Bungie is entering a competitive landscape with the revival of Marathon, which takes the form of a PvPvE extraction shooter this time. Despite facing stiff competition from notable titles such as Escape from Tarkov and Hunt: Showdown, the renowned FPS developer believes that their upcoming release can successfully coexist with these established games.
In an interview with GamesRadar+, game director Joe Ziegler shared that their approach is two-pronged. For gamers already immersed in the world of extraction shooters, Marathon aims to deliver “a new and interesting experience that really helps you get to the heart of why you enjoy the other extraction shooters that you’re playing.”
The second aspect of their strategy targets those who have only explored the genre briefly, aiming to engage them fully with a game that avoids the typical frustrations associated with such titles.
“We don’t expect Marathon to become Destiny 3”: Bungie reckons “if you are a Destiny player who’s not really interested in any PvP,” Marathon is “probably not the game for you.”
Marathon release date set for September, closed alpha coming this month – Bungie’s extraction shooter is not free-to-play but we don’t have a price yet.
Ziegler emphasized, “But really, I think a big opportunity for us is everybody who’s dabbled in extraction shooter games before, have seen what it could offer, but they just couldn’t get through a lot of the cruft. We are hoping to make it more approachable to that group, where they can get past that cruft and into the survival storytelling a little bit faster and a little bit better. Basically, everything they’re hoping an extraction shooter gives them from a tension standpoint, from a survival standpoint, is there without trying to relearn how to play a game.”
“It’s the easiest way to give the controller to a friend and be like, ‘we can play this game,'” added gameplay director Andrew Witts. “There’s not a [huge] amount of explanation to get in there. That’s kind of what the Bungie action game is, you can give it to somebody else and have that feeling, so you could share that experience a bit better without being like, okay, let me tell you a whole new novel way of how to play. We’re really trying to make sure that it’s really approachable. The action fantasy of the gameplay is really easy to understand. You know when you press a button, you’re like, oh, that felt really good and I really like this.”
Furthermore, Bungie has confirmed that Marathon will be released as a paid title in September for PS5, Xbox Series X|S, and PC.
After playing Marathon for 8 hours, I don’t think Bungie’s extraction shooter will be the next Helldivers 2 hit, but I don’t think it will be the next Concord bust either.