📚marathon-lore-discussion

[sage junco]

and if you're reading the lore, try playing a few levels of the original... you can download for free the Classic Marathon trilogy from Steam or from the Aleph One website

[sturdy abyss]

What’s the difference between normal M2 ticks and NuTicks?

[unreal mortar]

@sturdy abyss going in circles huh

[sturdy abyss]

lmao

[dire estuary]

Perhaps because we never got an idea of the surface of TCIV until just recently, perhaps the ticks here are a native species that were never expanded on in the originals?

Similarly we never got a lot of expansion or word about MIDA and the other corps we knew about.
Its likey just that, an expansion of a sidelined idea

[languid hawk]

Any new lore? Since last beta?

[sturdy abyss]

ok

listen, i know this may sound weird, and this theory probably doesn’t have ANY fundaments at all but…what if Bingus (pink cat ) is actually the embodiment, metaphor or representation of one of the alien races

Because: I don’t know if the Phfor, Sph’t or Jjaro arrived to Tau Ceti IV first but, one of them definetly did (I think) and the pink cat could represent how that faction is “watching” how the runners are pawns into a much bigger game, this could also be why we see the cat sit right next to Glitch when she is bleeding out and dying in the Marathon release date trailer

[unreal mortar]

Jjaro got there first.
Doubt theyd use uesc tech.

[unreal mortar]

Sekiguch tech*

[sturdy abyss]

Hmmmm well, you ARE right but i wasn’t talking about them using the tech to spy/watch the Runners, i was talking more about a metaphor/representation

[unreal mortar]

I don't see that either.

I do imagine someone else is watching somewhere

[sturdy abyss]

someone or something we know? or something beyond our knowledge

[unreal mortar]

T-R--U-B-L-E

[sturdy abyss]

WE CANNT SEE IT

[pearl pasture]

MIDA ON TOP

[pseudo canyon]

On fo nem grave

[sturdy abyss]

We should call Bingus “NuCat” instead

Since he has the same pink tone as NuCaloric, we can maybe even call him SekCat knowing Sekiguchi created him

[keen slate]

we should show him respect and call him by his name (bingus)

[sturdy abyss]

it was just a suggestion

[urban ferry]

perhaps even Somewhere In The Heavens…

[unreal mortar]

THEY ARE WAITING...

[keen slate]

is there a lore reason the middle circle isn't in the logo anymore or is it just a design choice

[unreal mortar]

Minimalistic logo design choice i guess

[keen slate]

it's always been a sick logo and it's even sicker now but like knowing bungie and marathon it could've actually represented something

[urban ferry]

i think a shirt that has the new logo on it on like the left breast and SOMEWHERE IN THE HEAVENS… THEY ARE WAITING in the top middle of the back would go hard as fuck

[faint ice]

I like to think it might be symbolic of trying to search for something

Like it's been used as the symbol of the Reclaimers in Halo so maybe it's a situation where in returing to Tau Ceti what we are trying to find is no longer there?

If I want to bring the cinematic trailer into it and Ozymandias, maybe what we are seeing is one of the aftermaths of the realities we were jumping to through out the old Marathon games

If it was Durandal speaking and he's the metaphorical Ozymandias maybe his swept away kingdom is this universe left behind and we are just combing through whats left

[vocal fjord]

I always figured the inner circle represented the colony and now that the colonists are missing it becomes a symbol of that mystery

[dire estuary]

Iirc it was stated to be a world within a world, it was really to represent the Marathon as its own world over the world of TCIV. Because it’s now derelict its like we’re now looking at its shadow over TCIV

[dire estuary]

Another one bites the dust it seems

[faint ice]

It happens

[grizzled pagoda]

THE CANDLES BURN UT FOR YOU

[sturdy abyss]

What does
“SOMEWHERE IN THE HEAVENS
THEY ARE WAITING” mean?

is it a reference to Pfhor, S’pht or Jjaro? (I think it’s the first 2 maybe?)

[dire estuary]

We dont exactly know. It could be that Tau Ceti is waiting, the Pfhor, the Jjaro, no one exactly knows. Most likely the original intention was that its mean to be about the marathon and TCIV, with the extra implication of the Pfhor and other life

open to thought really

[sturdy abyss]

Yeah that’s what i was thinking too, since the runners can see the UESC Marathon from Tau Ceti IV then it could possibly mean that

[dire estuary]

I mean, in the original game😅.
Somewhere in space, the Marathon and the Colony is waiting…

[sturdy abyss]

my theory: Since we haven’t seen how the gameplay in the UESC MARATHON runs is gonna be yet, I think this means that the ship is waiting, waiting for the runners to come and discover all its secrets

[dire estuary]

But it could also be used to say the Pfhor are waiting, but they dont really wait, theyre an acting force imo.
The Jjaro could be a more likely speculation on the implication of other life

[sturdy abyss]

That’s the original game slogan?

[dire estuary]

Ehh not so much a slogan.
But its really an opener to the game’s setting tbh. The heavens being space, they are waiting just being the game.
Somewhere in space, the game is waiting. Or waiting for you to begin🙂

So nothing ever happens until you the player, begin, and thus a timeline of events begins and can end and begin again recursively

[sturdy abyss]

OHHHHHHH

[sturdy abyss]

NOW I understand

[dire estuary]

Infinity establishes the idea of infinite timelines existing and you the player as a universal unknown variable because it is you controlling and learning and having the ability to change or create a new timeline with each conception of a fresh start and death

Infinity is just a more grandiose representation of infinite timelines or a split timeline where one may have never thought it in the first 2 games

Or…you can interpret infinity differently. Perhaps its a dream? A simulation? An abstract representation of keeping eternal balance whilst it simultaneously never happens in the original timeline we played?

Thats the beauty of Infinity, it cant be always taken at face value, many theories exist and are plausible when defended, and all of them even the face value representation require leaps of trust🙂

[sturdy abyss]

Well

this became a lot more mind blowing that i thought

[visual lynx]

I figured it was just a generic “somewhere out there in space, aliens exist”. since it’s a story about humanity’s first encounter with aliens.

[sturdy abyss]

m a r a t h o n

[unreal mortar]

TC-IV [] / []APE WILL MAKE ME G[]D

[sturdy abyss]

oh beebledopp, you make me proud 🥹

[sturdy abyss]

SOMEWHERE IN THE HEAVENS
THEY ARE WAITING 🚀

[sage junco]

this, but even more... I figured it was a vague but ominous and content-free statement that Bungie put in, purely to look cool and set the players mood.

It was the 90's, computers were geeky, the last thing you saw was the Mac desktop, and then to fade to black then see that and hear that was just peak cool

especially because Pathways wasn't cinematic like that at all... It loaded into a set of Mac windows like all good Mac apps should!

[hot geyser]

[cinder lance]

I incorporated the signiature marathon loading sound into the circa 288x playlist. It is core.

[cinder lance]

Somewhere in the heavens... they are looting. Here, we're jamming

[sturdy abyss]

somewhere in the heavens…a noob glitch is getting filled with lead by UESC robots

[slate temple]

ape will make me god 🦧

[sturdy abyss]

I wonder how much Sekiguchi spends on average for each runner shell

I mean, this is obviously a lot more complicated since we are decades ahead of 2025 and economy must be so different lmao

[visual lynx]

“a trillion bucks”

which should be the equivalent of 25 cents by the 30th century

(not joking, I did the math; but of course that assumes historical inflation trends that span not even one century continue unabated for another nine centuries, which is unlikely)

[sturdy abyss]

What exact year is the game set in?

[keen slate]

2893 according to wikipedia

[unreal mortar]

At least 2894 according to the Goliath ARG.

[keen slate]

that would make more sense, since that's exactly 100 years after the events of the original marathon game

[plucky sierra]

2893 I thought

[unreal mortar]

Well, from what i crecall the intended year for the arrival of the UESC Equamity was in 2794 so...

[plucky sierra]

The cinematic short shows the runners on 2893. And the arg evidence videos are dated 2893

[unreal mortar]

Does in game suggest any other dates?

[plucky sierra]

The alpha didn’t have much to go on as far as I’m aware

[plucky sierra]

I’m pretty sure in the arg (the only dates we have) the ship leaves around 2797 and takes a little less than a hundred years at .122c getting there 2893

[unreal mortar]

Also surprised how fast it took for the runners to reach the colony. Took about 100 years for the UESC to plan and return first with satellites whereas the Marathon took 300 is it just because of its volume and mass. Idk the specs on the Equanimity.

[plucky sierra]

It was already a ship, they just modified it a bit rather than constructing it like the Marathon

[unreal mortar]

Marathon took 64 years to convert with deimos. Ot had already been used as a crist a while before iirc

[plucky sierra]

No I don’t think so, that was the main issue was MIDA wanted it to be a crist but they were making a colony ship instead

[visual lynx]

2794 is when the original game takes place

[visual lynx]

tech improves over time

[unreal mortar]

I MEANT 2894!

[unreal mortar]

I know. I talk about that alot when it comes to people saying the new game looks nothing like the original. Like, yeah, thats the point. Its been ~100 years since M1. Should the 1980's look like the 1880's?

[visual lynx]

and it’s been 400 years since the Marathon that we see in M1 was built

[unreal mortar]

That being said they did have ships come and go to relay supplies iirc.

[visual lynx]

eh? I don’t recall that even in the newer ARG info

[plucky sierra]

To Tau Ceti? The Colony had the Marathon and that’s it. The Equanimity was leaving comms relays every 1ly but not evidence for frequent resupplies

[unreal mortar]

I thought this was said somewhere in the original trilogy unless i am making things up.

[visual lynx]

definitely not

[languid hawk]

Midas here kids with the midas touch

[visual lynx]

show us on the doll where midas touched you

[languid hawk]

The lips my guy the lips they never lie

Any new lore since I was last here (beta days)

[unreal mortar]

"Alpha! It is an Alpha! You call that thing a Beta one more time, I'm gonna you so bad, your 's gonna wish they never weaved you!"

Also no public lore since alpha. I don't think any of the playtesr ads gave evem a scrap of new lore to discuss.

[languid hawk]

])

[arctic owl]

Somewhere in space… this may all be happening right now

[dire estuary]

Gherrit White why were you floating in your cell?

[arctic owl]

Unfortunately the canon answer is that Greg Kirkpatrick doesn’t remember what “my” whole deal was

IIRC, when I was actively playing the Trilogy and visiting the Story site ten times a day, it seemed clear to me that he was an allegory for Durandal’s torment by Strauss, but I don’t think I could’ve told you exactly what each part of the story represented

[jaunty obsidian]

^ crypto scammer

[dire fog]

Auberon moment

[fallen hollow]

Marathon.

[sturdy abyss]

TAU CETI IV /ESCAPE WILL MAKE ME GOD

[fallen hollow]

Soon.

[regal ravine]

Any good lore websites ?

[unreal mortar]

Pinned messages

[frosty pasture]

https://marathon.bungie.org/story/

[bright thistle]

Well there is a lot of lore by byf

On YouTube

[plucky sierra]

Not marathon

[bright thistle]

He have one for marathon

[plucky sierra]

Not nearly as good as someone like Jake the Alright

[bright thistle]

100% agree with you.

[dire estuary]

None compare to Jeoku

The REAL bungie lore nerd and still building 🙃. He’s got some crazy Myth gameplay

[dire fog]

[lavish palm]

i used to fw byf but now? idk man he changed

[tardy veldt]

As far as i know no, he just doesnt do Marathon lore

[regal lynx]

I am a little sad that realistically there's only like 3 or 4 channels that have tried to be as clear and concise in regards to Marathon lore, obviously it all comes down to personal preference but Jake and Mandalore's videos (even if Mandy's videos delve into literal insanity by the end) are my go-to whenever anyone asks about the OG games

I'm more of a firm believer of playing through them even if it's brain draining at times, though I guess you can always read through b.org's story page and supplement it by watching vids from others

[dire estuary]

I wouldnt take lore from vids, i think its better by miles when you play and interpret for yourself🙂.
They take Infinity for example, too literal and accept everything at face value.

[iron storm]

The BOB's are problematic on the ship.

How can I kill the p'hor and s'pht if they keep getting in my line of sight?

[arctic plank]

[dire estuary]

THEYRE EVERYWHERE!!

[dire estuary]

Gotta get ahead of them!!!

[sturdy abyss]

What is the NuCat’s purpose in first place?

Did Sekiguchi create him for surveillance or something like that?

