Bungie responds to Marathon art theft controversy, admitting it stole assets and blaming a former developer: "We are conducting a thorough review"

This week, Destiny 2 and Marathon developer Bungie has found itself embroiled in a serious art theft controversy. On Thursday morning, an artist by the name of Antireal (here's her Ko-fi) shared a post on social media asserting that the studio stole various designs from a collection of poster designs she created back in 2017 and has used them in its art direction for Marathon.

To prove her claim, Antireal included several images in the thread (view them below) that directly compare pictures of Marathon's website, art from its official press kit, and in-game screenshots taken from the recent Marathon alpha playtest against pieces of her own artwork (her original designs are still up, proving they weren't made recently). The similarities are undeniably quite glaring, with many of Antireal's graphic designs, text elements, and even her personal logo visible on the surfaces of many of Marathon's in-game structures.

"Bungie is of course not obligated to hire me when making a game that draws overwhelmingly from the same design language I have refined for the last decade, but clearly my work was good enough to pillage for ideas and plaster all over their game without pay or attribution," Antireal wrote in a scathing follow-up post.

Now, Bungie has responded, confirming that it stole Antireal's assets and putting blame on the shoulders of a former employee that's no longer with the company.

"We immediately investigated a concern regarding unauthorized use of artist decals in Marathon and confirmed that a former Bungie artist included these in a texture sheet that was ultimately used in-game," said the developer. "This issue was unknown by our existing art team, and we are still reviewing how this oversight occurred. We take matters like this very seriously. We have reached out to [Antireal] to discuss this issue and are committed to do right by the artist."

"As a matter of policy, we do not use the work of artists without their permission. To prevent similar issues in the future, we are conducting a thorough review of our in-game assets, specifically those done by the former Bungie artist, and implementing stricter checks to document all artist contributions," it continued.

"We value the creativity and dedication of all artists who contribute to our games, and we are committed to doing right by them. Thank you for bringing this to our attention."

Notably, this is far from the first time that Bungie has been in a scandal like this. Last year, Bungie admitted a fan's personal artwork was used in the creation of a Nerf gun, and in 2023, it promised to compensate another artist after a piece of art almost identical to theirs appeared in a cutscene. And before that in 2021, a trailer for The Witch Queen DLC was found to contain a direct rip of fanart of the Hive goddess Xivu Arath.

The fact that this has now happened four times in four years is incredibly concerning, and there's clearly a major issue with how Bungie's art department handles watching for and dealing with plagiarism.

Worse still is the fact that this latest case is arguably the most blatant example of art theft yet; comparing Antireal's designs to the visuals of Marathon, you can make a convincing argument that her style is essentially the foundation of the extraction shooter's "graphic realism" aesthetic. The game's art direction — one of the things people love most about it — seemingly originates almost entirely from stolen work.

Antireal also went on to say that she's been followed by Marathon art director Joseph Cross and "a few others from Bungie" for several years, and has never once received communication of any kind. Not a good look, to put things (very) lightly.

You're probably wondering if Antireal is pursuing legal action; she's said that she doesn't "have the resources nor the energy to spare to pursue this legally," but that she's "lost count of the number of times a major company has deemed it easier to pay a designer to imitate or steal my work than to write me an email."

"In 10 years i have never made a consistent income from this work and I am tired of designers from huge companies moodboarding and parasitising my designs while I struggle to make a living," she added.

With how viral this controversy has gone and with how much support Antireal has gotten from the gaming community on her Ko-fi, though, she may be able to pursue something in the end after all. We'll see what happens.

Marathon is scheduled to release on Xbox Series X|S, Windows PC, and PS5 on September 23, 2025.