Marathon developer Bungie has acknowledged that some of the art featured in the game was stolen from an artist who didn’t work on the game, promising a “thorough review” of Marathon‘s “in-game assets” as a result.
For context, artist Antireal alleged yesterday that Marathon‘s environments are “covered with assets lifted from poster designs [she] made in 2017”, posting a number of examples of areas in which Marathon‘s art was lifted from her own as proof.
In response to Antireal’s allegations, Bungie, posting on the Marathon development team’s account, confirmed that “a former Bungie artist included [Antireal’s designs] in a texture sheet that was ultimately used in-game”.
In a thread, Bungie says its current art team didn’t know about the artwork’s theft, and that the studio is “still reviewing how this oversight occurred”.
As a result of the stolen artwork’s discovery, Bungie says it will now conduct a “thorough review” of Marathon‘s asset pool, specifically assets created or contributed by the former artist in question (who isn’t named, for obvious reasons).
Additionally, Bungie says it will be “implementing stricter checks to document all artist contributions”, although I’m honestly pretty shocked those checks weren’t in place to begin with and that something so egregious could get through unnoticed.
The studio says it’s “reached out” to Antireal to talk about the issue and is “committed to do right by the artist”, as well as by “all artists who contribute” to Bungie’s games.
Bungie’s lax security when it comes to spotting stolen artwork is even more upsetting given that this isn’t the studio’s first time being accused of stealing from fans. In 2021, Bungie used a fan depiction of one of its characters in promo material, subsequently apologizing and crediting the correct artist.
After that incident, in 2023, a Destiny 2 fan claimed Bungie had stolen their art for an in-game cutscene, an allegation that Bungie itself subsequently confirmed was true. Then, in 2024, artist Tofu accused Bungie of stealing a weapon design they had made in 2015, and again, Bungie copped to doing so.
I don’t want to cast aspersions, but I also don’t know how many times something has to happen before it can be considered a pattern. Let’s just say I wouldn’t be surprised if Bungie was caught out for stealing fan artwork again before Marathon is released.
If this whole thing hasn’t left a bad taste in your mouth and you still want to check out Marathon, you can do so when it launches on PC, PlayStation 5, and Xbox Series X|S on September 23rd.