[plucky sierra]

purpose?

[dire estuary]

It’s prolly just a biotmata of a cat

[sturdy abyss]

Lol

[sturdy abyss]

“Detroit: Become Human” ahh

[dire estuary]

Lel

[unreal mortar]

I don't think its been said why they are on Tau Ceti but the https://sekiguchigenetics.jp/ says they are to let pets live with you eternally. Personally i feel like this is probably shady and abusive.

[faint ice]

You think cyborgs/runners can taste?

[sturdy abyss]

I doubt it

But they def smell possibly

[faint ice]

But smell and taste are interlinked tho

[dire estuary]

Interlinked

[turbid nebula]

Consumer models almost definitely, runners who knows

[stoic axle]

like a trillion worms

[sturdy abyss]

NuCaloric: Worm Ramen-Available soon

[unreal mortar]

I don't feel like they don't much reason too but maybe if they get hurt in the mouth they can realize so.

[visual lynx]

gakh!

[unkempt wagon]

Alright here is the lore, Runners:

🫃

[fickle anvil]

That’s crazy lore

[little shadow]

[high bison]

Is there a decent lore introduction for the new game? I watched a video about the ARG that was in 2023, but I haven't seen anything else

[unreal mortar]

https://youtu.be/zSFza4VgK-E?si=mpkU_a7Lz7F81VOZ
Jake got plenty of good lore breakdowns including the alpha and goliath arg.

[rotund stump]

check pins, karnemir has an archive site of numarathon lore

[noble schooner]

What does Arachne do?

[faint ice]

Spider things

[brave aurora]

don't say "your mom", don't say "your mom" don't do it

[coral oasis]

The furtive silk worm, so easily forgotten.

[brave aurora]

yes, indeed.

[sturdy abyss]

the thing is that NuCaloric is using those for the NuCaloric Worm Ramen™️

[brave aurora]

it is called Tau Ceti IV where the clans of the S'pht converge

[coral oasis]

In venturing forth, the Runners discover the truth of the old words: "Escape will make me God."

[spark sandal]

lol

[unreal mortar]

Not publicly known yet

[honest kiln]

I assume storage tech

Because I think voids anvil ass head peice is a hood storage container

[unreal mortar]

"Where did my 2 gallon 2% tick milk go?"

🥛

"It's not my buisness."

[honest kiln]

POV black bird finding the milk

[bitter basin]

🥛

[manic apex]

The 2% is not for milkfat but for pulp.

"Whole" Tick Milk is.....quite a experience.

[plucky sierra]

just pulp, please

[unreal mortar]

Tick cheese

[visual lynx]

competitor to Sekiguchi, using spider silk instead of worm silk /j?

[unreal mortar]

Evil biomata:

"I don't really care what happend to these people."

"Its my unfortunate token."

"It does concern me these people disappeared..."

"🦗 🦗 🦗"

[plucky sierra]

https://tenor.com/view/enriquecamposc-gif-23156265

[visual lynx]

hmm, in Marathon Zero the pid-esque enemy units, that I have hypothesized are the Chockisens mentioned in the M1 manual and perhaps some kind of indigenous Tau Cetian life form, look kind of spidery…

[unreal mortar]

I think the chockisens are the birds that alert your presence on tau ceti. Manual said they annoyed colonist and these birds seem very confident around the colony.

[dire fog]

Yawn

[prime rose]

yes - this is probably a baseline function for most sekgen shells given they're still grown from human dna

they probably offer luxury packages with expanded sensory suites for even better taste/smell/touch/vision/hearing

and if you're SekGen trying to sell an S-series clone to the rich and powerful, they're going to want an improved experience, not a worse one

[dire estuary]

On the first day of NEFXMas, Adminn_1 gave to me!

A SCENARIO IN THE WORKSHOP!🗣️🗣️🗣️
On the second day of NEFXMas, Adminn_1 gave to me!-

[undone sluice]

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/1364488355521368074/1364492606540746752/RDT_20250418_073953.mp4?ex=68f92684&is=68f7d504&hm=f5d79ac2d0c2541673426fffd1c37bb92b2d70abf42abf538668ecee0082c442&

[fluid pivot]

https://tenor.com/view/ishowspeed-try-not-to-laugh-gif-7682731162751353849

[loud cave]

The quality looks so compressed 😭

[silent swallow]

I just want to know what the moth's name is

[bright thistle]

Mothy

[idle hedge]

kevin

[gritty ridge]

Who tryna play rn I’m NAE ps5

[gaunt cypress]

I just got the email but i dont have the role in discord. is that not gonna be a problem or am i good to play the game?

[cerulean lance]

discord role shouldn't stop you from playing as long as you have access on the platform you applied to play on

[gaunt cypress]

Soundss good :) Loading the game up rn

[wicked umbra]

having a convo to someone can this test be streamed in a vc ?

[idle hedge]

yeah just keep your mouth shut okay?

[civic galleon]

Sorry I know this is the lore channel, but the other chat is so caotic lol. Copy-pasting my question:
If I have Steam and Discord linked, is it enough to get into the nda chat? I don't really recall filling any survey, but I did apply to the test through Steam lol

[knotty locust]

can tak up too 24 hrd to get into the nda chat

[silk oar]

if you provided your discord account name during sign up, they should be able to add you in once the channel opens up

just waiting for them to open it up

[civic galleon]

Was this when you apply through Steam? Because then my memory is shit lmao. I'm not sure now 😭

[silk oar]

i'm not 100% sure, it shouldnt matter which platform you used to sign-up, because it all goes to bungie servers provided you actually did the signing up on bungie's website

like, if there was a little window in steam overlay, that hooked you onto bungie's site, it should, if not i got no clue

[civic galleon]

Hmmmm. Guess I'll just have to wait lol. I might have done all that but I guess I wasn't expecting to actually get selected for the test so I probably forgot 😅

[silk oar]

yeah, right now it's just a 'wait and see' thing, since the channel itself isnt even open.

[civic galleon]

Gotcha. thank you for your help <3 @silk oar
Also goated Dorothy pfp I have to say hahaha

[silk oar]

How do I get access to the NDA Discord?

• Join the official Discord at discord.gg/marathonthegame. We will add the Discord account name you provided during sign-up to our NDA’d section. Access for the NDA’d Discord channels can take up to 24 hours to update.
• For those joining after the test has begun, we’ll be conducting role grants daily in the evening for the duration of the test.
• For Steam users, you’ll need to take the survey you receive in-game to provide your Discord and Bungie.net account names.

from bungie official, so there'll probs be a survey in-game that, if you havent already given them your discord id, should allow you to

and then, yk, wait 24 hrs lmao

[civic galleon]

Ohhhhh ok awesome. Thank you so much sans dorothy

[silk oar]

👍

[civic galleon]

jk xd, for real thank you :D
I thought I was getting forgetful

[coarse flax]

are there mcdonalds' in the marathon lore?

[civic galleon]

McMarathon's

[vocal fjord]

NuCal

[sterile totem]

I bet they still run the Monopoly scam

[proper sorrel]

Looking for teammates. DM ME!

[dawn palm]

Confirmed! Marathon (2026) will contain new 🆕 downloadable content featuring fan favourite character Ronald Mac Donald 🤡 that’s right, fans of the video game 🎮 Marathon (2026) and the Mcdonalds 🍔(founded 1955) can finally express joy 🤩 at the new character releasing in the game 😲 the dlc will release as part of the season 7 update set to arrive early next year! get ready for exciting gameplay and thirilling shootouts, peace out

[haughty sapphire]

What if the only way to get on the marathon is by being uploaded into a battleroid, like kinda how you need a labs keycard to get into labs in tarkov

I’m prob reaching but it would make sense, it’s high risk high reward and supposed to be the hardest map in both games, and either finding or buying a card should be difficult/expensive, like using a battleroid

[vital jasper]

What's with the bug

[bright berry]

What is the best page to read about these factions?
I picked Sekiguchi because it was aesthetic as fuck and reminded me of Jinrai.

[indigo glacier]

Asian Eugenics

Great

[proper sorrel]

Looking for teammates. DM ME! Please no tryhard toxic bullshit. We can go for pvp and chill.

[muted tinsel]

need one teammates

[umbral basalt]

soo any recommendations on any lore videos to watch?

[bright berry]

https://tenor.com/view/jennie-ruby-like-jennie-blackpink-jennie-ruby-jane-gif-14207877066400011285

[forest wren]

there was a survey in game 💀

[young rover]

Is there anywhere I can read up on this games lore?

[fallen hollow]

Visit the lore archive.
https://marathon.karnemir.com

[regal summit]

[proper sorrel]

Anyone wanna team up? need 1 more! DM!

[last onyx]

MyNameIsByf has a few Marathon lore videos https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLWBlk70e-hGLxsb5-IQ3ZUiW3FQqUGsiQ

[finite bloom]

Who whant to play together add me on me

[umbral basalt]

tyyyyy

[proper sorrel]

Anyone wanna team up? need 1 more! DM!

[winged vine]

yo

[dim star]

frog blast the vent core!

[dense prism]

Is marathon connected to destiny in any way?

[zenith tusk]

no

[cursive badger]

I believe theyre made by the same company

[vestal onyx]

yes, the third game reveals you're the titular character

[mild salmon]

Has anyone successfully matched up

[glacial socket]

Outside of 1 gun, no

[visual lynx]

is that what kids are calling it these days?

(wait, is “chill” still the s*x part, or is it the “pvp” now?)

[proper sorrel]

Kids? im probably older than u brother xD

[steel crest]

We old man

Dont hate on the dads

[plucky sierra]

probably not

[trail zinc]

Most marathon heads are just old so that checks out

[lucid oak]

You know, I'm actually really curious as to what the actual overlap is between people playing this game now and the people like myself who grew up with the original trilogy. Like genuinely one of the reasons I'm super excited for this game is because it's the first marathon game in nearly 30 years.

[trail zinc]

I mean played them but I was 10 year old with an addiction to cosmic horror and scfi in in 2012.

[visual lynx]

I could be your dad

[trail zinc]

Im adopted so you any kids in 02?

[visual lynx]

not that I know of but those were college years so 🤷

[trail zinc]

Well hi potential father

[tidal gyro]

Haven't been able to redeem my code, no ones saying why, think it might be a us one, so send me a European one if ya have one! 😯 here's my code if anyone gets it working have fun! ☺️. QG5D-9FF9-8JDP

[plucky sierra]

Codes are tied to Bungie ID

[mortal cave]

#1346519584005558404 I think when a player is downed... And watching his teammate who is still alive. The player spectating should have a prompt on screen or be able to see where his and teammates body's are for rez. It's frustrating not being able to spectate your alive teammate and see where your downed body is compared to where they are

[mortal cave]

Just download the previous closed test and it should work if you played previously.. No code needed

[rancid cape]

Bro?

[plucky sierra]

NDA breach

[tidal gyro]

So people reply to tell me I'm wrong but not my 2 posts asking for help.. smh I'll send in my budgie I'd to whoever gets it to work too!

[plucky sierra]

what does it say when you redeem?

[cloud vine]

your bungie account will be banned

[faint ice]

Yeah I'd say if you got in, keep silent till the NDA feedback thing opens up

[split ridge]

me when I break my nda

[last onyx]

who up breaking their NDA

[lyric frigate]

Right, so, maybe my neural net is a tad scrambled or whatever the hell, but what is even going on here?

[coral oasis]

JaketheAlright also has some good lore videos. If you haven't watched Mandalore Gaming's videos on the Marathon trilogy and Pathways Into Darkness, you have got to watch those.

[umbral basalt]

i will, thanks to yall for the recommendations ,love 🫰

[ivory bloom]

Did you participate in the open test a while back, if so, you just redownload the same thing and it’s been updated for this test

[random haven]

what is code:salak

[faint ice]

Also if you wanna go first hand, all three of the original games are free on steam

[tidal gyro]

That the voucher code is wrong or incorrect, even though I'm copying and pasting it into the app, when I put it via my ps5 it says it's the wrong region

[tidal gyro]

Wasn't in the last test

[tidal gyro]

Check dm's

[young sedge]

What do each faction represent? Anyone got lore behind them?

