The Marathon series has been around since 1994, when developer Bungie — now better known for Halo and Destiny — released the original FPS game for the Apple Macintosh. After nearly 30 years lying dormant, the cult series has returned as an online-only extraction shooter with a unique look and the promise of ruthless action on a decaying planet.
Extraction shooters were seen as a niche genre for the "hardcore" gaming crowd, but the meteoric rise of ARC Raiders has popularized the shooter subgenre for a more casual audience. Can Marathon repeat this success? We think so, even if the bio-cybernetic mercenaries roaming the ruins of Tau Ceti IV's lost colony make it a more unforgiving place to exist than post-apocalyptic Italy.
We wanted to ask Bungie — specifically Julia Nardin (Creative Director), Joe Ziegler (Game Director), and Brian Vinton (Senior Art Director) — about its plans to recruit curious Runners, and whether we can expect universe-building as dense as Destiny's from its post-launch roadmap.
A point of concern with Marathon has been how it aims to onboard new players, especially those who have no clue about the series' previous history. Nardin kicked things off, saying there are "lots of ways to tell a story," with the strictly multiplayer making up for the intended lack of traditional campaign with a more video game-y and subtle narrative:
"The core loop is about scavenging an abandoned colony, so we set out to tell the best possible story about that colony and the people who lived there," explains Nardin. "A lot of that is done through the loot itself – there are text files and audio logs that you can collect that will help you piece together what happened on Tau Ceti IV."
"Many of the contracts you take from the factions who have a vested interest in the Marathon expedition also guide you and your crew along that journey, encouraging you to explore different corners of the world on your way to profit and mutual understanding. Durandal is back, of course, and we also have a lot of new characters – human, AI, and everything in between!"
Marathon has a pretty stacked voice cast, even if the actual 'runs' mostly involve sneaking around, grabbing valuable loot, and getting into gunfights against bots and players. Those names aren't just added value, and Nardin dared to promise "a few unexpected twists and turns that we're hoping will surprise everyone."
The Marathon that's just launched isn't meant to "replace" the original trilogy, though the alt-reality sections of Infinity and how this new entry connects to the whole thing remain a large mystery, probably on purpose.
Past what's already available and ready to be uncovered, the game's 'live narrative' will unfold over the course of seasons (free playable content and paid cosmetics included). When discussing this key part of Marathon, Nardin made sure to underline that Bungie has learned some lessons from Destiny 2's mistakes and the 'vaulting' of past content:
"We want Marathon to be an additive experience in the sense that all priority contracts and story content aims to be evergreen, meaning that it doesn't matter when you join, you'll still be able to play through the established questlines and fill out your Codex with achievements and collections that allow you to uncover additional layers of the world. We'll be adding to this foundation over time in the live service environment, depending on our players' response and at a cadence we can support, but we know what direction we want to go in and what we want to create for the community to uncover next."
Moving on to the game's stunning visual presentation, we had to ask Vinton, one of the art leads on the game, about how Bungie landed on its striking mix of cyberpunk DNA, techwear elements, and sci-fi imagery that felt reminiscent enough of its previous works without being more of the same. According to him, it all started with a "deconstruction" of the old Marathon games and "digging into" the industrial sci-fi elements and "crisp graphic designs" that evolved alongside the studio during the development of Halo and Destiny games.
"On Marathon, we call this aesthetic 'graphic retro futurism' – kind of a fusion of retro roots, oddball cool, modern technology, and visuals that correlate with modern tech, such as digital dithering that you see when rendering, and lattice structures seen with 3D printing... Our approach is to make the weird and unexpected look cool, in a uniquely Bungie and Marathon way. So yeah, the cyberpunk and techwear tones grew out of this search for freshness and surprise, and now they form a pillar of the game's identity," he explained.
Marathon also clearly leans way harder on science fiction and cosmic horror than 'space fantasy' as seen in the two Destiny games. Some of that comes from Halo's many dark sections (remember the Flood?), but it's all amped up here.
For Nardin, it was essential and a natural "inversion" of what Bungie fans had come to expect. "It's a natural fit for an extraction shooter where we need to maintain a persistent feeling of tension. Our plan is to evolve Tau Ceti IV over time in a way that reinforces the game's core loop, differentiating it from Bungie's other titles as our community's presence on the planet begins to influence what might be lurking there," she added.
Hungry 'loreheads' can also expect to learn more about the universe we're not directly seeing and interacting with on Tau Ceti IV. From my time with the game so far, Marathon already packs lots of engrossing lore and little stories as part of its codex entries, audio logs, dialogue sequences, and surprising cutscenes. Beyond the game's central mysteries, anticipate the focus to remain on "the player's relationship with the factions back home on Earth and Mars" and "the colonists who joined the (doomed) expedition." Runners and what their nature implies are a "parallel narrative" that will evolve too.
Nardin pointed out there's an interest in exploring "Runners as a community" and the kind of people "willing to give up their human body" for an augmented one: "Your consciousness has been copied, making you functionally immortal, but it comes at a great personal cost. And are you even still really you?" Marathon isn't just about the alien planet and the thrill of raiding a colony's remains; those looking for deeper sci-fi themes (and willing to do some reading and listening) will be fed too.
To conclude, and looking at the actual video game in front of us, we also asked Ziegler about what the plans are for players who don't enjoy regular squads. "At launch, we'll be providing both solo queue and the Rook experience for solo players," he confirmed. It marks a solid start – with Rook being an odd class (shell) in that it's a way to join the runs as a silent scavenger of sorts – but a 'duos' queue could be happening soon-ish too.
In any case, he and the rest of the team are hoping that "players will discover the joy of playing in a crew." My experience with Marathon so far tells me that's the best way to experience what it has to offer, but I'm glad Bungie hasn't forgotten about "lone wolf" players, and more could be coming on that front beyond solo queues and playing as the Chappie-like robot among trios.
"Marathon" launched on March 5, 2026, for PC (Steam), PS5, and Xbox Series X|S.
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