The discourse surrounding Marathon is an absolute nightmare. Obituaries were being written months before the game even launched, controversies kept surfacing throughout its development, and comparisons kept being made to how Destiny 2 has been treated since the launch of The Final Shape. Shut out the noise, though, and I think there’s something special in Bungie’s extraction shooter.
If Marathon dies, it will be a devastating loss in my eyes. I can’t think of a similar all-consuming gaming experience I’ve had in a long time. Perhaps it was Elden Ring when I last felt like taking up every spare moment I wasn’t playing by watching, reading, researching, and talking about the game. So, here I am, with the game now discounted by 20% on Steam, PlayStation 5, and Xbox, encouraging anyone with even a passing interest to give it a go.
This game’s got the sauce
My first foray into extraction shooters was Arc Raiders, and it remains the popular pick for many. It’s a fine game, but its by-the-numbers third-person shooting, the bland grey-brown mil-sim aesthetic, and overly-friendly player base did little to keep me invested or inspired to make multiple runs for toasters and power cables.
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Replace toasters with fractal circuits and power cables with dermachem packs, and Marathon may technically be asking me to do the same thing with more futuristic fluff. But that’s just one part of its presentation that’s on a whole other level. Elsewhere, the gunplay is so much more satisfying, and I’m thriving on the tension of loading into each map knowing that conflict with other players is all but guaranteed.
For me, it starts with little things: like the way the music subtly adds layers and ramps up once your fireteam has all readied up and you hit the button to queue into the match. In that moment, I feel myself getting pumped up, heart rate increasing, and primed for whatever objective I’ve set for myself on this run. The music is incredible throughout, in fact.
And then there are larger aspects, like the way a match flows on its late-game Outpost map. It’s a slow start, as you scavenge for keycards and clear out enemy AI while ducking into buildings to avoid the burning heat cascade that rains down every so often.
Eventually, you can unlock the loot pinata that is the Pinwheel ship, fend off other squads in its tight corridors or three expansive wings, and scoop up lots of shiny goodies to fill up your vault for future raids. And while not every run may go successfully, when it hits, it hits — hard.
I wonder if more people got to this point and experienced some of these highs, if the current player count would be higher. The stats do paint a gloomy picture, but I’ve also never known people to obsess over Steam player charts like this before. Another aspect of the discourse around Marathon that just feels a little unhinged.
I have no idea what the exact approach is to get more players dropping into the hostile environments of Tau Ceti IV. Bungie has already made some changes that give beginners more breathing room to learn the game in beginner matches before they’re dropped into competitive lobbies with other real players.
And there are new game modes that drop everyone in with basic gear to level the playing field from the off. It’s a drastic pivot from the game’s intended design to more of a battle royale mode; however, it should alleviate some players’ fears that they will constantly come up against better-equipped players all the time.
Death is only the beginning
I’m sure it doesn’t help that the on-ramp to Marathon is more like a vertical cliff. There’s a super-fast time-to-kill, aggressive AI enemies, and an intimidating array of weapons, items, valuables, and salvage that all seem equally useful but cannot fit into your minimal default backpack space.
I think with a lot of those, though, it’s a barrier you have to push through. I’ve watched streamers do a single run, moan about not understanding everything immediately, die to AI enemies at a contested exfil site, call the game rubbish, and quit.
As a long-time Destiny player who has been burned by multiple frustrating decisions with the direction of that game since the gear sunsetting and content vaulting mess, I’m not trying to just be a Bungie apologist here. But if you drop into Marathon with your mind made up already, refuse to engage with the game on its level, and dismiss it entirely after that, I think you’re missing out.
Will this price cut help? As optimistic as I want to be, it’s hard to imagine it’ll move the needle much. But, if it encourages a few more players to pick up the game and give it a fair shot, I’m hopeful that Marathon can at least hold a fairly stable audience to remain sustainable in the eyes of Bungie and Sony. We’re dealing with an astronomically bigger budget here, but I’m wondering if at least a Hunt Showdown situation could be on the cards.
Whatever’s in the future, I’m going to keep playing for now, and maybe finally crack open some vaults in the tremendous Cryo Archive map. I’ve already got a lot out of my time with Marathon — and I hope there’s more to come.
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james.pickard@futurenet.com (James Pickard)