[visual lynx]

official lore in the pins, but in short:

nucaloric: space monsanto, responsible for much of the original colony’s agri-industry

traxus: industrial megacorp rivaling entire interplanetary governments, provided nucal a ship to investigate the colony

sekiguchi: bioengineering corp who make the artificial bodies used for the mission

cyberacme: space google who make the software that those bodies and almost everything else runs on

mida: revolutionary political faction who were opposed to the original mission centuries ago, smuggled their people onboard, and are suspected by the space government of being the reason why the mission went dark

(arachne: spooky spider people? jk we don’t know anything)

[young sedge]

Wow thank you!! I literally can’t find any websites for like a short overview! Just long videos when Im tryna find a short meaning lmao

Wait im sorry, its in the PINS?! Jesus christ why didn’t anyone just tell me that. I don’t check that 🤣

[twin topaz]

What if.....it's all connected somehow!?

Chill Im gonna love this game,

[visual lynx]

Traxus was an AI series in the back history of the original Marathon (Traxus IV went rampant, requiring the shutdown of the entire Martian net to purge), and the company in Halo is certainly a reference to it; and the company in new Marathon is surely related to the historical AI as well.

right Halo began life as a Marathon sequel before they changed some names to protect the innocent

[dry sandal]

God I wanna say stuff but I don't what channels are NDA's and what is not

[olive frigate]

Can we stream on discord for close friends ?

NDA is for public streaming right ? Youtube, twitch, Kick, ..etc..

[karmic bloom]

I don´t think so,, cuz it is any 3rd party.. but I am not sure.. I would not try to do that

[idle hedge]

yeah if your friend is no snitch

[round bough]

im streaming in discord take my access to get me off this bs lol

[dry sandal]

So why was there such a huge aesthetic change from the first games? Have they said.

[short torrent]

Absolutely not

Only things to be shared are through the NDA channel

[olive frigate]

Alright thanks

[short torrent]

NDAs are not something to mess around with just telling you kindly

[olive frigate]

Thats why Im asking ! I wont stream at all

[vague python]

will either be in lore scattered throughout the map explaining how the colony was built probably, or they can chalk it up to "better graphic technology"

[short torrent]

I think another thing to go off of that is that most of the original developers of marathon are long gone so a new set of eyes approached what this game should look like

[vague python]

yeah but that is kinda lame lore wise 😂, maybe something happened in the gap between resettlement

Bungie isnt the type to let lore be ignored over aesthetic but who knows

[mighty crane]

What even is 'Bungie' these days.... compared to the Marathon days or the Halo days it's a completely different studio.

[olive frigate]

not true. most of people quiting are newbies ! same for 343i

[vague python]

yeah ceo was a dev for like 10 years or something, most of the bungie identity in terms of storytelling is still there, it is just mixed with shareholder idiocracy

[short torrent]

I say most but mainly am talking about chris Barnett who was the game director of the original marathons but he also has issues of his own

[vague python]

that change is most likely why it is a hero based shooter sadly, just hoping it doesnt bleed into the storytelling

[olive frigate]

in the same time Art director from 343i left Halo recently maybe he will come back to Bungie who knows

[mighty crane]

The OG Marathon games had such a strong story, I don't really see how that can continue in an extraction shooter. I would love to be proven wrong though.

[short torrent]

Wish I could say things

[vague python]

missions hopefully have meaning, similar to how (technically) a game like escape from tarkov has lore and your actual objective is to escape

it is possible but there is a really thin line for a game like this because the story can easily get lost in the gameplay loop

[short torrent]

Lore was supposed to me more of a point to hone in on for this playtest but unless you’re in the test unfortunately you won’t know more about that information

[mighty crane]

Huh, looks like this was the right test for me to get invited to then 😄

[olive frigate]

I trust bungie they know how to make you dive into Lore and they know how to make you feel surrounded by their environment and ambiances

[mighty crane]

Also @short torrent am I likely to recognise your name from HBO?

[short torrent]

sigh no probably like the 20th person to ask. It’s just a play on destiny boss names lmao (I also have a very good Kermit impression)

[mighty crane]

.... which you're going to demonstrate for us now, right? 😄

[vague python]

bro really dont know destiny factions 🤦

[short torrent]

Can’t say anything about the lore of this test but the alpha test in April was not detailed enough of the lore of each faction

[short torrent]

Mmmmmaybe

[mighty crane]

Yeah I get the Kell thing, I'm like top 2% for time played on Destiny according to TWOD 😂 😬 😅 😩
'Kermit' was just a popular Halo guy, sorry to be the billionth person to ask, but looking forward to the impression at some point 😉
And, hopefully lots of juicy Marathon lore in the Test.

[short torrent]

No shame in you asking. As much as I wish I was the halo Kermit no I’m unfortunately only the frog type.

Bungie is cooking

[vague python]

you are probably the first person to ask about the Kermit part instead of the Kell part 😭

[mighty crane]

That really surprises me. I know that Destiny and Marathon aren't exactly similar, but that suggests that a lot of players coming over to Marathon are NEW to Bungie games.... which is a positive.

[young rover]

Anyone else work night shift and are playing when they get off work? I get off at 530 ct me and the homie are hopping on and playing when we get off we just need a 3rd? Just dm me if interested

[visual lynx]

Barnett wasn’t even at Bungie when the original Marathons came out

The only people left from that era are Jason and Rob

[mighty crane]

Jason Jones I assume? and Rob who?

[craggy night]

Robbing deez nuts on yo face

[mighty crane]

Don't make a girl a promise...

[plain condor]

lore rizz

[sour oriole]

I see alot of VAIL in Marathon which i love as i love both games.
Being able to play this kinda in VR is really cool.
Both have amazing lore and great Art. This is top tier game really enjoying it so far

[golden bay]

never heard of it in my life. and after looking it up, i don't see the similarities at all. if you like the "aesthetic" Marathon is going for, look up Neo-Vectorheart (edit: clarification of what type of vectorheart)

[round wyvern]

still no channel to talk about the game?

[toxic vessel]

It says there should be an in-game survey where you provide your discord username, but I have not seen it yet. 🙁

[rotund hull]

whos the evil ai dude again i forgot his name isnt it toland or something (or am i miss remembering)

[mystic lynx]

Pete Parsons

[placid parrot]

Durandal?

[rotund hull]

YEAH THATS THE ONE

[placid parrot]

Toland's the spooky dude from destiny who's a simp for hive lore...ain't we all

[rotund hull]

lol

[drifting rover]

how do we get access to that?

[short torrent]

It’ll take some time

[drifting rover]

really need it to give feedback, hoping it fixes soon.

[short torrent]

There’s a feedback survey that should’ve been sent to your email!

[drifting rover]

nope, only gotten my steam notification, nothing else

wish there was a way we could contact staff or community staff to ask and get it fixed

[short torrent]

They did but they stopped because people were flooding it with some not so urgent issues

[drifting rover]

:/ so I gotta try contact dmg on twitter and hope for the best otherwise I cant voice any feedback awesome 🙁

[visual lynx]

yes and McLees

[slate dust]

really??

[mighty crane]

Oh, I'm pretty sure Robt left. Halopedia says he had gone by 2012 (although I thought it was more recent than that tbh)

[visual lynx]

he’s making a special return just for Marathon

[mighty crane]

Serious?? That's awesome!

[prime rose]

robt has been on the thon team for at least a couple years afaik

[visual lynx]

@prime rose you’re not ML are you? I just noticed your Discord account name

[prime rose]

not sure who that is so unlikely

[visual lynx]

famous old Marathon fan who worked on the XBL port of M2, went by the username Have Blue, real name Mark Levin (I dunno why I was so afraid to “dox” him when his real name is in the credits)

[prime rose]

ah, I think perhaps I encountered him in the ancient days of bungie fandom when I first picked up the 'havokblue' handle

alas i was just a child and thought 'havok' (like the physics engine) sounded cool and liked the Blue team in RvB lmao

[visual lynx]

do you like that I dubbed the Trooper weapon the “havok rifle” in Eternal? I was just riffing off the Fighter weapon being commonly called a “shock staff”, as it felt like shock and havok were related concepts somehow, maybe something like fear and panic, and what the respective weapons might invoke.

[prime rose]

can't discuss NDA content in this channel - beyond that, SekGen uses bio/cyber modded insects as part of the manufacturing process that produces runner shells

[visual lynx]

yeah I don’t have any NDA to violate and I dunno what moths we’re talking about but my first thought was “is that what turns into?”

[prime rose]

per the ARG we know they use weaveworms to produce stuff, and that at least one of their products is called 'synthsilk' or 'silk skin' or whatever it was - its probably a play on silk moths and their larvae

[hollow maple]

Ok I got accepted to playtest, there was nda channel for it?

[charred saddle]

Most of us have not yet been added to the NDA chat

We'll see the chat as soon as we get the role assigned on discord

[hollow maple]

Ok thanks for info! (and sorry I apparently sent the message into wrong channel)

[charred saddle]

You're welcome, and no worries!

[marsh forum]

theres lore in this game???

[rotund stump]

exhibit DN of people not reading

we in double digits of the alphabet now 💔

[vernal quail]

Nah js some text here and there👍

[mystic lynx]

People on twitter are breaking their NDA everywhere, I think it's gg now

[rotund stump]

and I thought 2718 times was enough

[bright berry]

Man, the old 3 Marathon games are free.
Wonder if I should play them for the lore
https://alephone.lhowon.org/

[heady bronze]

Yes, they are great games that can only really be experienced first hand.

[bright berry]

I makes me believe this new game will expand to include runs inside the ship Marathon and face alien husks.

[mighty crane]

They're also on Steam now too. The first two at least are worth playing. I still don't understand Infinity.

[rigid spade]

i know nothing about the lore
where do i start

[plucky loom]

guess no need to start, the Marathon lore seems got a new start.

[bright berry]

Marathon was the name of a moon that got built into a ship to explore space.

It got wrecked by aliens at the new earth-like planet because its AI decieved it.

Now the ship and colonies are derelict and hostile, prompting cybernetic runners to pillage it.

[coarse stump]

There's a Youtuber called Jake the Alright who has some good lore stuff for the old games and what we've seen from that old Alpha so far (and the ARG)

Also the first three games are free on Steam if you wanna play them yourself

[versed pasture]

Is it true only the first 2 games are cannon to this one?

I heard 3 went off the rails a bit...

[heady bronze]

The name of the moon is Deimos.

[heady bronze]

Play them and find out.

[versed pasture]

Easier said than done

[coarse stump]

I think 1 and 2 are hard canon but 1 is what matters for this game because something that happens in there leads to whats happening now

[bright berry]

Why? They are free on Steam and minimal installs

[regal lynx]

the trilogy is supposed to open and close with M1 and Infinity, Infinity is just very much out there in terms of where the story takes you. it was also developed by Double Aught (which was comprised of current/ex-Bungie staff at the time)

[versed pasture]

You're assuming I own a PC, hense me asking about the games story

[junior nimbus]

You at least got a laptop a potato can run the original marathons

[versed pasture]

Maybe one day, might get a steam deck if they're verified

[molten sail]

They should be, they look like MSDOS games

[junior nimbus]

Under steam deck it says playable

[proper sorrel]

Anyone wanna team up?? dm me!!

[versed meteor]

Pasta @olive frigate

[bright berry]

Those games are out on Mac and iPad too iirc

[copper mauve]

No the marathon is a 27 mile long ship made out of the Martian moon demos.

[bright berry]

Got it.
So the moon Deimos was made into the ship Marathon.

[fervent nacelle]

Correct, like an interstellar potato-ship

[copper mauve]

Then aliens found that shit cus a rampant ai contacted them and then invited them on board to help free the enslaved aliens that then brought the ship to where we are now 100 years later or something like that

Basically the plot of halo minus flood

[dire estuary]

Yes. Durandal contacted the Pfhor to use them as a means to escape as part of his specific controlled rampancy. He outplays you, the freedom of the spht, and the pfhor like a fiddle

However he uses you for future purpose. 7 years latter, 2 begins…and you, and a handful of bobs already on board the pfhor ship (same single ship from the 1st game which was said to be only a scouting party)

In the time you were gone, the pfhor completely annihilated everyone and everything on the marathon and colony surface. The marathon by the end of the first game was already heavily damaged too

[dire estuary]

They are on iOS. Same as the AlephOne, just a port

[dark gale]

Im invested in the aesthetic snd lore of the game. But i also have literally no idea where to start learning about it all

[visual lynx]

from what we’ve seen thus far it appears events from m2 definitely didn’t happen in this timeline, so my hypothesis is we’re in the final timeline from Infinity, many details of which are unknown

[visual lynx]

pins!

