect the game in any way? According to both parties, the answer is yes.

"We've always believed in a strong partnership with our publisher," Bungie's Pete Parsons said, reminding the audience of their strong collaboration with Microsoft on the Halo franchise. "I'd say the relationship we have with Activision is that of a strong team. There are members of the group that are here that we wanted here. They come to visit, we have regular meetings, and there are people here that are here every day. They're part of the Bungie team. They're Activision employees, but they're actively involved with the Destiny project."

Activision Publishing CEO Eric Hirshberg echoed Bungie's sentiments, saying that they're bringing much more to the table than just marketing muscle. In fact, he believes that the company's experience with Call of Duty will ultimately help Destiny. "This vision is new. And it takes innovation and technological prowess on both sides," Hirshberg said. "Activision currently runs the biggest back-end for multiplayer games."

"We have experience with cross-platform game development," he pointed out. Destiny is coming to Xbox 360 and PS3--a first for a studio that was once owned by Microsoft. "So there's been a lot of places where technologically we have helped Bungie realize the vision of the game that's been mutually beneficial."