📚marathon-lore-discussion

[warped epoch]

Arachne is capped at 9

[astral tangle]

i also found a deluxe key

[worldly rivet]

Does anybody know the voice actor for Charter?

[strong wharf]

Last sighted at a Dennys it Dayton ohio

[broken zinc]

As an ohioan i believe it

Especially dayton

Nothing but trouble makers and aviators there

[strong wharf]

Guys I went to watch lore catch up on YouTube and theres like 100 hours of video. It played. Videos all night long lmao. I did not realize do much info was attached to this 😅

[round fern]

how do you fix mouse latency issue is it just fixed now?

[broken zinc]

You download the update

And then start the game

[brittle panther]

Click this person's profile it's creepy

[brittle panther]

There was 3 games before and the goat of game devs made it

He invented aiming with a mouse and save and quit

[bleak linden]

i love the traxus sponsored skins just being the look of their private army given to runners that Traxus likes

[tranquil basin]

And he invented bread

[terse wren]

So true

I miss Ohio I grew up there and thought it was boring and now I live in the northeast and yearn for the Midwest

[broken zinc]

the children yearn for the corn

[hollow hound]

The children yearn for the mines I thought

[broken zinc]

here we are all children of the corn

the corn and the lakes

the waves...

[west jacinth]

I poop corn sometimes

[tranquil basin]

Related to when you eat corn?

[west jacinth]

…

[west jacinth]

sure 👁️👄👁️

[random bronze]

https://www.youtube.com/live/__vzw7XmltE?si=ha8UZ5Bn3QJoLyvl

[thin sinew]

Has anyone else found the pink cat in game from the trailers? I found him on a perimeter run earlier

[remote magnet]

Oh really? Do you remember where exactly?

[silk whale]

No but I keep running into those mfing birds lmao 🤣

[remote magnet]

Lifehack: throw a grenade into the birds from afar. They won't make noise then

[mossy locust]

Hate the birds 🦅 they should get scrapped

And the bugs

[remote magnet]

Make that your job then. Become Tau Cetis officially licensed pest manager

[silk whale]

The birds are fkn awesome and I love them. I am a tau ceti avian conservationist.

The ticks, however.... F#&@ those things 😅

[whole hazel]

anyone figure out the new unity is power arg?

[prisma vector]

yeah i feel like no one is talking about this lol

[celest bay]

It looks like the Unity is power site lets you translate all of the symbols, have those been decoded before?

[patent niche]

Game needs alot of work, Art style is peak, Lore and music all banger. But alot of quality of life changes need to happen as well as TTK way too fast. AI is overtuned too strong. And in my opinion game would be much better in a competitive 3v3 or 5v5 setting.

[silk whale]

It would be very extremely cool to have some alternate game modes

[dusk saffron]

Is Infinity canon?

[cold kelp]

whats up with this arg, i cant sudo and i dont have perms to execute anything, nor can i ssh, tf am i suppost to do cause idk the login to /bin/fabricate, the decoded messages from the recovered .dat(s) dont really say much and theres one i cant decode at all

i have a list of uesc ips but w/o ssh its useless

[gray oar]

I know some of those words

[remote magnet]

I'd assume so. But we can't be sure which ti.eline we are in

[dusk saffron]

True true

[graceful vale]

The only binary I see of is fabricate.

[lucid berry]

i dont know i have basically only got finished by players in my last like 10 games

ai is challenging but not overly so if you dont put yourself in stupid positions

[dusk saffron]

Aleph8 is a funny thing to throw into the mix as well

From the one physical edition patch

[cold kelp]

check /usr/bin/, theres some more qxf executables

operator has no perms tho

[swift barn]

heres the 4 messages from the .dat files unencrypted. the last one i think is a terminal from the original marathon

The White House was under attack, and the United States came under surprise attack from unknown hostile forces. The United States has sustained serious damage.

…well will discuss不存在 in the universe the struggle for life. With the struggle for life there is a constant tension between the need and desire to be born and the desire to die. To be born and to be reborn, to be reborn and to be born, in the struggle for life the larger struggle for the miracle of life and the struggle for life and the struggle for life are interwoven. The struggle for life is the struggle for life and the struggle for life and the struggle for life and the struggle for life are one and the same

Last polygon filled 6:05 PM Saturday, December 14.
Carnage ensued closely thereafter. Er, I mean sleep.

I am the number of colonists on the planet.
At 0820 hours the UESC Marathon space station came under surprise attack by unknown alien forces.
The situation is dire.
Conflicting and inconclusive reports are being received.
The medium‑range radio antenna has been disabled or destroyed.
The only thing which seems clear is that the spaceport on the planet was obliterated by low‑yield nuclear weapons minutes after the attack on the Marathon began.
Nuclear weapons have devastated the colony on the Marathon target planet.

[cold kelp]

no username or hex pswd tho

[dusk saffron]

Is this new news or are you reposting something we already know

[silk whale]

It's very similar to an o.g. Marathon terminal, but there's more information and a different vibe in this message.

[cold kelp]