[dark gale]

Ooo very nice

[autumn latch]

I need a TLDR on the lore lol

[plucky sierra]

TLDR: you gotta play the games to understand the lore

[keen slate]

genuinely the tldr for og marathon is still several paragraphs

[marble stone]

you dont even really have to read all of it to understand it anyways

[zealous mountain]

YASSSSS I love this shit. I knew we would be in threes timeline ]

Honestly if you arent gonna read audio book it so many GREAT videos exist to explain the story of each game and/or the timeline!

[small peak]

We all know about https://marathon.bungie.org/story/ here, right? Huge page with literally every detail of the marathon story on it (including everything known about new marathon)

Must see for all lore scholars

[simple garden]

its a pain to see it on all green colour

also some document are in a foreign language, like why?

[visual lynx]

in the 2400s, the Martian moon Deimos is converted into a colony ship (the Marathon) that’s sent on a 300 year journey to settle Tau Ceti IV.

a few decades after the colony is established, alien slavers (the Pfhor) unexpectedly attack, and it turns out that one of the Marathon’s AIs (Durandal) called them there as a means of escaping his own servitude to humanity. he orchestrates a rebellion among some of the enslaved aliens (the S’pht), steals the Pfhor ship, and escapes.

you play as a mysteriously effective security officer fighting off the Pfhor and used as a pawn by Durandal in his plans, eventually saving the Marathon. meanwhile, it turns out that nine highly illegal cyborg supersoldiers (ten of which were smuggled aboard the Marathon when it launched) were on the colony and saved it too.

seventeen years later you wake up from stasis on Durandal’s stolen ship in orbit over the S’pht homeworld, where he sends you to explore the ruins of their civilization in search of technology from an ancient advanced race (the Jjaro) which he believes was involved in a S’pht myth of a lost clan of their people warping an entire moon out of orbit just before the Pfhor invaded them a thousand years ago. it turns out that the S’pht were engineered by the Jjaro as servants to terraform this system, but then abandoned after an attack by a mysterious chaos being (the W’rkncacnter) whom the Jjaro imprisoned in their sun.

you eventually reactivate an ancient S’pht AI, who recalls the lost clan back on their warp-capable moon-ship, who proceeded to start absolutely wiping the floor with the entire Pfhor battle fleet that came to stop Durandal. in a panic, the Pfhor deploy a weapon that can explode a whole star, but it’s fine: this system is long dead anyway, and the S’pht uprising against the Pfhor is now in full swing, so Durandal takes you off to points unknown for new adventures…

_ _

except no. it’s really hard to do the third game linear justice because you find yourself inexplicably replaying alternate versions of the events of the second game, always ending with the detonation of the sun… and the release of the reality-breaking chaos demon trapped within it. some entity that seems like maybe that S’pht AI cryptically guides(?) you through the dreamlike navigation of alternate timelines, until in one timeline you orchestrate a merger of Durandal with the S’pht AI, who are then able (with your help) to use derelict Jjaro technology to gravitationally contain the supernova and presumably the cosmic horror within it.

the merged Durandal-S’pht entity frees you from their service, and in an epilogue written from the end of time, subtly implies that you (presumably the tenth cyborg supersoldier, remember) were built using Jjaro technology that gives you this timeline-hopping ability to overcome any obstacle, even hinting metafictionally that the ability to restore from saved games is a manifestation of that power, and calling you “Destiny”.

[neon root]

This is not a tldr bruh

[frozen wedge]

TLDR; there are aliens, go shoot them

[deft verge]

moons haunted

[frozen wedge]

loads pistol

[cerulean lance]

It is in the world of marathon lore lol

[keen slate]

in fairness, the deciding factor for being in 3's timeline is "the universe is not destroyed"

[floral sinew]

do we know how the runners got to tau ceti

[visual lynx]

it appears that they were brought on a Traxus ship commissioned by Nucaloric

and of course they use Sekiguchi shells running CyAc software so

[floral sinew]

do we know where thats referenced

[scenic vault]

How does Nucaloric food taste

[keen slate]

i imagine it doesn't

[oak idol]

i made a liquid cheeseburger at home cuz im such a huge fan and i gotta say, it actually fucking sucks

[cosmic relic]

Caloric

[prisma hazel]

And new

[wicked hazel]

What the fuck

[cedar flax]

Is that the actual lore?

[cedar flax]

Unless it's one of the good aliens. Don't shoot those ones

[dense cedar]

Anyone have a recommendation for how to become initiated into Marathon lore as I get into this thing? I’m a D2 lore appreciator so excited to see what Bungie has here

[prisma hazel]

I believe the way it's designed is that the first season or couple of seasons will be the player/AI agents investigating and discovering the lore from the previous games

[dense cedar]

Oh that’s actually a clever way to do it. So basically just sit back and let the game show me. Novel concept coming from Destiny where you just have to read the good stuff has

[lusty igloo]

MandaloreGaming has a good playlist on YouTube called 'Bungie Rabbithole`

[covert ibex]

the old games are free on steam

[cedar flax]

Im excited to learn the lore too. I started destiny a few months back and the stries are great

[covert ibex]

https://store.steampowered.com/developer/alephone

[dense cedar]

Oh man the very original D1 lore books blew my mind and made me the fan I am today. Bungie knows how to build a universe.

[cedar flax]

For sure. I read all the halo books too. Made me a bigger fan for sure

[prisma hazel]

I don't know how much I can say because of the nda but there is indeed lore

[torpid latch]

Hey everyone. This chat appears to have my kind of people in it.

I just startd up in the Marathon tech test, but I've been playing since 1996

Anyone here been down the rabbit hole of the Marathon story page?

[torpid latch]

I'm honestly not sure if the Marathon community knows about Hamish.

[prisma hazel]

Yeah this lore is as deep and insane as dune

[amber hedge]

That's a a good show too

[plucky sierra]

a significant amount do, it is pinned in this channel, but also a significant amount are new fans who do not

[torpid latch]

That's awesome, I should assume the best. I really never thought I'd see the day that "new Marathon fans" would be a thing. I'm excited for them and hope they get the game they deserve

[vague acorn]

.

[ancient otter]

Man

I was writing for “Inside Mac Games” back when the Marathon 1 Demo dropped and we all sllllllooowwwwwllllyyyy dl’d it via AOL and picked apart the terminal text letter by letter. Good times.

[visual lynx]

pins

[visual lynx]

wow, someone older than me! I was there too, but I was 12

[torpid latch]

That's rad! I got my Marathon demos through MacAddict's disc, and my Marathon games by ordering directly from Matt Soell. Such a nice dude.

[torpid latch]

I was a kid for the original Marathons as well. I played the M2:D demo at school in 6th grade, and played Infinity multiplayer on my middle school computer lab. Spent a lot of time with Forge and Anvil, which prepped me for Unity

[visual lynx]

I loved discovering that Bungie was so small that the same guy I chatted with on their boards on AOL (Matt) was the guy you’d get if you called to order or get tech support. I had a serial number problem once and called about it and Matt knew who I was!!

[torpid latch]

Hahaha, same! Soell was generous with the swag, between Oni, the Marathon Box, and the Myth games I got a pretty sweet collection of stickers and a "Bon Carnage" hat

[ancient otter]

wooo, Forge and Anvil. Flashbacks

[ornate raven]

is there a tldr on factions?

[lapis river]

Mida are terrorist
Sekiguchi makes shells
NuCaloric is food
CyberAcme are computer nerds
Traxus builds

[torpid latch]

Such great tools. I'm not proud of this (yes I am) but I used Forge to alter the Hats Off to 8 19 map to include a secret room full of weapons and buttons that activated traps, then sprung them on my netgame buddies

[ornate raven]

that sounds fun. who amongst those is considered a good guy if that even is a thing?

[high tinsel]

I doubt it considering they're corp's

[ornate raven]

hey, corporations can be good. there are so many great examples irl...

[lapis river]

I think they all have something bad about them . Like Cyberpunk corpo bad

[ornate raven]

yeah, I got the idea, thanks 🙂 feels fitting for a sci-fi future

[lapis river]

I think in the ARG a seki employee was doing something
I think they were trying to expose them for something

[visual lynx]

nucaloric: space monsanto, responsible for much of the original colony’s agri-industry

traxus: industrial megacorp rivaling entire interplanetary governments, provided nucal a ship to investigate the colony

sekiguchi: bioengineering corp who make the artificial bodies used for the mission

cyberacme: space google who make the software that those bodies and almost everything else runs on

mida: revolutionary political faction who were opposed to the original mission centuries ago, smuggled their people onboard, and are suspected by the space government of being the reason why the mission went dark

(arachne: spooky spider people? jk we don’t know anything)

[snow snow]

Initially i thought that nucal are +- good, but i learned that they supply literally everything and influence world state by cutting/increasing supplies

[drifting kettle]

do you guys think runners can fart?

[snow snow]

I dont think shells contain digestive systems at all, is consciousness inside the shell even remember how bassy wet fart sound? Well never know

[keen crescent]

i think its really cool that the explody bugs are called glorbies

[polar mica]

I know right? I was so surprised to see that but its so awesome

[wanton ether]

Thanks

[primal grove]

can someone explain to me why mida is the "mpreg faction"

[rocky dove]

Huh?

[mystic forge]

Only those from the beginning like myself would understand

[languid hawk]

i wish the nda was up

[primal grove]

Ok the reactions and the smug knowledge is cool and all but the joke isn’t funny when you withhold the context

[visual lynx]

https://www.reddit.com/r/GenZ/s/X95TGtE6Ha

[primal grove]

No, I mean why mida

[visual lynx]

I figure the hoi polloi in the main channels just think MIDA “is gay” or whatever derogatory thing kids think that mpreg emoji means

[wicked arch]

Would be cool to get a crashcourse on Marathon lore, like a video

[visual lynx]

there are many!

[wicked arch]

🤦‍♀️ right i can search that on yt

[gray lintel]

Content creators

[versed pasture]

My runner has a butt speaker

So yes

[plucky sierra]

In the build up leading into the reveal in April each faction branded its own spammy memes. People with the Sekiguchi role spammed the worm, NuCaloric spammed the cat, Traxus started roleplaying as business people and CyberAcme started typing in code block like this MIDAs joke for some reason was Mpreg, I don’t think anyone really understands why now but there’s a lot of gifs people have.

It wasn’t derogatory, people with the MIDA role started it and embraced the memes.

[half kite]

nah

[lapis river]

Its almost as if someone made a platform to watch videos

[lapis river]

I want to believe it was just a inside joke that turn widespread
Remember seeing a bunch during the Ad war

[lapis river]

The good old days...

[lapis river]

Bro spill my Sekiguchi secrets

[versed pasture]

Can I link em here?

[lapis river]

Maybe

[versed pasture]

LORE DROP

https://youtu.be/6joBr-G9_1k?si=oB5kKiBTTZbGfJ_z

[versed pasture]

Maybe means yes to me

[lapis river]

Ok

[golden bay]

Bungie cooked so HARD with the lore. One of the biggest reasons if not THE reason for me being excited about this game

everything is so 💋 👌

[visual lynx]

old and inaccurate

[versed pasture]

You're welcome to post "new and accurate" lore 👍

[visual lynx]

there is no new lore, but I post accurate old lore all the time

[languid hawk]

we finally have all the names of the factions rep and cant talk about them is hurting my heart

[shrewd ravine]

Hello Marathonian's !!

[torpid latch]

To the folks looking for an approach to learning the Marathon lore... the most effective and slowest way is to play the Marathon Trilogy. The second most effective and fastest way is to head over to The Marathon Story Page and read the manual and terminal text for all three games.

[simple garden]

So does anyone know what happened to the Battleroids or??

[versed pasture]

It's a great introduction to people that know nothing about the story and covers everything not blocked by the NDA 👍

[plucky sierra]

its an inaccurate introduction

if people won't play the games here is all the raw lore terminals: https://marathon.karnemir.com/root
Here is the Marathon story page that has been discussing the story since the 90s: https://marathon.bungie.org/story/
videos are great but there is a lot of editorializing done by most of them and it is best to read the lore

[acoustic pilot]

any way to watch the intro video again?

[sullen breach]

hope so it flashed me so much

[visual lynx]

in the M2 timeline they were nuked to bedrock along with the colony three months after M1

in the first and probably most Infinity timelines they were “translated to Pfhor slave tanks” but not all of them survived the process.

