Should You Play Marathon? A Review from a PVP Hater (Part One)

Does the beautiful aesthetic translate to a warning? Or is it the cherry on top?

Marathon is Bungie’s new game. I’m sure you’ve seen it because of the many conversations it’s generated over the course of its lifetime in the gaming space. It continues to do so, with the trickle of game news outlets starting to release their full, written reviews and scores for Marathon. As far as I’ve seen, it’s been doing really well for itself so far.

The timing is slightly serendipitous, as I’m also releasing a portion of my own thoughts on the game. It’s not a totally encompassing review per my own standards, which is why I’m still wrestling with a title at the time of writing. Is it my impression? Is it part one of two for an entire review? Something different altogether? Creatively, this has been a very interesting project for me to tackle because it lives in a different headspace than what I’m used to for my game reviews. I crave the challenge of new issues to resolve that spawn from variety within my creative work, so I’ve been enjoying myself.

The primary objective with my coverage of Marathon is to highlight why I got interested in the game, why I chose to play it, and what has occurred because I have played it. This first video focuses on the first two of those topics, with an eventual part 2 diving into the latter. I believe that I have a unique perspective by playing Marathon, one that may be helpful to share for the subset of gamers who are similar to me.

Those who understand my gaming tastes know that I do not like PVP-focused games. I’d go as far as to say I even hate some that I’ve tried getting into. I’m good at them from time to time, but my real issue is that I don’t enjoy practicing to become great at them. I’d much rather play a single-player or cooperative game in the majority of circumstances.

So, when Marathon came around, focused on highly competitive, player-focused skirmishes, I was not interested. The extraction angle multiplied my disinterest.

Losses in traditional PVP games I’ve played are just numbers on the screen, which make you feel somewhat bad about yourself. So what? Queue up the next match with different players, try again, and rinse and repeat until the numbers are good numbers. But in extraction, losing is devastating because you suffer a permanent loss of power due to losing your gear from the aftermath of any failed confrontation.

Despite my heavy disinterest towards the game within Marathon, I was highly interested in the art that comprised Marathon. Because doggone it, dudes, Bungie has some incredibly talented artists working for them and alongside them.

Marathon’s far future is designed unlike anything I’ve ever seen before. The bold colors on softly rounded buildings contrast beautifully with sharp, blocky text and UI elements. A lot of objects have a nice matte finish, which calls to mind 3D printing of some kind. Everything looks pristine in all the different lighting situations you may find it in across the maps on Tau Ceti IV. The tidbits of story the game has were mysterious and intriguing to boot, making exploring and learning the lore a tantalizing plus.

There are some gorgeous fonts in this game, used wonderfully. The glitching, pixel/symbol/ASCII dithering, terminal-based goodness is the pinnacle of dark/far future graphic design. Everything is wrapped together with beautiful sound design, which extends through its expressive, intentional, and catchy original god-tier soundtrack that deserves its own accolades. My jaw is on the floor. Marathon’s aesthetic is unmatched.

Which is why I decided to give the game a shot.

As much as I love my single-player games, my cozy couch co-op games, and games that have a de facto start and end... Everything that wasn’t Marathon’s gameplay piqued my interest into a desire to see for myself. Even if only a handful of hours in I determined the game was not for me, I determined that I would be more than happy to have, at the very least, supported such an artistically rich piece of media with my purchase, which I could hopefully continue to enjoy from the sidelines as it evolves, as live services do.

The act of deciding to play Marathon was no small task for me, even beyond my own mental hurdles. I had to reinstall Windows, as I had jumped to Linux, cold turkey, about a half year ago. But... it was worth it.

Playing the game for the first time, I was immediately rewarded with some genuinely gorgeous visuals in its opening cutscene and gameplay sequence. But afterward came the difficult part. Playing the competitive multiplayer-focused extraction shooter game.

I say it in the video, and I’ll say it here: I was not expecting to like it so much. As scary as the extraction part of the game is, I found it was empowering to think it was a different genre of game entirely. My friend reprogrammed my mind with a simple phrase: “Marathon is just a roguelite with PVP mechanics.” With more game time under my belt, I absolutely agree.

Sometimes you find good weapons to use or items to sell, and other times you don’t. Then, there’s always that chance you have to wager it all in a fight against other players. If you’re quiet, you can get in a surprise attack as a little advantage. But if you suck at shooting other players and are bad at player-focused combat - like me - you might just lose those kinds of engagements as well.

