Destiny 2 will exclusively be available on PC through Blizzard’s Battle.net

In a surprising announcement at today’s Destiny 2 event, Bungie revealed that the PC version of the Destiny sequel will be exclusively available on Blizzard’s Battle.net platform.

Battle.net will be used to both purchase Destiny 2 as well as for online gameplay, making Destiny 2 the first non-Blizzard developed game to use the system (which also handles the storefront and online components of Starcraft, World of Warcraft, Diablo, Overwatch, Heroes of the Storm, and Hearthstone.) It’s good news for Destiny, given that Battle.net is historically reliable when it comes to online gameplay, and also means that Destiny 2 will be able to take advantage of Battle.net’s robust player community. Bungie however, will still be in charge of maintaining Destiny 2’s servers.

The news isn’t a complete surprise, given that Activision Blizzard owns Blizzard Entertainment and has an exclusive publishing deal with Bungie. Still, it could be a sign that Activision is looking to build out the service into its own personal storefront, much in the same way that Ubisoft’s Uplay or EA’s Origin services. Blizzard has said that it will only be supporting Destiny 2 for now when it comes to non-Blizzard titles, although the company is also “potentially evaluating needs or opportunities for future Activision games.”

Destiny 2 will be released on Battle.net for PC on September 8th, alongside the Xbox One and PlayStation 4 console versions.

Update May 18th, 2:50PM: Clarified details of partnership.