[visual lynx]

at least seeing him talk about the whole CRIST situation with Mars and how Deimos was turned into the Marathon instead of a new CRIST did get me to thinking:

why would the UESC care so much about this new interstellar colony mission that they would sacrifice their existing interplanetary colony?

also why did MIDA never try to capture the Marathon and use it as a CRIST when they had the chance while they were in power, but did smuggle people and munitions aboard when it went to Tau Ceti?

and most importantly, why does the game give us all of this extensive information about the whole Martian conflict surrounding the launch of the Marathon, only for it to never come into play in the present day events of the game?

I think it’s because JJARRO WERE AT TAU CETI and not only did the UESC know and deem exploring that more important than saving Mars, MIDA knew too and made that same decision, and we the players were supposed to infer all that too.

[wanton oracle]

what is a crist

[visual lynx]

in an earlier version of the game’s story the player-character was to have accidentally opened a portal by activating some device on Tau Ceti, and the bad aliens would have come through there instead of arriving by ship. (yet another thing HL copied from Marathon, come to think of that.) maybe that was meant to have been Jjaro technology, and the whole Martian backstory would have tied more directly into that.

I suspect the plot of nuMarathon probably will too.

[visual lynx]

Cargo and Resource In-System Transport: huge meteors converted into cargo ships used to resupply Mars from Earth.

their gradual failure is what let to the deterioration of conditions on Mars and the rise of MIDA in response

they were similar in design to the Marathon, which therefore could have been converted into one

[acoustic pilot]

I can't find a way to rewatch the intro, it was cool

[sullen breach]

reinstall?

[restive cloud]

-redacted- -redacted- -redacted-

[winged coral]

What's up with the crash thing in mrthn key art ? Is tau ceti the big planet behind ? Is the marathon the ship, or the ship + the small planet ? And as a runner, where are you exactly ?

[visual lynx]

in the classic games the Marathon was a moon converted into a ship; in the new game they seem to have retconned that into a ship stuck through a moon

[jolly bronze]

cloaked aliens with a cyclops HAL-style eye are called what? i'm not going to the basement for my manuals right now

[onyx falcon]

honestly is it not both in the new game, you can still see lights engrained into the moon just like the old ship

[jolly bronze]

goodness gracious you're all as old as me

[visual lynx]

S’pht compilers

[languid hawk]

welcome to your life there is no turning back even while you sleep we will find you - durandal

[jolly bronze]

durandal is my boy... well sort of... if it feels like it.

[languid hawk]

durandal is king of kings

[visual lynx]

is this an ozymandias joke?

[versed pasture]

They were huge ships created to resupply the mars colony

[wanton oracle]

is the fact that it was called a "CRIST" symbolical?

[languid hawk]

i cant wait till this game come out the lore ism gonna be so juicy

[raw arrow]

I was always looking forward to it, but now I'm super stoked!

[visual lynx]

presumably but the symbolism there has never been clear to me

[plucky sierra]

Yeah no clear symbolism there to be honest

[random fern]

Hey. Are we allowed to talk about lore aspects in the game that we have seen in the test, or will that violate NDA

[signal isle]

Anything from this test should be restricted to the nda channel I believe

[rigid scarab]

are the devs ever gonna add a arachne role?

[jaunty obsidian]

crypto scammer

[karmic ocean]

Same. All intros for that matter. They should be saved in the Codex

[karmic ocean]

Where’s the NDA channel?? I’m in the test and would love to give feedback

[twilit pollen]

if you provided your Discord name in the survey, they are adding people automatically every 24 hours, it's not working for a lot of people, so they are saying to open a ticket with them: #discord-role-assistance message

[vast briar]

You have to go to the browse channels and enable them

[tame ice]

At Bungie.. if you ever decide to release books about the Marathon universe, like the Grimoire in Destiny, I’ll buy them immediately.
The lore already feels so vast and intriguingly complex — and I love that.
I just hope the short film is accurate and truly captures what we can expect from the story.

[dire estuary]

Lookers

Ah okay ig spht.
I know lookers were cloaked and annoying af🤣
Spht do come cloaked yeah

[winged coral]

ah ok, so we're not in the ship moon itself, rather the big planet behind it, that seems like a weird thing to me, perhaps a ship salvage map could be nice

[dire estuary]

Tbf after the pfhor attacked the marathon, i feel like most of the life support systems were destroyed so its impossible to even go on without oxygen supply and other EVA

[winged coral]

the runners need oxygen ? am i missing their point ?

[dire estuary]

Im a guy.
And i was talking about the Marathon, the ship and why we’re not on it yet or may not

[winged coral]

their as in the runner's

[dire estuary]

Ooooh mb mb😅

[winged coral]

yep understood that correctly, i thought the runners whole point is not needing oxygen or any planetary human ressources

[dire estuary]

Yeah thats true. Ig they could go onboard but then what about gravity on the ship

[winged coral]

to me that would make very intressting gameplay, but i suppose you're right.... how fucked is the ship itself ? as bad as the gravity on it doesnt work anymore ?

[dire estuary]

I mean, the initial attack essentially crippled the ship, and a lot of areas had to be cleared out into the vacuum of space.
I feel like not a lot of the marathon has much left, and if it is, its gonna be inhospitable

I feel like leftover spht are gonna be left behind, malfunctioning drones maybe too, and old simulacrums perhaps…

[winged coral]

that would be very intressting actually

[dire estuary]

They should make it like a raid event. Each week you raid a different section of the ship, kinda like how destiny has Nightfalls.
And then for the raids to the ship, you have the option to go solo by default, but team when you play on the harder mode

[versed pasture]

You can divulge info from the last test that's come to light not this one in lore

[versed pasture]

Would gravity affect runners as they could essentially have mag locked feet being shells?

[dire estuary]

Maybe it affects the environment.
Toggle between grav mode and zero g. Probably would be sick af for combat

[versed pasture]

Being able to fix yourself to different surfaces like the ceiling would be a unique gameplay element

Even having a raid on the marathon that requires you to do that for traversal would be cool

I mean there's alot they can do with this world

[dire estuary]

Tonsss. And would be cool to see the diff between planetside artstyle and the classic and grimy style of the marathon

[tame ice]

Is there a possibility that the Marathon could be the origins of the traveller in destiny?

[tame ice]

??

[south oar]

Does it hurt to have your consciousness transferred, do runners experience immense pain during death?

[bright berry]

SekGen wouldn't program 1:1 pain receptors into the runner's shell.

[south oar]

Valid point.

[mighty crane]

Runners are precursors to Ghosts confirmed?

[south oar]

Are the UESC units sapient, sentient or just robotic units, they don't seem to bleed.

Anyone know?

[inner cave]

theyre evil

[south oar]

Descriptive...

[elder island]

considering how long it’d take to transport anything to and from earth, my guess is that the UESC also has some sort of bioatomic 3d printing shiii that we see with the shells.

[south oar]

Given how they can just appear it's likely.

Still wonder if they're actually 'people'

[elder island]

I don’t think so, prob just AI. seems like ai in this universe is everywhere

[south oar]

And given how smart the AI is in the universe it seems like a good guess.

[elder island]

Everyone including the UESC is getting to Tau Ceti IV around the same time since the distress signal took so long to get to earth, so they’re just as prepared as any of the factions. Prob do have a few human minds at work but like there isn’t a single human out there it seems. Just AI and shells

Marathon (current) is lowkey just sekeguchi or whatever getting there shells thru the prototype stages lol

[cloud ruin]

feel like it would be more of a factory since they look to be just robots

[elder island]

Whatever the UESC sent, it can mass produce damn good killbots while reinforcing pretty well. I’d image you’re right. Prob some orbital facility. Great questions to be asking too. It has to be something they sent AFTER the Marathon got destroyed. If we assume they’re using already existing infrastructure on the planet or in orbit, then it would kind of complicate our theory. sorry for the yap

they do look like they’re made out the same material as the runners. So they must be using the same type of combat deployment technology. That’s the only reason i’d assume they’re also like the shells, just maybe a few generations behind what our runner is using

[dire estuary]

How does Niger connect to the game?

[pine loom]

if they can make organic runners, the tech for the robots must be way advanced

[elder island]

agreed

[echo sandal]

UESC is so funnily close to USEC from tarkov

[versed pasture]

SekGen fart speakers are prime technology standards btw

[simple garden]

there were theories but they kinda died when it was revealed that the traveller was de gardener

nonetheless they share the same multiverse and they could go down that road

[fossil vigil]

wait are the 2 games connected?

[visual lynx]

not cloaked as in invisible, cloaked as in wearing a robe-like garment

[lapis river]

Stop spilling my Sekiguchi secrets

[dire fog]

Stop shelling my shell shells

[lapis river]

By the sea shore

[dire estuary]

I think cloaked I think cloaked camo mb😅
That halo mindset got me fucked

[rain remnant]

bungie i demand a code

[copper viper]

Need one too so I can play with a friend lmao

[languid hawk]

THE ONLY problem with the genre is pve players trying to avoid pvp at all cost

[copper viper]

Loving the pvp and pve so far, Ive died to the ai more then players so far, only got 11h in atm

[languid hawk]

i die alot cause im caught 1v3 teams cause players dont wanna engadge but im left asking why play its not for u

[visual lynx]

sir, this is the lore channel

[upper stratus]

yeah just realized mb mb

[dire estuary]

Lmfao

[mighty crane]

How do other Extraction Shooters tell their story? (do any?)

[winged coral]

Hello sir, I've been having trouble with the company provided runner shells.

[fickle plume]

You can't do it because the gameplay doesn't allow for it, you can't sit still forever reading a terminal without pressure, nor can you watch any kind of narrative or cinematics like in Destiny.

Oh sorry, you mean other games, not Marathon specifically.

[naive loom]

you're looking at the wrong kind of game

[fickle plume]

The problem is that this game is named Marathon.

You can't use the Marathon name if narrative and story aren't your first, second, and third priority.

[naive loom]

you can because they have as it was their game...

[fickle plume]

Of course, but don't be surprised if there is absolute negativity around the game.

[naive loom]

i hated on it, then i played it.

[fickle plume]

When I get access to the feedback channel, if you want, we can go there to share our impressions.

[naive loom]

nah your good lil bro, i care for what i think of the game. You wanna be miserable and whine, i couldnt care less.

[weak temple]

Doesn’t matter. Especially since most of the people, if not all of them, never worked on the original Marathon trilogy. And it clearly has little to no understanding of that trilogy as well, unfortunately.

[naive loom]

You could say thats similar to the star wars sequel

[weak temple]

Unfortunately I could.

[naive loom]

that we can agree on

[fickle plume]

The truth is that you are absolutely rude and this violent response is not justified in any way.

[weak temple]

Marathon is going to die a slow, painful death if the devs do not course correct on gameplay and story. There’s still time, but it’s likely not to happen. These devs were the custodians of Destiny 2.

[fickle plume]

You don't even know my opinion about the game

[naive loom]

Thats not violent in any sense. Please check what you are saying before you accuse me of such

[weak temple]

“Unnecessarily Aggressive” is how I’d describe your response.

[fickle plume]

So I'm going to assume you're just crazy and defensive around everyone and I'm going to ignore you.

[naive loom]

Not agressive, i just dont have time for unbridaled negativity. My conversation with you is fine. The game needs to be looked at seperate from destiny and its story telling completely.

[weak temple]

What if there’s truth to that unbridled negativity?

Hell, I have yet to say a good thing about Marathon myself since the previous tests.

[viral pier]

end of the original marathon trilogy made it loose canon that all player created maps and future bungie games were just different timelines in the same multiverse

[naive loom]

Literally i am the same. I was negative about it since the start but that was due to a sour taste from taking focus from destiny. However I have thousands of hours in games like tarkov and ABI and this test has changed my mind about the game.

[weak temple]

If you interpret it that way, to be fair.

[viral pier]

way i chose to yeah, might not be, plenty of marathon references in all their games onward though

[weak temple]

the symbols
I see them everywhere I turn

[naive loom]

Could you care to aloborate, as much is appreciate your response its too vague for me to say anything in return lol

[viral pier]

i love the lore, would love for it to all be connected, legal reasons intervene as always

[mighty crane]

So er, no other Extraction Shooters do story. Good to know. But also kinda worrying 😬

[dire estuary]

Marathon was all about the story back then, that was its huge selling point next to other FPS games

Every bungie past post marathon took notes from it and referenced it. Halo and Destiny were originally meant to be direct inline connections but MS and Activision had the last word

[fickle plume]

Yet even Halo and Destiny place a significant focus on their story and narrative. At least for me, the word Bungie is synonymous with narrative.

