The court has rejected Bungie’s attempt to dismiss the Destiny 2 Red War lawsuit, saying YouTube videos and fan-made wiki pages aren’t enough to evaluate copyright claims at this stage.
A federal judge has ruled that Bungie must continue facing a copyright lawsuit that claims the company copied parts of Destiny 2’s original Red War and Curse of Osiris campaigns from an unpublished sci-fi work.
The case, filed by writer Matthew Kelsey Martineau, has been active since late 2024, and things have gotten more complicated with Bungie’s own game content now being inaccessible due to vaulting.
Martineau, writing under the pen name Caspar Cole, alleges that Bungie lifted plot elements, characters, and themes from his work posted on WordPress years before Destiny 2 launched. He specifically points to the Red Legion faction, a powerful alien military force in both his story and Bungie’s game, as well as other shared elements like a celestial object hovering over Earth, war beasts, and more.
Bungie responded in late 2024 with a motion to dismiss, calling the allegations vague and unsubstantiated. To support its case, Bungie submitted hours of YouTube footage and screenshots from a fan-made wiki to show that Destiny 2 was nothing like Martineau’s work. After the court granted Martineau a chance to amend his complaint, Bungie tried again, filing another dismissal motion.
In a decision issued today (May 2), the judge denied Bungie’s motion to dismiss the case and also refused to consider several exhibits the company submitted, namely fan-made YouTube videos of Destiny 2 and pages from a fan wiki called Destinypedia.
Judge Says No to YouTube Clips and Wiki Pages
The new court filing was Bungie’s attempt to get the lawsuit thrown out at an early stage. In its motion to dismiss, Bungie included links to fan-recorded YouTube videos and summaries from Destinypedia to show the content Martineau was accusing it of copying, since the original campaigns were removed from Destiny 2 years ago and can’t be accessed anymore.
But the judge wasn’t on board with that. In her official ruling, Judge Susie Morgan made it clear that just because Destiny 2 is mentioned in the lawsuit doesn’t mean the court can rely on third-party videos or unofficial wikis. “While Plaintiff does reference Destiny 2 in his complaint, he does not reference the YouTube videos containing Destiny 2 game footage, the Destinypedia pages, or the Tyson [Green, Destiny 2’s game director] declaration,” the order states.
“Bungie archived the original code that comprised the ‘Red War’ and ‘Curse of Osiris’ campaigns (known as ‘legacy builds’),” game director Tyson Green’s declaration reads. “However, the ‘Red War’ and ‘Curse of Osiris’ legacy builds can no longer run because their outdated code is incompatible with Destiny 2’s underlying operational framework, which has evolved considerably since the ‘Red War’ and ‘Curse of Osiris’ campaigns were retired.”
“As a result, Bungie cannot feasibly provide the Court with the original Destiny 2 game as it existed in 2017, including the accused ‘Red War’ and ‘Curse of Osiris’ campaigns, in any operable or reviewable form. Nor will Bungie be able to produce the accused campaigns in operable or reviewable form if this matter proceeds to formal discovery.”
The judge emphasized that Destiny 2’s campaigns like Red War and Curse of Osiris are no longer available, and Bungie admitted there’s no way to play or review them in their original form. Because of that, the court couldn’t do the usual side-by-side comparison to determine if there’s actual copyright infringement. Bungie’s solution—fan-made videos—just wasn’t good enough.
“The Court will not consider the exhibits attached to Defendant’s motion to dismiss and will not convert the Defendant’s motion to dismiss to a motion for summary judgment,” the court wrote. “There has not been sufficient time for discovery, and the attachments are admittedly of third-party origination. Their authenticity has not been established.”
The court walked through several reasons why Bungie’s exhibits wouldn’t be considered. First, even though courts can sometimes look at documents outside the complaint, that only works if the materials are directly mentioned and central to the case. In this instance, Martineau didn’t include the YouTube links or wiki pages in his filings. That made them off-limits.
Judge Morgan also pointed out how complicated this case is compared to past copyright claims. Bungie had cited previous rulings where courts dismissed claims after comparing books or movies. But the judge explained that this situation is different: “This case would require a much more complicated side-by-side analysis… even if the Court had access to a complete version of Destiny 2.”
She also noted how the game and the written work aren’t even in the same format. “Rather than compare a brief movie scene and a copyright for a pinball machine… it appears the Defendant is asking the Court to compare a collection of short writings to thirteen-plus hours of third-party originated YouTube videos of Destiny 2 [and] several third-party originated online Destinypedia pages.”
Because of this, the court refused to treat Bungie’s motion as one for summary judgment and confirmed that the case should move forward. Martineau, for his part, had laid out dozens of alleged similarities in his filing, from a “Red Legion” to powerful celestial objects hovering above Earth, to character arcs, flame weapons, and timelines merging through sci-fi tech.
The court found those claims were enough to meet the threshold. “Plaintiff has sufficiently alleged the elements of an action for copyright infringement,” Judge Morgan concluded.
You can read the full 16-page document here.
Court Rejects Bungie’s Attempt to Dismiss Destiny 2 Red War Lawsuit, Refuses to Consider YouTube Videos and… by TheGamePost on Scribd