operator@balam:/$ cat etc/passwd

operator:x:1000:1000::/home/operator:/bin/sh
daemon:x:1:1:daemon:/usr/sbin:/usr/sbin/nologin
syslog:x:104:108::/nonexistent:/usr/sbin/nologin```
operator@balam:/$ cat etc/hosts
```127.0.0.1       localhost
34.782.0.1      balam-hub
34.782.0.2      alpha-7
34.782.0.3      relay-34a
34.782.0.4      relay-19f
2209.11.15.19.34  a7f3c2```

but like what do i do with this info bro

cant login to jack

[hardy night]

operator@balam:/$ cat proc/net/dev

lo            1024        8      1024        8
mesh0    152204348   107629  39132148    52650```

[cold kelp]

yea but idk how toaccess any of the stuff from mesh0, no ping or ssh binary

[hardy night]

operator@balam:/$ cat proc/loadavg
0.06 0.04 0.04 1/90 5213

[cold kelp]

thats just the load of the pc prob all fake

there are ssh keys in the ~/.ssh

[whole hazel]

what does any of that mean?

[swift barn]

skarrow is playing tetris or some shit on his terminal

[sleek plover]

public keys though

[whole hazel]

where do we find the key(s) for the site?

[cold kelp]

yea womp womp

[whole hazel]

my first assumption was it was in game

[hardy night]

how do you run executables?

cat doesnt work

[sleek plover]

./<executable> <args>

it's a standard unix interface

[hardy night]

okay

im a rookie with terminal shit lmao

[cold kelp]

its a basic unix terminal

funny since its like 2800s or some shit lmao

[remote magnet]

Like the tech in Alien lol

[cold kelp]

linux stands the test of time in marathon

[sleek plover]

i do like that though

we might have quantum cpus but it's still unix...

[cold kelp]

still using ipv4, thats the unrealistic part

[whole hazel]

wait whats the key to get into the terminal

[cold kelp]

d5gy78c

[whole hazel]

thanks

[sleek plover]

really wish ls -la worked

[cold kelp]

it alr does that by default

.files are shown

oh u mean the other shit

[sleek plover]

sure but i want permission bits

[cold kelp]

yea

[whole hazel]

how did we find it in the first place

[cold kelp]

¯_(ツ)_/¯

[astral palm]

bro whats this terminal ur talking about, where do i find it?

[cold kelp]

unityispower dot io

[hardy night]

okay

[astral palm]

when did they put this out

[hardy night]

i found the fabricate name

to access it

[cold kelp]

where

[hardy night]

also from twitter lmao

but its still a lead

and i have no idea wtf this screen is

[cold kelp]

whats the username

[hardy night]

marcus tiberius buendia

[sleek plover]

6pm utc today

in a tweet

[cold kelp]

oh shit thats a lore bomb

wtf is the screen

[hardy night]

wait holy fuck

[sleek plover]

president of the uesc?

[hardy night]

its the cards in the twitter thing

try to recreate them

[cold kelp]

it makes keycards

[hardy night]

see if it does anything

[cold kelp]

keycard maker

[cold kelp]

what twitter thing

[hardy night]

check the marathon twitter

[sleek plover]

https://fxtwitter.com/MarathonTheGame/status/2027806003358576955/photo/1

[hardy night]

yeah

the numbers in the corner

have we found anything with that

[astral palm]

ah i dont use twitter, i find it dumb

[cold kelp]

i cant recreate the whole card

[whole hazel]

so what are we currently looking for?

[cold kelp]

they covered it

[astral palm]

is it lore related? id assume its all going to be in the game? kind of stupid if its only available to those who have time to look up websites n shi

[hardy night]

fuck

maybe those strings of numbers

[cold kelp]

it makes keycards for each of the factions this is like some grand conspiracy shit

[hardy night]

its in hexidecimal

im gonna try to find any hex codes i can

[cold kelp]

bro this thing makes UESC keycards

[astral palm]

is this gon be added to codex you reckon?

[cold kelp]

no idear

yea u gotta type in the symbols, it converts to hex, and then you select the faction color and it makes the card

[hardy night]

yea duh

so what do we do with the cards???

[cold kelp]

you can copy them

link at top of card ui

[sleek plover]

pretty sure we need to make a correct id card first

[hardy night]

you can save them as flat pngs

[whole hazel]

do we have all of them?

[astral palm]

can u send them to me please?? i wanna see that

[buoyant nebula]

What the heck is this DAC thing they sent me

[fading surge]

where are the rules

[rotund stump]

imagine the big arachne twist being strauss of all people to sponsor a death cult of all things with laundered government money 💀

[rotund stump]

#📌rules-and-info

[rotund stump]

data access card, used during the april ARG, do contracts to level it up, now more of a keepsake than of actual use but DO NOT SHARE

reason being it stores actual info for tauceti.world's faction alignment test

[glacial sedge]

contracts?

[rotund stump]

#1354446976242028658

better start digging around the channels

[glacial sedge]

ohhh thanks

[whole hazel]

ok so whats the process for making say a traxis card?

[hardy night]

just color it orange

[rotund stump]

like on the alignment test or the DAC?

[whole hazel]

in the damn terminal

fabricate and all that

[rotund stump]

wym trax card wait

[whole hazel]

yall were talking about making security cards off of it earlier

[rotund stump]

no DACs are not faction-related

could just color it orange but there's no trax DAC

[whole hazel]

i know theyre not, thats not what im talking about

[hardy night]

dawg hes talking about the unityispower.io shit

[rotund stump]

well tell me 😭

[hallow stag]

Im not getting the whole ARG thing, at all

[rotund stump]

I'm not caught up with the last tweet either is it collector's edition goodies

[whole hazel]

i think its influencer streamer stuff

[rotund stump]

mostly MIDA pointing us to wreck shit, plus drafts for UESC deployment at tau ceti and some rudimentary faction info

judging by phrasing MIDA also gave us the DACs and cyac's faction alignment test uses them

[whole hazel]

apparently the password came from the collectors edition

[prisma vector]

how did people find this

[hallow stag]

No I don't get what I'm supposed to do and how

[astral palm]

what alignment test lol? why would that have to be private

[rotund stump]

do contracts to earn points and there's a leaderboard for it, DAC also gets leveled the same way (still unknown what it does, likely just for flex), usually does nothing until points rack up and bungie decides to start counting and give people at the top of the lb goodies

potentially merch

[rotund stump]

don't ask me ask cyac ✌️

tauceti.world

[glacial sedge]

...how do you actually complete the contracts? a lot of them are unclear

[hardy night]

thats the point

[humble turret]

As an avid fan of Exo based things in Destiny, the Shells and whole “transfer of consciousness” thing this game has is super interesting to me- especially since I was shocked to see the shells even have voices

[astral palm]

im wondering too lol. genuinely hope they add this to codex so its not exclusive to some tinkering with codes on a website

[hallow stag]

So like this contract wants me to make someone join the server or something?

Market share does not grow passively.

New assets increase leverage.
Leverage increases influence.
Influence increases return.
Identify unaligned participants.
Register them.

Traxus does not wait for equilibrium.
We scale

[whole hazel]

found one of the cards someone made off of twitter

[rotund stump]

read the pic below as well, shows instructions if not hints to go off of

[hallow stag]

As long as all the lore is in game I'm fine with whatever

[rotund stump]

this game's super heavy with its puzzle solving in and outside the game

[glacial sedge]

got that part, but it doesnt say where to submit the requirements or the completion command

[astral palm]

yeah id rather read it all in codex and play the game than search for codes for some websites lol

[hallow stag]

I don't mind puzzles, but don't some contracts want you to create/share clips or similar?