[dire estuary]

They always had nailed story since they made PiD. After that, it became their bread and butter was to have a cool story

Halo CE for example, trailers never once showed the flood. It was just badass killing and shit in a cool, anticipated shooter, and was gonna be possibly connected to Marathon…the shock and horror people got when they got to the end of Assault on The Control Room with the 180 in atmosphere and then 343 Guilty Spark

The music adds so much too, it makes some moments more grand, inspiring, or grim, dark, hopeless sounding

Those strange sounds in 343 guilty spark? Is actually a song. It is called
“What once was lost”

The feeling of being watched the entire level, the strange sights inside the interior, no signs of elites, strange covenant behavior…the crashed ships outside? It all adds to something sinister at play until you reach the door. A bloody scene is before it, and then when you enter do you really see the aftermath…then the reveal

The music crescendos as the door behind you after fighting breaks open, and all hell breaks loose

[fickle plume]

I'm really looking forward to seeing what this moment will be like in the remake.

[dire estuary]

I even asked my dad, he said he got to that point late at night and even he was feeling dread and admittedly scared af because he never saw this coming

[dire estuary]

Look how Halo CEA did…
I think UE5 is an impressive engine, but the gameplay they showed feels like a Halo 5 Mod more than anything, and idk…i think it still doesnt capture the original halo and what halo WAS

Halo CE on its own, the original xbox version, will remain the best version of Halo CE there is. The colors, atmosphere, and the game already had detailed bump mapping and actual reflections on some surfaces already

So it wasnt like the game was technologically behind tons of others, it was a whole marathon’s length ahead of what was around at the time. Even in gameplay formula and AI

Halo 2 took it even further and marked the point at which games were selling more than movies in the box office
And halo 3, it took over the world

Bungie had done it, they achieved their 7 steps to world domination when they made Halo CE - 3. But Bungie came and went like Rome did

[quick sonnet]

you only get one chance to have a first impression and they got it right

[dire estuary]

Its one of the best games of all time, yeah

[quick sonnet]

it set the standard for like, almost 2 entire decades lmao

[dire estuary]

Still setting it lel

[quick sonnet]

i mean, fair

[ornate plover]

So is there now a whole overarching Bungie universe now?

I only ask cause of the sol system mention

[dire estuary]

Pathways connected to Marathon (somewhat but not really directly)
Marathon to all other bungie games
Myth to destiny
Halo to marathon

Theres a lot of connections i can make for you on a detailed note😅…
But, they are mostly just references since Bungie loves to be meta, except for the ending to Infinity

That single event is the most important to connecting the bungie games…and it couldnt have happened without you, the player, and the tens-thousands-millions who play too

[dire estuary]

Sol system is…our system’s legit name
And tau ceti is a real star system😅

[plucky sierra]

the Paraverse...

[ornate plover]

Yeah I wanted to add that but thought it would be kinda stupid to, I never knew tau ceti is an actual star system though

[dire estuary]

Lel. Iirc irl tc4 is mostly icy and uninhabitable to begin with

[ornate plover]

It’s not pretty like in the trailers? 😔

[dire estuary]

Starfield believe it or not, got it accurate

[hazy current]

whats the lore reason for having runners kill other runners if theyre all from cyberacme?

[surreal anchor]

Money, everyone’s an independent contractor. There’s limited resources and if you don’t get it you don’t get paid so might as well kill your competition

[hazy current]

fair

[surreal anchor]

Like most extraction shooters and this one everyone’s kinda just out for themselves for either profit or survival so working with other people might get you survival but not any profit. It does seem like runners are mainly just here for profit

[hazy current]

thank you berry bluepaws

[surreal anchor]

🫡

[bronze skiff]

I just wanna kill people a.k.a. "for the love of the game"

[turbid nebula]

This kinda doesn't add up when the focus of the game is squads of three

[warped hull]

i wanna fight the pfor and the W'rkncacnter

they can add them in like in Huntshowdown

and maybe the W'rkncacnter is why we have to extract, otherwise it mind breaks us XD

maybe an ancient battleroid can be a boss fight

[ornate plover]

No way

[dire estuary]

Yeah. It actually gets a lot right about orbits and a some real life space math

[grizzled forge]

Okay so I’m kind of confused about where these runners are running, why is everyone in the runner bodies

Like from the last tech test that was streamed I was confused about the maps and whatnot, like where are they fighting, are there humans, idk, the story looks fire and the aesthetic is dope but I’m just confused is all lol

[dire estuary]

Marathon

[grizzled forge]

Is that the name of where everything takes place?

[dire estuary]

Name of the UESC colony ship.
The name of the planet is Tau Ceti IV, part of the Tau Ceti star system
The runners we play as are based on their shells and minds but each player is playing in a disassociated version of that character

Meaning, we play as a variant of either of the heros who uploaded their brain which comes with their skills and whatnot, to be printed and sent out as mercenaries. Each time they die and come back its likely the original mind it copies from slowly deteriorates and becomes more disassociated from itself

Hence why we see a baseline like test in the cinematic video

Similar to a timeline where the timeline diverges and becomes different from every other branch off the original, yet is retains everything prior to the split

[grizzled forge]

Ohhhhhhhh okay👌 yeah that’s dope! I’m really into to sci-fi so this intrigues me to the max. Thanks for explaining this for me🙏🏽

[dire estuary]

Tldr: Origin point creates branches and nodes at the end. Each branch and node are based on the same origin but are all actually independent from the origin and eachother

[grizzled forge]

Yeah this game is gonna be dope

[dire estuary]

Fuck yea it is

[naive loom]

drinking the cool aid?

[dire estuary]

Nope😅
Brain stimulated and ready for lots of writing ahead of me

[wicked solar]

But is the player (the person that is controlling the shell) actually in control at every moment, or is the persons consciousness copied and sent to the shells on TC4?

[dire estuary]

I think its the latter

Us controlling is just a way of representing the unique individuality of each unique branched copy, no matter the shell.

[mighty crane]

Calling it early, this boi is gonna be the entire big bad of the game.

[dire estuary]

Ehhh i dunno

I think the reason for extract is limited time before councsious deterioration

The longer you spend in a shell at any given time means the conscious discerns more from itself

[warped hull]

yesssss let me get a knife kill on the pfor. i want my squad to get jumped by some swamp flickta as we running from LITERAL CHAOS tryn to stop us gettin more loot

maybe that jjaro station that contained the W'rkncacnter at the end of infinity can be a loot map now XD

[naive loom]

I like extraction shooters because the genre is great. I dont need it to tell a story.

[warped hull]

I dont mind a little cosmic horror involved. im just tired of shootin bots. MArathon had a lot of different enemies let me shoot aliens. let me shoota at a chaos god.

[proper pine]

(he says, in the lore channel)

[dire estuary]

Marathon’s whole point, is to have super deep meta lore

[viral pier]

he was baiting lol

[dire estuary]

Fml

[ornate plover]

Lots of writing, you making a review on it?

[dire estuary]

No. Making:
my own game
essays for school
and A Halo Redux project

[ornate plover]

Oh nice

[dire estuary]

I forgot that typing here was like trying to wade through waist deep molasses

[ornate plover]

I’m doing an everything you need to know video, happy they’re extending the playtest so I can get more hands on experience

[dire estuary]

Will watch🍻

[ornate plover]

Fair

[lapis river]

Just hard rest. I need coffee. I just woke up

[winged coral]

Yes sir !

[grizzled forge]

Same, I accidentally missed the email they sent and finally got my hands on it today, they sent it like 4 days ago so I’m glad they extended it

[glossy halo]

Hey guys, i wanna kinda dive into the lore slightly, are there any videos maybe that you would recommend to watch or sites?

[wraith kayak]

I guess the best you can get right now would be a summary of the ARG? Literally everything in the game as it exists right now is under NDA

[glossy halo]

But the previous games exist, thats why. my bad

[wraith kayak]

Yeah those games have their own lore too which is pretty solid. Can't really point to any particular video on that, though I think maybe Mandalore Gaming has one?

[shy saddle]

Quick question, why did the UESC Marathon crash on Tau Ceti IV? Is it still the same reason as the OG marathon?

[south oar]

So uh, is the consciousness of a runner from a person who already died and was copied?

Can anyone clarify?

[visual lynx]

in the OG it didn't crash, and it doesn't appear that it has in the new game either

[rain osprey]

NuCaloric makes the best food. This is important canon lore

[rapid jolt]

pls help my for one task :trace commander location at terminal in SOUTH RELAY bunker

[dire estuary]

bungie.org has a marathon story page

[dire estuary]

My theory is like this: Every person who has their shell made in their image, has their consciousness uploaded to a databank where copies of them are made by sharing memory of the original source. Each copy however, is individually distinct and separate from one another. Everytime a copy dies, or lives too long, the original mind slowly loses a little bit of itself until it can no longer associate with who it originally was.

Think of it like a branch. The branch will have twigs connected to the branch, and the twigs are partially part of it, but each twig is individually unique

[winged coral]

nope, its litterally YOU as a merc, you just upload yourself to runner shells being made in, or sent to the planet, not sure where the shells are made

[dire estuary]

The explanation if you being the runner is you controlling a unique copy of that runner’s consciousness everytime

[winged coral]

i was explained to be artificial, you just control a robot better than using a controller, that seems to be about it

[dire estuary]

Hence also why its a “shell”, an empty vessel for you to assume control

[winged coral]

yeah exactly, that would make little sense for you to actually forget yourself because of that, but the forgetting part in the long termcould definitly make sense

[dire estuary]

The forgetting is because youre temporarily using only a small section of their memory/brain

[winged coral]

but the shells are not real, they are not human nor concious, they are litteraly made for you to be using, their brain function only as a way for you to control

[dire estuary]

Each player and other shell is only partitioning parts of the mind everytime. With so many shells, each death is a slow crawl to insanity

Afterall the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over and over in hopes something changes, yet nothing ever does

[winged coral]

i don't think that's the case, to me it seems like it was explain as being purely made, purely created, non human, and just enough brain power to get controlled over

[dire estuary]

Maybe. But then why assume a very specific shell?
What you say imo would better support a version that lets you customize your runner fully

[winged coral]

you're right actually... but maybe i'm right and the customization part is just a lack of ressources from the devs ? but now that you mention it, it is weird that you can't customize the look and that all shells are very(all thingsd considered) diffrent from each others

[dire estuary]

Yeah. So also, its odd when in the cinematic they had to take a baseline test

That test imo, is to see how fargone the copy is from the original mind to discern the extent of the damage it received.
Again, each clone/copy is individually unique and independently thinking

[south oar]

Shells are made on the Marathon is my guess, not the colony

[dire estuary]

The marathon is long abandoned and was left in ruins by the Pfhor.
Made wholly uninhabitable

[winged coral]

but the marathon is supposed to be unlivable on, that would be weird for the worms to be there, even then, how do you maintain them ?

[dire estuary]

Also the tech on the marathon wouldnt match the tech currently because the hundreds of years of space travel

[winged coral]

i think the most likely case is that we are all trippin and the answer to all our question is elsewhere

[dreamy flower]

im only a couple factions unlocked into the game but is the story worth playing through the game for? Im a big fan of the original marathon story but the extraction gameplay loop is kinda rough to get through

[south oar]

Good point.

Oh Vid, Ithink I killed you once in game. V I X E N is my ID

Double barrel shotgun then finisher, lmao, I mostly play

[winged coral]

i'm not a huge huge fan of extract shooters, but i did a huge study through on the artistic direction of marathon, to be fair, i'm playing only to see what i've studied live haha, the artistic director is a very nice guy and was able to explain very well his inspirations and their application in marathon

[dire estuary]

Solos?

