Marathon server slam consumed my weekend — 21 hours from 'meh' to believer

Around this time last year Embark and Bungie both ran playtests for their new extraction shooters. Marathon's alpha felt like the culmination of two years of feverish speculation about the studio's first non-Destiny project in over 15 years, but Arc Raiders upstaged Marathon and the latter was delayed, leaving it a fixation of skepticism for parts of the hobby.

My turnaround happened on day two, when I realized what sort of FPS Bungie is aiming for—an approachable but very much lethal PvP shooter. I started running toward gunshots instead of sneaking around them, turned on my mic, let random players fill in my crew, and finally had intense back-and-forth fights that brought Hunt: Showdown to mind.

Marathon's pacing surprised me. Shells move with a gradual, methodical thud that feels closer to Halo than Call of Duty, which shifts emphasis to positioning, timing and stealth over slide-jumping or rapid crouch tricks.

marathon, bungie, arc raiders, extraction shooter, playtest, alpha, pvp shooter, hunt showdown, halo, stealth