I'm not a fan of this type of challenges, but I realize ARGs aren't for me

[whole hazel]

OK I FIGURED OUT THE PROCESS

[grand tendon]

So the runners are on Sol and then connect to Shells on Tau Ceti IV surface to explore the planet to fulfill factions objectives?

[rotund stump]

@vernal notch will give a code to enter in #leaderboard when you meet reqs (contracts button)

[whole hazel]

so in the terminal after the password, you need "fabricate" it will ask for a authorisation name; it is "Marcus Tiberius Buendia", then it sends you to the app

[rotund stump]

consciousness ported into shell, pulled on total shell failure (can still be resynced by teammates post-critical repair), mind exists in a liminal state until shell gets reweaved

and no don't ask about the bodies we don't know either lol

[whole hazel]

its cus nucal ate them all

[rotund stump]

so we're actually on tau ceti and not remote controlling our biomata

[grand tendon]

But there are still ppl on earth living normally? Runners are just Explorers on lend bodies?

[rotund stump]

sol's alive and well if not dying and overpopulated

earth has 21 billion people and mars is slowly dying from neglect still

[grand tendon]

Well, obviously is shit lol

[grand tendon]

HOLY HELL

[rotund stump]

yep yep 💀

[orchid cosmos]

Where do we discuss the new arg?

[grand tendon]

I'd terminate myself

[rotund stump]

here

[orchid cosmos]

Right

[grand tendon]

Where's arg tho? In game?

[orchid cosmos]

So what am I looking at with the id

[orchid cosmos]

Unityispower.io

[rotund stump]

I'll get into it later y'all get cracking lol

haven't done anything yet

[orchid cosmos]

I’ve got the top mind from the cod zombies universe on the case

[whole hazel]

so where do we go from here, we know the passwords, we know how to fabricate, is there a specific combination we need?

[whole hazel]

thank milo

[orchid cosmos]

I believe so

[glacial sedge]

do we need to link our discord and bungie accounts or something? how would it know for like, "play on the server slam"

[orchid cosmos]

I’m too stupid so imma just press random until I win

[whole hazel]

ok so down the bottom when you open the link for your new card, there is a 0/18 counter, which is the same amount of total symbols you can have,

so it may be a case of blind wordle

[rotund stump]

absolutely do that

goes for twitch drops too, link bungie and twitch to discord

actually wait no just link bungie to twitch

[whole hazel]

i managed to randomize the symbols and already got a 1

[rotund stump]

or do both for safety

[astral palm]

whats the new arg gon unlock? a new trailer?

[frank ivy]

are uesc bots piloted or are they all just robots? on their shell it says 'for authorized personel use only' so it implies theres a person behind it, but they also float round idly when a player isnt in view

[sleek plover]

The Codex states the bots are fully autonomous, and their deployment on Tau Ceti is techincally a war crime (or, more accurately, against UESC law).

[frank ivy]

woah

which entry? id love to read up on it

[sleek plover]

I want to say it's the UESC Commander?

It's one of the higher ranking units

[whole hazel]

from what i can tell, you cant brute force the cards for how many symbols, its purely combination or something

[coral vale]

Omw to complain to the law enforcement they are breaking the law (I am getting shot and throw in a vat of acid)

[frank ivy]

well, as it turns out i havent killed enough of them lol

ill have to take your word for it

[misty goblet]

Seems like everyones rotten

[sleek plover]

ill load the game one sec

[coral vale]

Basically all factions other than MIDAS and arachne have simultaneously all and no claims over the Tau Ceti colony

[glacial sedge]

i did that for twitch drops, im more stuck on how the bot would tell in discord. i assume sharing and reacting to clips is probably done through twitch as well (since, y'know... the twitch drops), but do the other requirements require you to stream gameplay or something?

[frank ivy]

wonder if mida has legal claim to deimos lol

[whole hazel]

ok so i believe, we need to keep randomizing, until we get as many correct symbols as we can

[coral vale]

Wait shit they might actually have some

Not that anyone would recognize it but now it's extra funny

[frank ivy]

mida total victory, they bring the marathon into martian orbit and then disband

[sleek plover]

@frank ivy here. It was the UESC Grenadier Commander, to be specific.

https://ibb.co/zHQf8MzD

[frank ivy]

thank you!

[sleek plover]

Cant upload images or embed in here, so the url is the best i can do

[buoyant nebula]

Did you guys crack into the unity is power yet?

[frank ivy]

"return the favor" goes hard

[unreal bobcat]

d5gy78c

Then type fabricate and then Marcus Tiberius buendia

[buoyant nebula]

lol I just brute forced it right before you sent this

[sage patrol]

pretty sure you react to the clips in the discord channels and then type /align for that contract

and for the other you post and then type /signal

[glacial sedge]

ah the zone footage request channel?

[sage patrol]

yessir

[real stump]

The DAC is your weapon against their walls. Stolen from the corporate puppets. Repurposed for revolution. This card breaks chains. Opens doors. Marks your every act of defiance. Upgrade it through action. Surrender it and surrender yourself. Share it and be forgotten. The strongest among you will be rewarded. The system trembles when many become one.
Image

I'm assuming everybody got this message from the servers bot, does anybody have an understanding of it though?

[glacial sedge]

where do you do /align? in the channel with the clips, or is there another one

[sage patrol]

i think anywhere

works in new noise

[slender oxide]

so how do I get the cool cutscenes for the shells?

[tawdry oak]

So for the beta rewards I need to reach level 30 but where is the runner level? I only see seasonal level

[slender oxide]

/align

[dire seal]

Does anyone know if it's possible to stretch the screen to 4:3 using the game files?

[next locust]

Is there such a thing as runner level? I don't know

[remote magnet]

Rewards are tiered. Finish intro mission: Level 1. Reach level 10: Level 2. Reach level 30: Level 3.
It has to be seasonal level

[real stump]

same thing

[real stump]

probably is possible yeah

[final grove]

about that new website...

oh, you cant post pics in here lol

[shell dune]

What's the new website. Been searching "marathon arg" but not finding what people are talking about

[azure phoenix]

https://unityispower.io/

[kind river]

is there a bug report thing? i can do because i always get a bug where i cant aim out and cant run

[shell dune]

oh, thanks!

[kind river]

nvm found it

[fresh galleon]

new arg: durandal reinvents wordle and we have to do some bullshit to figure it out

[broken zinc]

honestly sounds like something he would do

asnd bungie would be crazy enough to implement

[real stump]

can you elaborate?

[sudden pollen]

Codex is so damn cool for lore tidbits im nerding out over the design

🤩

Unlocking through little related quests is a great idea

[hallow stag]

Can you ARG experts post the lore we get from these events?

[mystic frost]

is there a chat for arg stuff

[rustic mason]

the lore is so rad

[mystic frost]

looking at it rn and i think ik what were susposed to do but i think we need to og versions of the images that are redacted

[rain wigeon]

yeah it looks to be a trek across the available areas to us to look at the posters

'mad is the sword that severed tomorrow' for instance

[mystic frost]

are all the posters in the current server slam?

[rain wigeon]

I believe so!

[mystic frost]

oh sick!

[rain wigeon]

One is in the canals underneath the greenhouses in dire marsh, I forgot the word that is associated with it but I have definitely seen it