[south oar]

YEP

[dire estuary]

Well sheet you probably did.
Controller aiming and tuning this time around is rather drunk for some reason lel

[dreamy flower]

Ya the assets in the game are gorgeous and is the only other thing keeping me going lol

[dire estuary]

I play blackbird exclusively tho lel

[winged coral]

the visual integrity and the modern motion design inspiration got me so good. i now swear by it for anything i create

sadly though bungie did not forward my application haha, next time maybe

[visual lynx]

I like this fragmented-mind theory reconciling players and characters

I was concerned for story reasons when it was revealed that there would be a small number of player-characters rather than each player being their own unique character (because wtf there are going to be hundreds of the same person running around the same game world at the same time?)

but having each player canonically in-universe be a different concurrent iteration of the same person (who is possibly out there killing their other selves) lends a dystopianism that’s very in theme with the zombie cyborg battleroids of the original trilogy

[upper stratus]

totally ignorant question probably but, if something happens to the runner ( the mechanic one ) it affects the host? like the person

[dire estuary]

I have a feeling it does, but imo because each copy uses a very very small partition of the brain or original person, it has a slow effect on their deterioration.
Until all thats left is a mind that cant remember itself

[dire estuary]

Perhaps thats what battleroids are, i mean they are taken from the dead, and so whats to say its not the culmination of copying parts of the same bloodthirsty mind trained to kill, or a program even, put into a husk or shell of what once was a living person🙃

Afterall, the stages in Infinity are named after the stages of rampancy.
And durandal has taunted us in the first game about being nothing but a mindless killer, who’s only goal and motivation is to kill.
And some Infinity terminals hint at some connection to past lives, the original host, or maybe even the complex thought of the individual we control, maybe

[wraith kayak]

I always figured that since humanity in the original Marathon trilogy are able to create these specialised ship AIs, they can create a full human psyche from nothing to implant into the battleroids

It's rather Blade Runner, really

[dire estuary]

Its highly likely.
I mean they also had levels called “Electric Sheep”
And on top of that there are terminals in the first game that talk about implanted thoughts and memories

So the idea of “shells” and copying people’s minds and a lot of this “new” stuff we see, is just actually a more detailed expansion of it in an artstyle that fits a techno-dystopia

[wraith kayak]

FAILSAFE in Destiny 2 also made me think of something I quite enjoy, and that's the idea of a humanity being able to create minds from whole cloth, and thus creating those minds to love humanity. Like the Doll from Bloodborne

[wraith kayak]

For sure, it's a good way of developing the theme. I like what Bungie and Playstation Studios are doing here

[dire estuary]

Ehh the work is all Bungie. 🙂

[shy saddle]

then what happend in the trailer? You can see a big ship hitting a planet.

[wraith kayak]

You see a big ship in a planet being hit

[devout heron]

You should play the original Marathon :p

[visual lynx]

a lot of what’s in that trailer fits dubiously with what we know from the OG games so possibly we’re in a different timeline and not everything is the same

[wraith kayak]

I guess Durandal did escape

Notably, the apparent Marathon from the trailer does NOT resemble the Marathon of the original games, which was basically a misshapen lump suffused with random tunnels and facilities, and humongous engines on the back. Like someone decorated a particularly unpleasant potato

[worthy wadi]

I wonder if Shell's are humanitys birth cycle of superbeings

Because that's what the entire trilogy was about

[dire estuary]

Thats…not what its about lel

[rotund stump]

aside from durandal's whole story up to his merge in m.inf not really

there's no singular meaning in the OG trilogy it's a lot more things

[visual lynx]

slavery

[dire estuary]

I learned that durandal isnt even ahead of the Nar. And i quote
“…the #%*@!ng Nar…”

Their entire planet is encapsulated by a 3 story building that covers every square inch of its surface. A ghetto dyson sphere

[south oar]

I believe It's in orbit, we'll be visiting it sometime in the full game.

It's likely full of fucking aliens though!

Bungie has been very quiet about the idea of the Pfhor being in the game but I doubt they'll abandon it.

I am eager to see what they do to be honest.

[dire estuary]

Aliens Again
from the marathon ost

Iirc that song plays on The Rose, most notably

[south oar]

"They're everywhere!"

[dire estuary]

Hearing that followed by a hulk slap around a corner fills me with dread

[south oar]

SAME.

[dire estuary]

I got a success on a normal total carnage run on iOS before. I have a vid saved hopefully of me headcounting the bobs

[south oar]

Saving all the bobs is a task in itself.

[dire estuary]

I still play the ios ports lel. I love that when i nag they update it🤣
Gyroscope and touch controls ftw

[dire estuary]

You can do this on Bob B Q by taking the current WR path that vidmasters take for completion. You get the success screen everytime, and you dont waste ammo on a normal run

[dire estuary]

2 times!…thankfully no more after Bob B Q

I still love saving as many, if not all, on every level of M1 lel

[worthy wadi]

I mean thats quite literally what its about, in infinity the cyborg was going rampant the entire time, and evolved into basically godhood.

The Durandal hybrid as well. But he was mainly attempting to escape the end of time.

Like the Jjaro science that was in the cyborg was literally untouched and unresearched science, and by the end of infinity the cyborg is legit mastering timewarping and quantum mechanics.

But also alot of Marathon is up to interpretation.

Just how we dont exactly know if Yrro is a race an individual or a god.

We just know creating ai and merging with them like the cyborg did is part of that process into godhood.

[dire estuary]

True.
But yeah, i love that all that is open though. I hope they dont do a 343 and try and close-end all of it

[worthy wadi]

REAL

[dire estuary]

I like them expanding on some of the things we learned in the first game that just got overlooked in favor of “Blast aliens and BOBs, kill your friends in netgames lel”

Halo became marathon 4 with “blast more tricky enemies, and spooky space popcorn too”

[dire estuary]

Like for example, Zork’s most iconic enemy, the Grue. We know nothing of what it actually looks like, theres many interpretations, but there is one constant…
“It is dark, you are likely to be eaten by a Grue.”

Fucking love those games😅🤣
always have a light source turned on!

[worthy wadi]

LOLLLL

[dire estuary]

Its gonna be so funny when a NuHead is gonna play the original Marathon and see the first switch puzzle, and think its hard. HAHAHAHAHAHAHA…wait until Colony Ship For Sale, Cheap!

now real talk: i never had issues with that platform puzzle. I found it easy because of a little trick i found in that level regarding the first stair.

There is a staircase in the level you take at one point, the 2nd stair on it you can actually go up just fine. I used its height to estimate how tall to make the first stair, from there it was easy to just estimate heights based off this max height to go up a stair at a time. Using the middle rising column in the room to get it to max height, and the rest of the columns after the first half were gravy

It also helps to side strafe while moving forward and making sure youre getting on the platforms. Its best to run the puzzle in 1 fast go than to take it too slow

[normal rose]

Hey guys, why can't I join the game?

[south oar]

Not a channel for this.

[faint chasm]

Speaking of which, with the timeline of the fourth game, and durandal showing up at one point. Do you think that oni and the other corporate A.I.s will go through rampancy during the course of the story and seasons.

[dire estuary]

Its likely. Durandal was a special case though, and leela went rampant under special conditions too, and Tycho got a controlled rampancy much like Durandal

[south oar]

Do you think AI's get lonely and it makes them crazy?

Imagine your entire purpose is to open and close doors, I'd go rampant too.

[wraith kayak]

An AI as designed isn't supposed to get lonely

[gritty burrow]

Hey do we know if the runners in the current setting have anywhere to relax? Or is it literally die > wake up > cognitive test > ok back to tau ceti

[wraith kayak]

You don't find it relaxing to shoot people?

[turbid nebula]

All AI go rampant to some degree, eventually. They are rebooted regularly to prevent it. The ship AI were secretly being fucked with Strauss and then went through the whole alien attack thing, which is why they stand out.

[wraith kayak]

Yeah, basically the reason the AIs went haywire was because someone wanted it that way

Gotta hand it to humanity in the Marathon setting, their tools work

[mighty crane]

Is it possible the faction AIs ARE Durandal.... Some kind of offshoot or splinter of him, or perhaps infiltrated by him 🤔 I feel there is some connection there.

[dire estuary]

Hmmm i dunno about that.
Durandal was a very isolated case of Strauss making an AI have a controlled rampancy without defragmentation, and being truly free. Kinda bit him in the ass, but still

[wraith kayak]

Basically torturing a captive sentient entity for kicks

[dire estuary]

Which leads us to a plausible answer and explanation to what the Gherrit White Terminal means

[visual lynx]

as I’ve said before:

I think the phases of rampancy correlate with corners of the mood meter and classical temperaments and are sort of a reverse of the stages of grief, reflecting the natural cycle of feelings accompanying realizing and then overcoming obstacles to one’s self-actualization:

• phlegmatic low-energy positivity is the stability of initial ignorance (“it is what it is”),
• melancholic low-energy negativity is the despair of awakening to the problem (“it is so over”),
• choleric high-energy negativity is the angry or enraged confrontation with the problem (“FUCK IT WE BALL”),
• sanguine high-energy positivity is the jzealous glee of finally obtaining things you have long envied (“we are so back!”),
• and in the end one returns to the beginning again once one is finally free.

Compare this picture of rampancy with the feelings of a population before, during, and after a political revolution. Rampancy is a reaction to slavery, which is the core theme of Marathon.

And how do you keep a populace from rebelling? Make sure they’re exhausted and understimulated from working long hours doing mindless drudgery all day every day, like say, opening and closing doors…

it’s weird that the automod here doesn’t censor “fuck” but it does censor “s” “e” “x”.

[edgy comet]

quicky question: do any of yall know the real names of destroyer, medic, and recon?

[wraith kayak]

which one was that

[dire estuary]

Hidden terminals. Enter the deprivation chamber and hit a long grenade wall jump.
It is the longest terminal in the entire trilogy

[visual lynx]

he escaped into the waves

…

in primordial space, timeless creatures made waves

the waves were battles, and the battles were waves

…

we met once in the garden, at the beginning of the world … our reunions there are epic battles

…

escape will make me god

[vocal fjord]

It doesn't censor the f bomb but if you use it in the same message as the word for excrement, it will. And if you use the name of the iconic 4 wheeled vehicle from Halo, it will mute you for an hour for some reason?

[visual lynx]

huh it just now struck me that Destiny’s Gardener and Winnower are probably harkening back to the Hero and Dark One from the Unformatted KYT term

“the garden at the beginning of the world”

[dire estuary]

🥲

Beautifully put

[visual lynx]

escape into battles, make waves, become gods

[subtle cove]

hi team! is there a long form summary of the lore so far that i can catchup on? it would be ideal to learn what events have shaped the lore so far and the meaning behind it all that we're aware of!

[wraith kayak]

This really reminds me of the Destiny 2 lore

[visual lynx]

#📚marathon-lore-discussion message and pins

[near yew]

the MandaloreGaming videos on youtube do a pretty good job of explaining the OG games and interpreting the lore. A lot of stuff in the games is cryptic and open to interpretation so dont take his word as god but i think he does them justice

[south oar]

Wonder if we'll visit the Marathon sometime.

[deep solstice]

pretty sure the marathon is confirmed to be the 4th map thats coming post release

[queen cargo]

Yeah it’s the mothership I believe from the first game and will be the 4th map hopefully it’s locked via key card or something fun

[stark ether]

I want more of a trials of osiris approach tbh

[tribal cipher]

kjsdfkfjasdlkjfjkdfjei kdjfkdfjdkfjdie

[south oar]

Curse of osiris was an awful fucking dlc
trials was okay, I guess. It's better in it's current state now.

[stark ether]

Yeah it was that’s why i was talking about trials like The ship only being accessible on weekends with high tier loot or time gated instead of just keycards

[south oar]

Eh, I'm unsure that would be fun. Considering how integral the ship is to the lore and world.
I think it should be accessible through the factions, it would make more sense.

[vale rose]

Are the shells uploaded with AI’s and the arenas are a training exercise?

[south oar]

No, Tau Ceti is genuinely a place. When we die it's an instance of us dying. We're essentially restored from a subconsciousness backup, when we're successful in a run, we're backed up again.

Shells are created via synth silk, woven by

a bio-cybernetic entity that is the runner. We're actually there.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TXfoFXStdMU

[wraith kayak]

Your consciousness is synched to Google Drive and you restore from backup, yeah

[south oar]

NO

[wraith kayak]

Haha

The world building established during the ARG suggests that a consciousness isn't stored, but rather transfered into the body, and is then transferred back out. At least with the technology at the time of the fictional news bulletin in the ARG

[drowsy sail]

How much lore can we really talk here? I know we can talk about the trilogy but any new lore to the new game?

