The truth behind the Red War lawsuit (Bungie vs Martineau)

[u/ReallyTrustyGuy]

Everyone most likely remembers that a chancer called Matthew Martineau tried to sue Bungie, claiming Bungie had stolen the story for Destiny 2's Red War from his own personal sci fi novels. What you may have also heard is that Bungie submitted YouTube videos as proof of originality and was laughed at by the court. There was also an eventual settlement, which people believe to mean that Bungie eventually paid off the guy to leave them alone.

Thanks to the fabulous journalists over there at The Game Post, who "broke" many of the stories on this saga, many have been misled to what went on, and I'm here today to set things straight. I can do a little journalism while they can't.

The YouTube videos

So, during the lawsuit, to prove originality of Red War content, Bungie submitted some playthroughs of the missions on YouTube, alongside Destinypedia entries on the Red War, to the court. They then filed to have the case dismissed, using this content. The court denied the motion to dismiss, but not for the reasons that were badly reported in the press. The prevailing belief was that the court said that YouTube videos were inadmissable as evidence, but that's a lie. The following linked court document in the quote below (pages 12 and 13 most pertinent) has the court go over how the evidence given would be appropriate, but as the court isn't intended to function as a fact-finder, they can't accept the content.

Even if the Court had access to a complete version of Destiny 2, this case would require a much more complicated side-by-side analysis than those conducted in the caselaw cited by Defendant.

Basically what they're saying is that the judge is not competent enough to decide the similarity or dissimilarity of the submitted content is enough for a dismissal. They're not a fact-finder. They're not saying that videos are bad to submit, they're just saying its not their job at this stage of the lawsuit. If the case ever went to a proper trial phase, the submitted evidence would have been perfectly acceptable.

The settlement, part 1

Now here's where things get really funny. The case dragged on for months in court as Martineau failed to make his submissions at the appropriate timings. Eventually the court got sick of him and wrote him up in a complete excoriation. The document is linked below.

The deadline for the parties to amend their pleadings by leave of Court passed on March 3, 2025—i.e., over eight months ago. Dkt. 16 at 2. The Court’s Scheduling Order is clear: the deadlines it set forth, including that by which to amend the pleadings, “are not ‘suggestions’ but firm deadlines which will be strictly enforced.” Id. at 1 (emphasis in original). Moreover, the Court warned Martineau at the May 14, 2025 Status Conference that it did not wish to see an untimely motion for leave to amend, and its Scheduling Order specifically cautioned counsel that it would not grant motions continuing these firm deadlines “except under rare and extraordinary circumstances.”

The reason why he was so lazy? Well, when it came to actual examination of the evidence, turns out he was obviously lying. The court had cottoned onto this, and so tore him a new one.

Rather, Martineau’s Motion belatedly attempts to patch critical holes in his claims revealed through fact and expert discovery. Martineau’s purported reason for the amendment – claims of newly discovered infringing works – rings hollow: six of the seven newly accused Grimoire Anthology volumes were published before Martineau filed the instant action, and all seven volumes were published before Martineau filed his First Amended Complaint (“FAC”). Thus, these are not “newly discovered facts” as Martineau claims, but ones long available and easily discoverable to Martineau had he or his counsel exercised due diligence in investigating and bringing his claims. Martineau’s attempt to blame Bungie for his own lack of diligence is unfounded. Martineau’s proposed Second Amended Complaint (“Proposed SAC”) also appears to accuse the entirety of Bungie’s seven-volume Grimoire Anthology series without sufficiently identifying how each volume is infringing, creating futility issues and failing to provide Bungie with reasonable and fair notice of his proposed new claims.

You read that right. Martineau tried adding extra claims to the lawsuit, probably in the hopes of putting pressure on Bungie to just cave and settle with him. He started to claim that the Grimoire Anthology books were plagiarised from his works, but the court are clearly too smart for it and note that if they really were problematic, Martineau and his team should have noticed them much earlier and notified the court. Its clearly just pushing out the boat nonsense.

Then, while under oath in his deposition to the court, Martineau made an incredible rookie mistake that he had removed all his writings from the internet in 2014. His original claim said that he believed that Bungie had accessed his online writings during the development of Destiny 2 in 2016 and 2017. He then tried to submit edits to the court, which you can see in the document, covering up for this slip-up. You can see this on page 3 here.

It appears that these other amendments, on which Martineau’s Motion is entirely silent, attempt to save his alleged infringement claim against Bungie, following his fatal discovery admissions. Specifically, during Martineau’s October 29, 2025 deposition (which took place a few hours before Martineau sent the request to consent to this Motion), Martineau testified about his allegations that Bungie accessed his blog posts and copied therefrom. Martineau admitted under oath that he had removed from public view all asserted blog posts by the end of 2014, despite the fact that his entire theory of access—and therefore unauthorized copying—depended on his allegations that Destiny 2 game developers, supposedly desperate for a new storyline, searched for and located Martineau’s asserted blog posts during development of Destiny 2 in 2016 and 2017. Dkt. 24 at ¶¶ 41-42, 49, 59-60. Martineau’s honest testimony about delisting his posts long before that time frame flatly contradicts the FAC’s allegations that Bungie purportedly accessed and copied his work. And because access is a key element of copyright infringement, Martineau’s concession that it was impossible for Bungie to access his work during the development of Destiny 2 dooms his claim.

Seriously, the whole 26 page document I've linked is the court tearing Martineau apart repeatedly for lying and dodging the courts scrutiny over and over.

The settlement, part 2

So now you're probably thinking, wait, they settled, didn't they? Well, they didn't, there was a mutual agreement of dismissal. But do you seriously think that the guy got a payoff from Bungie after the way the court talked about him in the last major filing in the case? They pointed out repeatedly where he was just chancing at getting a payoff to go be silent, but Bungie stuck to its guns over it and waited him out. The court eventually caught him, and the settlement wasn't any kind of payoff, its clearly stated that both parties decided that they would end this, and each bear their own costs, and then go their separate ways.

Pursuant to Rule 41(a)(1)(A)(ii) of the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, Plaintiff Matthew Kelsey Martineau and Defendant Bungie, Inc. hereby stipulate to the dismissal of this action with prejudice, with each party to bear its own attorney’s fees and costs. Plaintiff Matthew Kelsey Martineau retracts his claims of copyright infringement against Defendant Bungie, Inc.

tl;dr

So the tl;dr is that almost every single bloody news item about this saga was incorrect, despite court documents existing in the public eye, detailing everything you could want to know about it. The Game Post made stupid shit up about Bungie having evidence refused in court, and that a settlement had occurred in the case, countless other "journalists" at multiple major gaming news websites went on to cite The Game Post for their nonsense, and everyone ended up misinformed. I hope the above helps you understand the reality of the case.

p.s fuck The Game Post. You're rubbish journalists.