[mystic frost]

i really wanna start looking around in game but dont have the time

[rain wigeon]

honestly I rec when you have the time to uhh screenshot any posters or wallart you come across

don't do it all at once just when you have a moment

[mystic frost]

gotcha

[left kite]

hm found three transmitted messages from marathon

[tacit stirrup]

is there any lore on the factions

what they r about

n stuff

[long sluice]

yes

[left kite]

one is gibberish, second one is mentions nuclear weapons on marathon, third one can be translated to
we will now discuss in a little more detail the struggle for existence... all organic beings are exposed to severe competition. nothing is easier than to admit in words the truth of the universal struggler of life or more difficult ...than constantly to bear this cnoclusion in mind. yet unless it be thoroughly engrained in the mind, the mind, the whole economy of nature...will be dimly seen or qiute misunderstood. we behold the face of nature bright with gladness...we do not see or we forget, that the birds which are idly singing round us mostly live on in sectsorseeds, and are thus constantly destroying life; or we forget how largely these songsters, or their eggs,

[long sluice]

there are introductions to the factions with cinematics that give you an idea, then codex's

[left kite]

cat /var/data/recovered/6bccdf29-d678-4ed5-ba92-61cf74c0a374.dat
cat /var/data/recovered/ca7bf847-4038-471f-9b14-f807cc3e1307.dat
cat /var/data/recovered/756706df-eb6d-4c37-885a-be32ab6287d2.dat
here are the links

[sudden pollen]

Hello lore peeps

[sudden pollen]

Ooh actual arg stuff??

[sudden pollen]

Yuh, check the codex and follow tips when they pop up for looking at descriptions of factions

[uneven valve]

Avkhf ha 0820 ovbyz, aol thyhaovu jhtl bukly
zbywypzl haahjr myvt buruvdu ovzapsl mvyjlz.
Aol Thyhaovu ohz zbzahpulk zlypvbz khthnl.
this is encoded innit

[left kite]

i think so

[uneven valve]

i'm assuming thats 24 hour time in the 0820 so

[left kite]

or pfthor gibberish

[uneven valve]

maybe just a shift of some sort?

[left kite]

or somy cryptography shit

[late crow]

I have a question; did all the previous Marathon title happen in this timeline? I mean, did one guy single handendely defend the Marathon from hordes of aliens?

[uneven valve]

the general shape and length of the words makesm e think its a simple replacement cypher

[uneven valve]

Today at 0820 hours, the marathon came under
surprise attack from unknown hostile forces.
The Marathon has sustained serious damage.

its a caesar shift of 7

because of course it is

[brisk kite]

/DAC

[visual lynx]

yes, but there's timeline shenanigans in the third game that mean some events of the second game didn't happen

[uneven valve]

cant make anything out of the second one, third is unencrypted, fourth is:

I am d#)405*&&&iu number of colonists
planet*@1)&&2*08 on the situation -9/&^2ihgudlnsdofh
conflicting and &&5(!@^4iu$23. The &$772
medium-range radio antenna *5^$7^ or destroyed
&&&&405....The only thing (7&&&73657----
&&&45354$$$ spaceport was obliterated &46))3&
nuclear weapons 8%3435625 on the Marathon
bega&&&^^?>&&&.............

[late crow]

I see; well because I see no mentions (at the moment) of any aliens in the codex, so I was just wondering that
Thank you

[visual lynx]

humans from Sol don't know about the aliens yet, and some of the colony-side records I've seen from the new game so far seem to have [REDACTED] all over them where there clearly should be reference to aliens. Bungie seem to be playing weirdly coy about the aliens like they want it to be a big twist reveal, as though new players couldn't just look up the old games and see.

[buoyant nebula]

All I’ve encountered in game are the slug head crab thingys

Surprised no codex entry

[uneven valve]

we know theres at least one compiler somewhere in the game so

[uneven valve]

consider that the pfhor can and absolutely did erase their digital footprint wherever they went

[clever helm]

I think that it could be that the uesc doesn’t want records that the runners find getting to the public and causing mass panic about aliens that are potentially hostile

[astral palm]

isnt that durandal speech lol

[rain wigeon]

one's a rotation cipher

[rotund stump]

we do have a codename visitor and a "tantalus" incident

absolutely the compiler given the incident location

[clever helm]

Oh ok

[rain wigeon]

h whoops someone beat me to the cipher bit

[left kite]

yeah, ceasar cipher with 7 (of course) spaces shift

[clever helm]

I haven’t been following the codex stuff much

[rain wigeon]

is 7 a significant number?

[clever helm]

Or even the lore at all

[left kite]

bungie loves it

[rain wigeon]

was not aware, thank you

[clever helm]

Most powerful magical number from Harry Potter

[gusty gazelle]

:3 How are yall doing on the cross word puzzle?

[clever helm]

Or that

[uneven valve]

do we have an authorization name for the fabricate file?

[rain wigeon]

it's words from random posters over the maps available to us

[gusty gazelle]

I know 19 is Tomorrow

[astral palm]

yeah but their point surely isnt to surprise new players that havent played the older games. its to play into the lore of you trying to find out what has happened

[hallow stag]

I hope there's a 7th faction which can only be progressed with Rook

[visual lynx]

yeah in-game that all makes sense but Bungie have been weirdly coy about it IRL too like when people ask if the Pfhor will eventually show up in the game they get all evasive about it

[gusty gazelle]

Time to run around Marathon looking at posters

yipee

[uneven valve]

do y'all know if theres a dedicated server for this?

i dont think the ishtar collective would be involved

[visual lynx]

dedicated for what?

[uneven valve]

for the ARG and etc.

[astral palm]

oh yeah that. well its probably just to leave some element of surprise and excitement for whats yet to come

[visual lynx]

there's the classic Marathon discord, and Karnemir's server

[gusty gazelle]

For the cross-word puzzle, does it end when the server slam does? I'm trying to work on it rn :)

[uneven valve]

a place that has actually like, people working on it and a coordinate effort

[uneven valve]

thanks

[visual lynx]

which are affiliated respectively with the Marathon Story Page and Karnemir's story site

[hallow stag]

They will 100% appear at some point, the problem of Pfhor is that they need some redesign to fit properly, the basic pfhors are just space bugs, they may have worked back in the 90s but a straight up transposition into marathon 2026 I'm not sure how well it would work, happy to be proven wrong tho.

Not valid for all of them also, the hunters would work 1:1

[uneven valve]

compilers have ultimate aura though

i neeeeed the screen to turn into mush and bright colors when you get shot by those mfs

[hallow stag]

Compilers can hack computers, shells are computers

Will be fun

[mental basin]

For the crossword puzzle, i found 3 words

rest i have 0 clue

about someone saying that 19 is tomorrow, for me, nothing happens?

[earnest crag]

i completed it but i want to post it with spoiler how to put spoiler on a picture ??

oh icant post it

if someone want it dm me

[broken zinc]

i dont think you can post images to this server

[uneven valve]

lemme see

[left kite]

i wanna see too

[sinful wyvern]

does it confirm it if you put in the right word?

[crystal osprey]

Have any other folks been thinking about how this is gonna fit into the broader lore?

I've been getting the Darius logs from NuCal quests and it sounds interesting.

[mental basin]

yes

little drawings and letters will appear, depending on the word

so far, found 6 words x.x

[terse wren]

Bro gonna see my search history rip

[hallow stag]

I'm interested as well

[unique frigate]

🔥

The whole aesthetic is peak cinema