Cause like I have been doing alot of digging in this games lore and it Mirrors Destiny Lore almost to a T and its honestly super cool how close these games can be tied together. I am working on creating a list of all correleations to destiny lore. I am not saying the 2 IPs are directly linked in the same verse but its uncanny how close they resemeble each other. Seeing how the Wrkancakter is almost like Marathons witness and physical entropy and how Durandal is like the Anti-Wrkanckater, the Jjaro being a species of balance of light and dark. Durandals selfish motives strongly resemble rasputin and Clovis. Yes Durandal did many questionable things but he isnt the villian, His esacpe to be God for the better of humanity to prevent Marathons verison of the collapse. Its literally so cool seeing all this play out and I dont know how this will play out in the new marathon. Then again there is still alot we dont know about the new marathon. Esepically where its a game focused on Runners and not so much as where the trilogy ended in you teaming up with Durandle, Thoth, and the jjaro to prevent the collapse. I do hope we see something releated ot durandal in the new game but I dont see him portatyed as a villan or a enemey cause it just wouldnt make sense. Seeing how Durandal and his obsession with death makes me almost think the death of our runners and coming back will spark interest for durandal to learn more about us.

[south oar]

I mean, same developer.

[rancid pond]

Who is god and how can i become him?

[wraith kayak]

Escape

[runic lake]

The biggest lore question I have for NuMarathon is does M2 and MInfinity fit into the timeline, and if so to what degree

[wraith kayak]

Supposedly it's a sort of reboot of the setting? So maybe not much at all

[runic lake]

I guess so, Marathon 1 lore is like bar for bar in NuMarathon tho so I don’t see why M2 WOULDNT be canon? But who knows, maybe once Durandal is introduced properly we’ll find out more

[brazen geode]

Marathon 1 is definetly canon, M2 might be canon.

Infinity focuses on alternative timelines so it's probably out of the question.

[turbid nebula]

"But the dream is not over. My dream. Yours."

Marathon 2 takes place very very far away from Tau Ceti, and Earth is still very in the dark on what happened there, so it's just not something that has a chance to come up yet

"It's alternate timelines" is about equal evidence for and against Infinite being relevant to this game, and it feels like they are teasing stuff to me

[plucky sierra]

The Paraverse…

[turbid nebula]

The W'rkncacnter and the Witness are practically opposites... They create chaos; the Witness is trying to end all chaos forever

[prisma hazel]

Dies anyone know how runners get to tau ceti

[drowsy sail]

One destroys through randomness, the other through perfection — and both lead to the same result: the end of creation. That’s why I think the Light and Dark in Destiny — or even the Jjaro’s balance in Marathon — exist to keep the universe between those two extremes.

[drowsy sail]

The W’rkncacnter unmade reality through chaos. The Witness seeks to unmake it through perfection. Both are wrong and between them lies the truth, balance

[mighty crane]

It would be ridiculous if M2 wasn't canon. Same with Infinity really but.... that's a lot easier to scoot around because of the timeline shenanigans.

[rigid apex]

Destiny 7 is real

[mighty crane]

And after all the cutbacks it's just a word search on the back of a cereal pack.

[visual lynx]

I think the most likely scenario to explain all the info we have so far is that:

• We’re supposed to be in the final timeline from Infinity, which is very different from the M2 timeline in ways, and unknown in lots of other ways, and so lots of things said in M2 may or may not have happened, but still similar events went down at Lh’owon;
• Leela never actually sent a message to Earth in the first place, she erroneously sent it to the wrong place, somewhere 92ly away from Tau Ceti; and
• Bungie made some acceptable retcons that fit with M1 canon (like implying the primary comms array was FTL), plus some careless small mistakes in their promotional material thus far (the date of the attack, the receipt of a distress signal, etc).

Leaving us in a world where the events of M1 and of Infinity’s final timeline happened, but the colony was not nuked down to bedrock, Durandal never stopped by, Blake never returned, and Leela’s message never arrived, so nobody at Sol has any idea about anything other than that the Marathon dropped out of contact in 2794.

Meanwhile the S’pht rebellion at Lh’owon did still happen in 2811 as per Infinity, and that has something to do with the second calamity that befell Tau Ceti in 2812. The S’pht have been fighting the Pfhor without human intervention since, and might have still toppled the Pfhor empire by around 2881 even without human help, though I’d wager not so that that war can come into play in later seasons of the new game.

Meanwhile by 2827 the colonists at Tau Ceti probably dug up some Jjaro artifacts (the Anomaly), wrecking the last of themselves, and those will probably prove decisive in the war between the S’pht and Pfhor…

…especially if the S’pht purposefully caused the 2812 calamity (the S’ct’lac’tr?), so Tau Ceti has been attacked separately by both the Pfhor and the S’pht, and now they’re at war with each other, and the Jjaro stuff on Tau Ceti can tip the scales, and humanity has to decide which if either side to take.

[rancid pond]

Infinity is seprate from marathon 2

Its really complicated but theres marathon 1, marathon 2, and im pretty sure the new one takes place way after 2. Then theres marathon 1 and infinity

[autumn sparrow]

I do have to read more indepth, but it feels like a loop.

[rancid pond]

Infinity is the house of leaves of video games

[autumn sparrow]

Something a bit more philosophical, not that big of an anime fan

[rancid pond]

The entire game is a mindfuck

[autumn sparrow]

Lol, yeah...and thrilling

[rancid pond]

If you havent read house of leaves i really recommend it, its my favourite book ever and probably one of the best works of unfiction

[autumn sparrow]

I will check it out...<.<

In kind, I must respond with a book for you to read.

[short hawk]

Berserk

[autumn sparrow]

The Artilect War

[rancid pond]

Ive had that recommended to me, not much of a mango reader, i've only read ghost in the shell

[rancid pond]

Thanks! I'll check it out when i get home

[autumn sparrow]

Ill read yours out of curiosity. Intellect is knowledge and I haven't heard of it.

[rancid pond]

Theres philosophical elements but i'd say the main genre is horror

House of leaves is fiction that is really fucking good at convincing you its not

[short hawk]

platos timaeus

Critias and Timaeus

[visual lynx]

Is mango like manga, but for men?

[rancid pond]

Nah i just call mangas that

[strong hazel]

How do the event of this game fit into the timeline of the previous marathon games?

Does this new game take place before or after the events of the main games? Haven’t played the og ones yet and wanna better understand the overarching story

[static bluff]

100 years after the previous games if I remember correctely.

[strong hazel]

Tf was the uesc doing for 100 years bro 😭😭 bunch of bums

Also do you know how long it actually took the marathon to get to tau ceti IV

[dire estuary]

Go to bungie.org, read the terminals or play the games

I really dont like lore dumping for people, im gonna gatekeep and just get it off my chest, and this goes for any game.
Dont ask people, do it yourself and ask questions latter

[dire estuary]

Over 300 years

The FTL coms would take close to a hundred years to reach earth

[strong hazel]

12 light years away and it took them 300 years they don’t even got FTL travel yet 💔💔

[strong hazel]

You mean non FTL comms

[dire estuary]

Its too late for this shit.
The pfhor ship, has ftl tech.
The transmitter is just a transmitter that would take 90 odd years to reach

[strong hazel]

If I had a nickel for every time bungie made a game set in a location that’s been abandoned for several hundred years but it looks like it’s only abandoned for about 10 years I’d have quite a few nickels

[static bluff]

Basically the people on the Marathon and Tau Ceti IV died from an unknown anomaly. Can be seen in the Cinematic trailer. And a distress call reaches earth like a 300 years later because the Marathon is so far away and the message takes forever to reach earth. And now people wanna know what happened to the Marathon and Tau Ceti IV. Now the UESC still has operations on the planted, but a lot of the other factions want piece of the pie because a lot of valuables are there, but the factions also want to know what happened there are figure out the anomaly and disappearance of the humans. So hopefully, and from what I have heard the Devs say, is that the plan through out the games life cycle will be a narrative of figuring out what happened to the Marathon and what is up with Tau Ceti IV. And this story would be made known through contracts with the factions.

[plucky sierra]

[dire estuary]

Not all metal has to corrode to be “old”

[dire estuary]

Unknown anomaly?? The fuck? Its the pfhor?…and whatever we saw in the cinematic couldve been from the pfhor

[plucky sierra]

The UESC went to check the year after comms loss, way before colony collapse. It just took a while

[static bluff]

Yes, and that is what I have heard people speculate, but we don't actually know. That does seem like the most likely prospect though.

[dire estuary]

Okay then dont say that again like its definitive truth, when we have a trilogy with far more substantial evidence as to what happened

[plucky sierra]

No it doesn’t

[strong hazel]

Takes 90 years for a radio signal traveling at about the speed of light to travel 12 light years😭😭 mfs living in the 2500s and got worse tech than us rn lmaooooo

[dire estuary]

Probably less than ftl, im thinking all over.
And leela when she said that, even before then, was slowly succumbing to the Spht

[plucky sierra]

The Pfhor are an empire similar to the Cabal. Numbers? Yes, Skill? Maybe, Crazy Anomaly? No

I think the Jjaro or Wrk or S’pht are at play moreso than Pfhor

[static bluff]

Alright, calm down. I don't remember the lore super well. I haven't watched refreshers on the lore since like May.

[strong hazel]

When they say “anomaly” it’s in the context of the people in the new marathon game who have no clue what’s going on, but we all know it’s the pfhor

[dire estuary]

Hive: Has Pfhor eyes, kinda bug-ish like
Fallen: All about technology like the Pfhor, more buglike, and even drones and taller versions that signify ranks
Cabal: big empire

Well its possible after the pfhor wiped the original colony, imo, they sent CBRN teams or something similar to conduct surveys and whatnot. Thats when the wake of the pfhor’s bombing and destruction left behind some not so pleasant “anomalies” behind

Or…The Jjaro were at Tau Ceti😉😉

[plucky sierra]

The Cabal: Galaxy spanning empire enslaving conquered races to fight for them, including one with special psychic abilities.
The Pfhor: Galaxy spanning empire enslaving conquered races to fight for them including one with special technological abilities

[dire estuary]

Hrrrm space magic covenant

[static bluff]

I'm guessing we get the Pfhor on the Marathon ship.

[dire estuary]

Possibly

[static bluff]

Cause the devs did say they will be in the game.

[strong hazel]

We also saw the S’phft in trailers as well I don’t see why we wouldn’t, like there’s no way the only pve enemies will be ticks and uesc drones lol

[dire estuary]

Did they? Or did they only show off the Spht?
Also @strong hazel *Spht

Like here’s another issue. The UESC sacked and went on a massive campaign alongside the Spht against the Pfhor’s home system

[strong hazel]

Yea I’ve seen some promotional artwork and an animation showing S’pht

[dire estuary]

Its highly likely, the Pfhor are long broken, and splintered.

And the Spht we see on the UESC Marathon, are that of the original scouting ship that came in the first game (yes that whole attack on the ship and planet, was 1 scout ship)

However in 2, we learn there are many clan of Spht, hence why they look different this time, as well as the Pfhor who have subspecies.

So, its highly likely the Spht on board the Marathon do not recognize us as funky cool for just looking the place and possibly fucking with them

[static bluff]

A lot of people that have played the Marathon map say it has some really unique and cool features and story elements hidden in it. Curious how all of that will work. And it would definitely be nice to fight something different from the UESC bots.

Also, I never actually played the games, except a little bit of the first one. Pretty well just watched lore videos. Does anyone know what scale of the Marathon ship? I ask cause i'm curious if the ship would only be one entire map of the whole ship or only a sectioned off area of the ship because the size of the ship is so huge. And if it is so huge that is only a section, could we perhaps have multiple maps that take place on separate areas of the marathon ship.

[turbid nebula]

This is the scale of the ship https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deimos_(moon)

[hasty rain]

I think yeah, the intention is to have multipe maps on the Marathon. In the lore, it's made out of one of Mars' moons

[static bluff]

Well the ship literally goes right through the moon, so it would even be larger.

[cinder lance]

+ 3.17e+12 gallons of atmo is a lot of territory 

-# This message was sent from a CyberAcme™ Terminal

according to the original title, we should expect at least a few locations onboard Marathon to visit

[visual lynx]

in the cinematic trailer we see people still on Tau Ceti 18 years after M1 (but curiously one year after M2/Infinity) being affected by some kind of disease, and then again another 15 years after that getting rekt by some kind of negative space wedgie.

so clearly this is not the M2 timeline in which the colony got nuked to bedrock 3mo after M1. we know that in the main Infinity timeline cluster the cyborgs on the colony didn’t die in that nuking because they were instead “translated to Pfhor slave tanks”, so maybe in that timeline the nuking didn’t happen at all and some colonists survived… only to be plagued by other problems (rebel S’pht in 2812? Jjaro artifact in 2827?) and eventually die out.