Destiny 2's robo-dog was an idea from Bungie's art department

Those who have been deeply invested in the latest Destiny 2 season (Season of the Seraph) will no doubt be aware of the Easter Egg-like addition that can be found upon earning the Revision: Zero Exotic pulse rifle, and then smashing all 50 of the strange glowing orbs around the Sol System. Upon doing this, you can head into an interesting alcove in the Operation: Seraph Station Exotic Mission, where after a bit of platforming, you'll come across an Exo dog called Archie. Needless to say, it was an addition that went down very well with the Destiny 2 community.

As for how Archie (Archangel in full) came about, in a recent group interview, senior narrative designer Nikko Stevens told us about the robo-dog's origin and how it actually came from the art team.

"Archie was a pitch that came out of the art department," said Stevens. "This is another example of how ideas really bubble up from anywhere and find traction and move forward. This kind of came out of the art department. Rob Adams [art director] and his crew came forward and in concepting they were talking about how they wanted to make this Exo/robotic dog. That was kind of like how it started. And of course, as soon as someone comes forward and says, 'we want to make a robot dog', everybody in the room goes, 'yes, please can we make a robot dog?'"

"It caught traction very quickly and narratively we wanted to support that, so we wove it into Ana and Rasputin's story and the story of the Seraph Station. I want to say teams across the Vanguard group pitch in for stuff like this, so the artists create the robo-dog, and then our investment and activity designers figure out how the experience for unlocking that dog is going to play out for the players and what it's going to feel like to lead up to that moment. And then narrative kind of figures out how it makes sense within the story, and then we named it Archangel and Archie."

"It's a huge cross department effort to do stuff like this and those ideas can bubble up from anywhere."

We're told that this is a similar story to how Lightfall's "owlfish" came into fruition as well, which we'll get to see in full effect when the expansion arrives in late February.