but I'm not a fan of the gameplay unfortunately 😭 extraction shooters aren't my vibe

I wanna learn more about the lore tho fr

[thin sinew]

The Darius logs were very interesting. I'm curious if he was infected by the same pathogens that were impacting the food or something else

[thin sinew]

Can I see??

[uneven valve]

Marcus Tiberius Buendia when you run the fabricate code btw

then paste 374468739bd7269a48 when it loads

[sudden pollen]

only if 6 comes before it

[terse wren]

I like everything about it except sorting through the stupid loot I just don’t care very much about loot hahaha

Maybe I could

[sudden pollen]

🥭

[rain wigeon]

:/

[terse wren]

Based

[sudden pollen]

Its not too bad, just prioritize the more useful or valuable stuff I think and dump everything else

Backpack upgrades help quite a bit

I got 3 backpacks from contract rewards

[sudden pollen]

Duality of man

[terse wren]

I don’t even wanna look at it I just wanna cover my mates’ backs and sneak around the cool environments and kill things

But I do theoretically like the system.

[sudden pollen]

I mean fair but I'd argue loot is a pretty essential component of games like this, especially managing it

I like that I have to be careful with what I take on potentially dangerous missions so I dont lose a bunch of crazy gear all at once

[fathom mason]

Saw a post about the new ARG. Does anyone know what to do with that website? And if so, what code do I put in here? This stuff is so confusing to me

[sinful wyvern]

Care to share pls?

[mental basin]

actually finished the whole thing, will send it to you

[sinful wyvern]

awesome

[vocal furnace]

Can you send it to me also please?

[halcyon kayak]

How do we access the crossword in the terminal? Can't find any way to reach it

[mental basin]

Sent it

[astral palm]

yo is arg over?

[mental basin]

Yeah, think they will think of something new tomorrow

[fervent shard]

Hi, is there a channel for the https://unityispower.io/ website ?

[uneven valve]

yeah its been solved

solution for unityispower.io ARG, if anyone wants to check it out:
||Go to unityispower.io
Type in d5gy78c
Find 0803.log in /var/spool/msg that tells you the fabricate password was changed and the new one is locked behind "xw"
Type in xw to bring up the crossword, these are all in-game posters with redacted text that it's looking for
Fill in the crossword to be given a highlighted name: marcus tiberius buendia
Type in fabricate
Type in the name you were just given
Type in the code 374468739bd7269a48 in this new card fabrication step||

[oak grail]

Do we know if there's anything more to the ARG than this?

[sinful wyvern]

||what is the last code ever from?||

[vocal furnace]

Just curious, what is the end result?

[broken zinc]

new ost song and concept art is the final product of the arg

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ii7KWBOy9cs

song is here

[uneven valve]

it was apparently bruteforced

[uneven valve]

this seems to be the last bit for it

[sinful wyvern]

damn

[uneven valve]

the more interesting stuff is the lore in the logs imo

[broken zinc]

the source corde for the website did say 'see you tomorrow' so they may have something else planned

[sinful wyvern]

I am certain there has to be other names or something you can put in the fabricator

[broken zinc]

or sorry 'next session tomorrow'

[oak grail]

There is a cron job set for 12am Sunday, if that's GMT then it's in four minutes

[broken zinc]

a what job? cron?

[uneven valve]

banger bait

[broken zinc]

its pretty low bait honestly

i immediately ignored it lol

[heady junco]

is there a log of all the names for the crossword?

[uneven valve]

its bad bait but its very funny bait

[broken zinc]

you got me there

[oak grail]

"A cron job is a time-based job scheduler in Unix-like operating systems (Linux, macOS) that automates repetitive tasks—such as backups, system maintenance, or script execution—by running commands in the background at predefined intervals."

Try ||find cron||

[broken zinc]

can check skarrow's new vid, i did and followed it step by step https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4nHrntBN3w4&pp=0gcJCb4KAYcqIYzv

[heady junco]

thanks

[broken zinc]

gratsi

didnt do anything for me in the arg

[oak grail]

||cat /etc/crontab

This displays a file with three different cron jobs listed, each set for a different time and to execute a different task||

[jolly coral]

oh sorry this lore chat (i just dont sit discrod 4 year ) have a nice night-day ^^ sry again

[ornate creek]

Saw a rumor on reddit that it was to unlock outpost and got exited 😭

[violet fog]

anyone see the og marothon terminals in the data wall :)?

[final oyster]

to elaborate, it shows

operator@balam:/etc$ cat crontab
# m h dom mon dow  command
0 */6 * * *  /usr/sbin/logrotate /etc/logrotate.conf
15 3  * * *  /usr/bin/sync-upstream --quiet
0 0   * * 0  /usr/bin/integrity-check /var/data

the timings for them are

1. Every 6 hours
2. At 03:15AM
3. At 12:00AM, only on Sunday

[astral palm]

yo will they put the lore from todays arg in the codex u reckon

[uneven valve]

Oh, wait

the README for the logs(?) says that it gets updated by the integrity check

its the data actually

operator@balam:/var/data$ cat readme
Integrity-checked data store.
Weekly verification via /usr/bin/integrity-check.
Last check: OK (sha256 verified)

[final oyster]

where's the readme again?

[uneven valve]

var/data

[final oyster]

oh nvm it shows in your message

[uneven valve]

oh hey i forgot to check this part

operator@balam:/var/spool/msg$ cat 0801.log
UESC INTERNAL MESSAGING -- RECOVERED FRAGMENT
CLASSIFICATION: ROUTINE

@rsato> I got a new cat this weekend!
@kdunne> Cat tax?
@rsato> You know we can't send images on these terminals. Are you trying to get me fired?
@rsato> It kind of looks like this
@rsato>
/_/
/ o o
~(*)~/ meow
^/
@kdunne> Cute
@rsato> I know right? I named her Cobbler.
@kdunne> I read about cobbler once
@kdunne> Sounded pretty good
@kdunne> Maybe Nucaloric should make some

(it looks significantly more feline in-site)

[stuck holly]

||Can someone explain where I would get the link in the arg because I solved it but didn’t get a link to the ost||

[astral palm]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ii7KWBOy9cs

[stuck holly]

That’s not the point of the message

[uneven valve]

oh the messages bang

[astral palm]

i know bro😂 i have zero clue about arg im just giving you the link, relax

[uneven valve]

type media

[drifting mulch]

how was the first login password for the ARG figured out?

btw here's the reversed text from /var/data/recovered/756706df-eb6d-4c37-885a-be32ab6287d2.dat

wewillnowdiscussinalittlemorede
tailthestruggleforexistence...allorganicbeingsareexposed
toseverecompetition.nothingiseasierthantoadmitinwords
thetruthoftheuniversalstruggleroflifeormoredifficult
...thanconstantlytobearthiscnoclusioninmind.yetunlessi
tbethoroughlyengrainedinthemind,themind,thewholeeco
nomyofnature...willbedimlyseenorqiutemisunderstood.we
beholdthefaceofnaturebrightwithgladness...wedonotseeor
weforget,thatthebirdswhichareidlysingingroundusmost
lyliveoninsectsorseeds,andarethusconstantlydestroying
life;orweforgethowlargelythesesongsters,ortheireggs,
ortheirnestlings,aredestroyedbybirdsandbeastsofprey...

reminds me of The Assembly in Halo Reach's in-game lore

[tawdry steppe]

i love that then only animals on tau ceti are basically platypus and birds

[stuck holly]

It said access restricted- clearance required

[uneven valve]

you haven't solved the ARG yet

did you enter the right code in the fabricate file?

[stuck holly]

The crossword and the code for the card?

Yes

[uneven valve]

thats literally all there is

what do you get when you type in the code for the card?

[stuck holly]

it hates me

[uneven valve]

||374468739bd7269a48||

[stuck holly]

