Marathon console players can turn off PC matchmaking if they want, but Bungie made a point to give everyone the same gameplay experience

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The devs have the age old divide in mind

Marathon runners in pre-order bonus styles
(Image credit: Bungie)

It's almost surreal to say, but Marathon comes out in just a few weeks. Anticipation is high for Bungie's first non-Destiny release in over a decade, and since it's coming out on multiple platforms, some attention has been given to making sure players get a balanced experience across PC and console.

In an interview with Ali213, Joe Ziegler, game director on Marathon, revealed that players can actually disable cross-platform matchmaking. It's mentioned that PS5 and Xbox Series X/S players can make sure they don't get placed against PC users, though presumably there'll be an option to do the same the other way around as well.

Launch Gameplay Trailer | Marathon - YouTube Launch Gameplay Trailer | Marathon - YouTube
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In particular, PC players can tend to be quicker on the trigger, though it varies game to game by how much and to what extent. This is an argument that's burned for as long as first-person shooters have been available on home consoles and personal computers. What's important to remember is the possibility is always there, and it's good to see Bungie keeping that in mind on launch.

Being an extraction shooter, there'll be PvP, PvE, and indeed, PvPvE, but speaking of matchmaking, Marathon isn't going down the route of Arc Raiders and sorting runs based on the likelihood of people blasting each other versus the in-game enemies. There will, however, still be accommodations for wanting to focus on PvE.

The latest State of Play revealed a server slam is happening on February 26, opening the possibility of getting a preview before Marathon goes on wide release on March 5. It's been a long-time coming, but a new Bungie shooter will be in our grasp soon, what a time to be alive.

Sony is "very confident" in Marathon after playtests revealed "good points," as well as "not good points" that have since been changed for Bungie's Arc Raiders challenger

Anthony McGlynn
Anthony McGlynn
Contributing Writer

Anthony is an Irish entertainment and games journalist, now based in Glasgow. He previously served as Senior Anime Writer at Dexerto and News Editor at The Digital Fix, on top of providing work for Variety, IGN, Den of Geek, PC Gamer, and many more. Besides Studio Ghibli, horror movies, and The Muppets, he enjoys action-RPGs, heavy metal, and pro-wrestling. He interviewed Animal once, not that he won’t stop going on about it or anything.

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