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Marathon game director Joe Ziegler just published the kind of 'state of the game' letter that Destiny 2 players would actually kill for right now. Three months in, the silver bullet has officially been chambered: a PvE-only mode is coming to Marathon, and so is a lot more.
Season 2 of Marathon will introduce two more experimental game modes. One, coming at the start of the season, has "a touch of PvP" but focuses on PvE. The other is "a PvE-only mode that's focused on crews being tasked with completing objectives together and making some progress across matches."
Some Marathon players might call this heresy. Marathon avoiders might call it salvation – a way into the game's incredible gunplay, art, and audio that doesn't involve the stress and frustration of PvP.
As a response to an intimidating game whose active population quickly shrank after launch – Ziegler focuses on the "strong core community" Marathon's developed – it's about as silver as bullets get.
Ziegler examines three months of feedback in his lengthy post – the highlights, the pain points, and the lessons to bring forward. I'll let our Marathon review tell you what the game does well. Let's focus on what, as Ziegler says, didn't go so well, and what Bungie wants to improve.
First, a Bungie classic: "Marathon is overwhelming to learn." Ziegler recognizes that the onboarding experience is heady, and from there it's "easy to hit a wall if you're not spending lots of time, don't have a consistent crew, or are not super skilled."
"Matches can feel like a death spiral for some players," he continues. "You kit up, you go in, you die to a spawn rush, or someone gets the jump on you as you're looting. Faction progress can feel like a slog, and you struggle to get mats and credits out to upgrade." Playing solo, of course, makes it all worse.
Endgame fights are often flooded with "bubbles, ‘nade spam, and snipers," Ziegler adds, and "sometimes you don't want to sweat." And in this mix, "matchmaking can be a blessing or a curse."
Season 2 of Marathon will start to tackle these problems, and Bungie's also got plans all the way up to at least Season 5, from new runners and weapons to new-player improvements and world-building ambitions. Bungie is working on new ways to extract with varying risks, an updated matchmaking system with "different dimensions" to better align players, UX improvements to "help make setting goals and getting into a match smoother," and changes to the contract system that will elevate progression.
Season 4 will focus on "building more depth into the existing extraction loop," Ziegler adds, while Season 5 will look at ways to bring "the whole ecosystem of (PV(P)VE) play together and evolving our weird sci-fi world in new ways."
Season 2 starts June 2, bringing the game's first wipe. The farther ahead we look, the more abstract plans become, but it certainly seems like Bungie is swinging for the fences. With these future plans, Ziegler speaks over the understandable unrest circulating among Marathon (and also Destiny 2) fans following new owner Sony's latest staggering write-down on the studio. Marathon was not an Arc Raiders or Apex Legends-sized instant-hit, but it's got more in the tank.
"Big things coming down the line!" Ziegler says.
I played Marathon and its 1994 predecessor to see how Bungie has evolved over the years.