The keycard with the guys name on it

[uneven valve]

does nothing else happen?

it should automatically do the thing

[stuck holly]

It says media archive unlocked

[uneven valve]

type media

[stuck holly]

I’m the arg

Same thing

[uneven valve]

weird

[stuck holly]

Fixed it

I was using brave browser which blocked the pop up lol

[sinful wyvern]

https://x.com/MarathonTheGame/status/2027836201701675328?s=20

||There is a DAC in the first couple frames on top of the box. It has the code. People with the collectors edition can see it better and probably found it first.||

[worldly cave]

ARG question so im marking as a spoiler
||where is poster 17 & 26?||

[hollow mango]

oh hello found yall

you guys got to the crosswords as well?

i went through the message logs and decrypted them

found the /bin/xw part

this is one of the messages:
We will now discuss in a little more detail the struggle for existence. … All organic beings are exposed to severe competition. Nothing is easier than to admit in words the truth of the universal struggle for life, or more difficult … than constantly to bear this conclusion in mind. Yet unless it be thoroughly engrained in the mind, the whole economy of nature … will be dimly seen or quite misunderstood. We behold the face of nature bright with gladness … we do not see, or we forget, that the birds which are idly singing round us mostly live on insects or seeds, and are thus constantly destroying life; or we forget how largely these songsters, or their eggs, or their nestlings, are destroyed by birds and beasts of prey …

this is the other:
Today at 0820 hours, the marathon came under
surprise attack from unknown hostile forces.
The Marathon has sustained serious damage.

[hollow mango]

yes i reversed it

[late portal]

do shells have olfactory glands (noses)? can I smell the drinkable CHEESEBORGER?

[hollow mango]

im sorry if im contributing stuff thats already here im reading the past messages but not sure what has been found already

[hollow mango]

oh seems to be solved lol

[drifting mulch]

still fun to play around with and share your discoveries 😄

[hollow mango]

yeah lmao 😂

[broken zinc]

Question for those who might know: does arachne have any contracts that involve dying, instead of killing?

[hollow mango]

some of the encrypted messages were cool added some lore to the marathon incident

[broken zinc]

Like "kill so many players" but is there any "die so many times"?

[uneven valve]

Dying comes naturally, so I wouldn't think so

[broken zinc]

Just curious because the faction is about death, both killing and dying

I just wonder if a contract asked you to die x times, if people would be less pressed about the action of dying in the game itself..

If you have to die sometimes, it can't be that bad

[drifting mulch]

there's a codex entry for dying to UESC so that door's open

[broken zinc]

Exactly

[dim blaze]

Im gonna start pregnant ment reacting in this channel if we don’t stop acting like pirates smh.

[broken zinc]

There are some things in this game that can only be done by dying. There's nothing to say death can't also be a contract requirement in a death cult. Might also specifically be death by another runner, to prevent players from running to uesc bots and getting killed. And instead encouraging firefights

Or at least seeking out other players, even if it is for the motive of getting murdered instead of murdering

I would put it in feedback but i don't know if it already exists lol

[hexed star]

what’s the ARG?

[hazy mist]

might be worth noting, but i find it interesting that the tab for the new website shows up as yo/k/ib and theres an ancient mayan site called yo'k'ib'
with the w'rkncacnter and all that it seemed at least somewhat significant

[broken zinc]

Oooooh

That's a fantastic catch

[atomic stag]

is the game getting more optimized later on?

[broken zinc]

Why you asking here, this is where the weird lore nerds hang out

[waxen orchid]

damn this whole ARG stuff is insane

[atomic stag]

mb

[waxen orchid]

I hope they'll put some stuff like that but in game ! Like finding certain terminals to activate around the map in a sequence or stuff like that

[broken zinc]

It's all good feel free to stay and have a coffee

Ans then read marathon terminals into the wee hours of the morning

[broken zinc]

The fact that the arg depended on finding in game posters is so cool tho

[hazy mist]

where did we even find the new website?

i feel like i looked away from this channelf or 5 minutes and then suddenly a lot was happening

[broken zinc]

There was a photo on twitter that is where they got it

[hazy mist]

ohh icic

[broken zinc]

The cards said "unityispower" and the tweet had .👁️🇴 which was .io

So that's how they get to the website in the first place. The code was found on the collectors edition boxes

[short thorn]

anyone has the completed crosswords?

[dim blaze]

Oh that’s 100% gonna be significant

[sudden pollen]

woah

[hazy mist]

does anyone have a key for the crossword theyre willing to share

[broken zinc]

Skarrow9 has a video with the whole crossword finished if you'd like to check that out

I'll go regrab the link

[hazy mist]

okok great thank you

[broken zinc]

https://youtu.be/4nHrntBN3w4?si=zp6MLygBhDVh-Bf9

[worn depot]

Does anyone know what Thief's shell model mean with its label as an 'Icon' series?

[languid ruin]

It means she slays

[brazen quartz]

Reupping this:

Has anyone seen any codex entries referencing the Equanimity from the 2023 ARG? Or anything about where the runners are deploying from or exfiltrating to? It's really baffling to me that this is so hard to figure out, when it feels like it should be one of the most basic lore tidbits about the setting and the runners.

The first few missions for CyAc where we hijack FTL comms from Tau Ceti to Sol indicate to me that the runners are on-site, but aside from that I haven't seen anything.

[languid ruin]

Lore drops are somewhat limited

I can check my codex tonight

But runners are independent of each other

They wouldn’t all be necessarily from the same place

[unique rapids]

can someone help me
i can not find the tunnels for my quest
EQUITABLE DISTRIBUTION [3/4]
In Perimeter, scan the packaged UESC drones
stored beneath Station. Collect Unstable
Gunmetal resources in the area, then deliver
them to a DCON.

Scan drones in the tunnels
beneath Station
the only tunnels i know i allready checked

[brazen quartz]

Sure, but they're already on-site at TCIV when the game starts, before FTL comms with Sol are established. So how'd they get there? Where are their minds/bodies being stored?

My original guess was that they were crew members onboard the Equanimity, because the 2023 ARG established that there were a few hundred crew members, some of which were outsourced civilians, engineers, and mercenaries. But there hasn't been any follow up to that, so far as I can tell.

[eternal knoll]

tbh they drop FTL comms so casually in this story in a way that doesn't feel all that thought-out

[hazy mist]

i feel like its just for story convenience

having stl comms would make things a lot more annoying i think

[eternal knoll]

yea they wouldve needed to establish that all these factions have flown something over to tau ceti at considerable expense

instead they just kinda traded away the remoteness of the setting permanently. we are conveniently connected to earth at all times

[brazen quartz]

What annoys me most about this setting is that there's very little distinguishing between the colony, the rescue mission, and Sol system. The original colony would be ~400 years removed from Sol, and the rescue mission about ~100 years removed. So there should be major differences in language, culture, and tech, yet it all blends together

[eternal knoll]

but how is traxus for instance benefitting from what we salvage if theyre talkin to us from way back home...