You might think, “Okay, Brando, are you some kind of masochist then? Is the ‘art’ really so good that you’re willing to endure devastating loss after devastating loss just to be able to exist in the Marathon universe for a moment and maybe read little codex entries for scraps of lore?”

It’s a bit subjective, obviously. But for me, I have really enjoyed playing the game. I definitely think the dive into a place beyond my comfort zone has been worth it. It has been fun, and here’s why:

There are three things that enable me to have fun, despite not being very good at the game. The first two go together. Marathon’s contracts give you gameplay objectives for experience points and often do not require you to exfiltrate the area alive to complete them. These help me move the goalpost of what victory means to me, at least temporarily.

Going along with this, there is free equipment you can bring into every game. So you’re not required to bring “your” gear into a match if you don’t want to. These both make losses almost meaningless if you let them alter your psyche enough.

The final huge component is being able to play Marathon with friends. There is something really special about how different the experience is when you can play with a full 3-man team of friends. You’ll have some really high highs and some very low lows with your mates. Communicating effectively, synergizing your abilities, sharing loot, and picking off other teams to loot their bones is incredibly rewarding and is perhaps the best cooperative experience I’ve had with an FPS game in recent years.

Our schedules don’t exactly always align, so we can’t play as often as I’d like, but rummaging through the remains of civilization on Tau Ceti IV with people I know has been a fantastic highlight of my time in Marathon. If you have friends to play with on a regular basis, for more than a few hours a week, I think it’s quite likely you’ll all be hooked on it for quite some time. If you can find friends with an open mind to try it, that is.

I say it like that because Marathon has been through a lot of terrible news cycles and has even garnered an anti-fan club. It’s unbelievable to me. About 10 years ago, when Fortnite started to rise in popularity, I was vocal with my dislike of the game and the culture that the youths surrounded it with. But I did not wish Epic Games would financially capsize and make Fortnite unavailable to play, frothing at the mouth as I looked at in-game player counts. I definitely did not curse Tim Sweeney’s name and hope the company would suffer major layoffs. I certainly did not feel compelled to discuss that opinion online either.

But I’ve actually seen those sentiments about Marathon on social media. What twisted culture created this? What happened to contributing positively to communities of things you liked and ignoring those you did not?

It feels like the result of the corporatization of entertainment reaching its apex. The masses have forgotten that games are art and that art is subjective. For these people, big-budget games are products that must be created within these unknowable restraints. Otherwise, the “game’s bad, the studio’s woke and dumb, so fire everyone”, right?

It’s unbelievable the vitriol you’ll come across online. Can you imagine if there were anti-fan clubs against other pieces of art, like the Mona Lisa? Or Christopher Nolan’s Interstellar? They probably exist, sure, but the absurdity is much easier to spot.

This is all to say: Do you have 40 bucks? Do you like FPS multiplayer shooters? Do your friends? Got an open mind? Think it looks cool? You will like this game. The guns handle so well. The world is pristine. The gameplay loop is addicting. It’s entirely worth the price of entry. The outrage online is stupid and should be completely ignored. To back that statement up, go on any site where you can read reviews from real players. They all have a very positive slant. Trust us (AKA, those who have played it). You won’t be disappointed.

This has been a super-ramble of an article, and for good reason. Much as I recommend Marathon, I need more time with it; I WANT more time with it. I’m pushing myself to get better and go further than ever before. I need to see the maps. Then, my next review can completely and fully focus on every aspect of the game and my experience with it.

One of my biggest pet peeves these days is seeing big outlets review games. “Oh, BigGameNewsSite gave this game a 7.” What does that even mean, man? Who reviewed the game? Were they subjective with it? Objective with it? What even is their gaming history? Did that inform the review decision? All these questions, so I just consider the whole thing with a massive chunk of salt.

That’s why following YouTubers and individuals reigns king. I’ve followed Dunkey for 10 years now. I know what he likes. It’s not entirely what I like, but I know enough about his preferences to know if I’d even enjoy something he’s really into. His history gives him value as a reviewer, to me, even when he’s giving a completely personal and subjective opinion on something.

That’s kind of how I look at this article. It’s good to know in advance why I’m playing Marathon and why I don’t think I’ll enjoy the game. My snippet of history informs my overall review, and readers (and viewers!) will be better off for it. Simple as that.

Thanks for reading.