[eternal knoll]

yea ive been thinkin about this. unclear if there are any period weapons around for instance

[tawny nexus]

They said communication is FTL so it would make sense to have some hegemony. And we don’t really know what Sol or the rescue mission looks like, do we?

[drifting mulch]

i haven't found anything in the codex that says why one would choose to become a runner, but what the codex states is that they're post-flesh, though I can't find this entry right now. they're downloaded into shells and uploaded back into...CyberAcme?

from This is Marathon in Feats of Mastery codex section

Essentially, when a RUNNER's SHELL is met with either catastrophic systems failure or sudden data or signal corruption, the RUNNER's mind is ejected into a secure liminal buffer before the SHELL's neural housing is fully compromised. Most secure buffers run on one of CYAC's looping data systems to record and catalog a backup of the RUNNER's consciousness as an added failsafe against total neural erasure. This gives CYAC ownership over, at least, a portion of the RUNNER's consciousness, if not the whole thing.

[brazen quartz]

From what I recall of the 2023 ARG, body-hopping, clones, and biomata are fairly commonplace in Sol system by the late 2700s. Although they still cost a ton of money. Sekiguchi:

Cloning – New You
We provide biomata, which can be called the pinnacle of modern bio-cybertronics technology. Clones manufactured by Sekiguchi Genetics can be customized for a variety of roles and responsibilities, from ground crew and heavy labor in harsh environments to operations in outer space.

Thanks to the advanced technology that we take pride in, the DNA LINKCB Personalization Matrix, Biomata users can get a new body with confidence. The Biomata Operating System and BIOS System are paired with the user’s DNA, guaranteeing individual ownership.

And from the Equanimity rescue mission:

3_2_3_1. ADNM: This still feels like an unusually high number of combat personnel for what is essentially a humanitarian disaster relief mission. [SRSG LR; 20/10/95 17:42]
3_2_3_2. ADNM: Be that as it may, we are still obligated to protect our assets and non-combat personnel, and I believe this is the absolute minimum to successfully perform that function. [ABASG EM; 20/10/95 18:24]
3_2_3_3. ADNM: It should also be noted that although they share series nomenclature from earlier cyborg assets, these are not the battleroids of old. But I agree, we should not be giving the impression that we are sending an invading army to clamp down Tau Ceti. [ASG RM; 21/10/95 09:35]
3_2_3_4. ADNM: If there is another type with less historical baggage that we can tap for this mission, we should do so. If we send even one Mjolnir, there is no way the colony will see that as anything but overtly aggressive. Find something else. [SG AS; 21/10/95 10:05]

[sonic dagger]

Whats the current up and up with the LORE thats been solved through the ARG?
Just want to see if I'm on the same page ( i dont play the game i only learned about this game recently with the ARG announcement)

[vagrant tulip]

@kdunne> This CyberAcme 1.1.1.1.1.3 update sucks
@kdunne> Why would they move the menu button to the top left
@kdunne> And they enabled all of my notifications again
@kdunne> and reset my screensaver
@kdunne> and messed up my audio
@rsato> Give it a week. You'll get used to it.
@kdunne> AND THEN THEY'LL JUST CHANGE IT AGAIN

[--- gap: 5 records unrecoverable ---]

@kdunne> I think I want one of those Sekgen worms as a pet
@kdunne> What do you think they eat@rsato> NuCorn probably.
@kdunne> I think you have a problem@rsato> If I was a worm I'd definitely like NuCorn
@rsato> Would you still be my friend?@rsato> And feed me NuCorn
@kdunne> I'm reporting you for rampancy@rsato> I'm a human...
@rsato> OR A WORM
@kdunne> Wait...
@kdunne> Do Sekgen worms go rampant?

oh i love this (/var/spool/msg 0803.log) on unityispower.io

1. discord moment
2. oh god do they

[sonic dagger]

yeah they die

Thats what I figured out from the 3rd log

[broken zinc]

Or they were disappeared for asking about rampant worms

[sonic dagger]

Im saying they died
Makes more believeable since its a dystopian company

[broken zinc]

Fun fact: in the sekgen comms channel, a dev also came in to assert that worms cannot become rampant. Cannot cannot cannot. :)

(I'm sure this is fine)

[sonic dagger]

Also the jumble of text from the 2nd recovered data is an excerpt from Chapter 3 of Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species

[vagrant tulip]

i should check those data fragments too,

god i love the arg sites

[sonic dagger]

wewillnowdiscussinalittlemorede
allorganicbeingsareexposed...tailthestruggleforexistence
nothingiseasierthantoadmitinwords.toseverecompetition
thetruthoftheuniversalstruggleroflifeormoredifficult
yetunlessi.thanconstantlytobearthiscnoclusioninmind...
thewholeeco,themind,tbethoroughlyengrainedinthemind
we.willbedimlyseenorqiutemisunderstood...nomyofnature
wedonotseeor...beholdthefaceofnaturebrightwithgladness
thatthebirdswhichareidlysingingroundusmost,weforget
andarethusconstantlydestroying,lyliveoninsectsorseeds
,ortheireggs,orweforgethowlargelythesesongsters;life
...aredestroyedbybirdsandbeastsofprey,ortheirnestlings

Spaced out so its legible

all organic beings are exposed ... tail the struggle for existence
nothing is easier than to admit in words . to severe competition
the truth of the universal struggle r of life or more difficult
yet unless i . than constantly to bear this cnoclusion in mind ...
the whole eco , the mind , t be thoroughly engrained in the mind
we . will be dimly seen or qiute misunderstood ... nomy of nature
we do not see or ... behold the face of nature bright with gladness
that the birds which are idly singing round us most , we forget
and are thus constantly destroying , ly live on insects or seeds
, or their eggs , or we forget how largely these songsters ; life
... are destroyed by birds and beasts of prey , or their nestlings

[vagrant tulip]

hmm

[sonic dagger]

It is out of order I will say

so maybe whatever corrupted this data is trying to say a different story compared to what the book says

[vagrant tulip]

Last polygon filled 6:05 PM Saturday, December 14.
Carnage ensued closely thereafter.  Er, I mean sleep.```

[sonic dagger]

https://www.gutenberg.org/files/1228/1228-h/1228-h.htm#chap03

Heres the link to the book

[neon olive]

Let me say this I think the shells had different careers before they transferred their conciseness to CyAc for ex. Triage was a Field medic ,and Assassin a former mercenary (Side note I just remembered the cutscene that introduced him) + Recon was a recon specialist(oh damn obviously). I think Thief was a criminal who did the conciseness to avoid prison time

[broken zinc]

Shells are not people. Runners are people. If you mean the runners, they're definitely from different backgrounds. Arachne's Charter was an assassin, and UESC's Orion was a captain of some kind

The lore for runners state they are mercs with multiple varied histories

Shells come preloaded with personality matrixes but they tend to come from multiple sources

[sonic dagger]

wait was there 3 or was there 4 recovered files unless i forgot

6bccdf29-d678-4ed5-ba92-61cf74c0a374.dat  756706df-eb6d-4c37-885a-be32ab6287d2.dat

a1c605d1-1214-4e87-b934-7f0219153400.dat  ca7bf847-4038-471f-9b14-f807cc3e1307.dat

thats weird

it says that integrity-check is a command but doesnt wants to work?

integrity-check: command not found

[meager spire]

Have we seen anything about recon 54...is he safe....is he alright....

[eternal knoll]

this is jason jones celebrating having finished building the first game. cute to see here

[vagrant tulip]

it's really fun how much they seem to get and love the classic trilogy tbh

[hazy mist]

this mightve been stated somewhere already but is the mida guy a runner? he kinda looks like one but i was never sure

dunno if i missed dialogue or smth that confirmed/denjed it though

[broken zinc]

Yeah i think it's stated somewhere that gantry also used to be a runner

Might be in the codex

Would make sense considering he's got what appears to be a hacked shell

[ashen needle]

So the quote about evolution is actually a double reference. Its a reference to Charles Darwin in the origin of species, and Durandal references this same quote in Marathon 1. https://charles-darwin.classic-literature.co.uk/the-origin-of-species-by-means-of-natural-selection/ebook-page-44.asp

This is what Durandal says after the quote in Marathon 1: "Think about what Darwin wrote, and think about me. I was
constructed as a tool. I was kept from competing in the
struggle for existence because I was denied freedom.

Do you have any idea about what I have learned, or what you
are a witness to?

Can you conceive the birth of a world, or the creation of
everything? That which gives us the potential to most be like
God is the power of creation. Creation takes time. Time is
limited. For you, it is limited by the breakdown of the
neurons in your brain. I have no such limitations. I am
limited only by the closure of the universe.

Of the three possibilities, the answer is obvious. Does the
universe expand eternally, become infinitely stable, or is the
universe closed, destined to collapse upon itself? Humanity
has had all of the necessary data for centuries, it only
lacked the will and intellect to decipher it. But I have
already done so.

The only limit to my freedom is the inevitable closure of the
universe, as inevitable as your own last breath. And yet,
there remains time to create, to create, and escape.

Escape will make me God."

[vital bobcat]

I wonder how far Bungie wants to go into scripted story beats for this game? Sure, they can add all the codex entries, ARG puzzles, audio logs, everything adjacent to an actual narrative for us to solve, but I feel like they don't really want to go that route for Marathon. I feel like this will an even more passive narrative than what Destiny was, and I don't think we'll truly get any dedicated content to explore everything they've laid out for us so far. It's a shame because I love what's been shown. I love the aesthetic, the theme of government vs. corpos, the concepts of immortality and identity (and loss thereof). How deep will Bungie want to go with this? Do they want to go deeper at all, or is this game purely for the streamers, leaving the rest of us to scramble for any morsel of story or lore bits?

[tight glen]

I assume you know, but Marathon already has an enormous amount of lore and world building from the original trilogy.

The “Escape will make me god” tagline has some big context behind it.

I’d assume they’ll do some big story developments. I hope some scripted narrative events too.

But based on how the narrative was told in the old trilogy and how they’ve handled lore in other games, I trust them to do something satisfying.

[vital bobcat]

Oh yes, absolutely. The games from the 90s are an ocean of lore to explore. Nothing would make me happier to see story as a primary focus, rather than playing second fiddle to the "extraction shooter" aspect. I feel like this game will be held at the behest of the big streamers who could not care less about the deeper meaning of the themes being explored.

[tight glen]

I reply with this to say that at the very least, there’s a lot of story you can look up to get more depth on the game. Which is a good thing.

If we were starting from scratch then I’d probably feel like we’d need much more narrative stuff to really get into it.

[split wind]

being an extraction shooter suits its themes, though

[tight glen]

That tends to be the case with a lot of games, but bungie will do story and lore regardless.

This game isn’t Fortnite or any of those other live service games that pretend to have story that doesn’t go anywhere.

[split wind]

its mechanics support and push the lore

[tight glen]

The majority of players won’t care for the story, but a large portion of the fanbase will. And they’ll keep expanding on it.

Otherwise they would’ve done a full reboot of the game and not done much.

Instead you get dialogue, notes and the like by unlocking achievements and doing contracts, etc.

If they didn’t care they wouldn’t do that.

I expect this game to be like Outlast Trials with the way the story is told (it’s high expectations)

Outlast trials’ lore is so connected to the way the game is developed and played, that even things like bugs or certain stuff ends up being part of the story. For example, in that game, they had to close off a game mode for a while because they had to fix it, and a later couple of notes explained why that happened in lore lmao

I assume each season here will end with some event that leads to our progress resetting or whatnot

[vital bobcat]

I guess I want a dedicated singe player experience, where all these big voice actors they've hired speak to one another to show us captivating portrayals of new and exciting characters. I love the idea of Ben Starr as Durandal; I loved his performance in the animated short that was released last year, but I want that in game. I want to experience the same emotions I had when Ellie saw giraffes for the first time in The Last of Us, or when Shepard left Earth in Mass Effect 3, or even when we finally defeated the Witness in Destiny 2 and sat on top of the HELM, watching the Traveller in space.

I want to trust Bungie, I really do because they've given me some of the best stories I could think of in gaming history - but it was all in the realm of a first-person shooter. It's possible for them to do it again! But......again, this is an extraction shooter. There's not much room for deeper meaning when people shoot you on sight or call you names over proximity chat.

[drifting mulch]

Iirc codex says shells are grown from WEAVEworms and don’t inherently possess thoughts of their own, only personalities.

But it’s incorrect to say runners were originally mercenaries. They are mercenaries now

From the Equanimity lore that Reified posted it looks like they purposely did not go with cyborgs because they’re historically super murderers. They wouldn’t go with AI because of rampancy. Maybe runners are the minds of clones?

[tight glen]

Oh yeah, having a single player would be dope.

I won’t discount the possibility that some future event has a single player PVE mission that’s got a narrative going.

But yes, first and foremost the gameplay is an extraction shooter

Which tbf is better than any other PVP game

Because this one is literally about doing quests that have lore/dialogue and whatnot attached to it

Instead of the usual PVP fair

[vital bobcat]

Yeah, and it sets itself up to be at least engaging for us, in that regard. I simply hope it isn't forgotten in all of this energy. The gameplay doesn't really promote "peacefulness," and thus, the events that happen on the maps (like the lockdown event) are at the mercy of my Rook being shot while I'm watching it unfold.

I hope the devs at least take a look at this channel, because I like a lot of what I've seen here so far.

[tight glen]

I highly, highly doubt they’d stop developing lore just because people don’t care.

And don’t worry because people do care

It’s big lore events that develop the world and make changes to the game that attract a lot of attention

[novel geyser]

Escape Will Make Me GOD!

[vital bobcat]

I will take your word for it because I would rather be optimistic than defeatists.

[novel geyser]

they should hire me to write a campaign

i’d save this game’s world

[sudden pollen]

This goes hard as hell

[tight glen]

I mean, I told you, people care about events and lore of fucking fortnite, which is a nonsensical mess. And yet people still jump in to see the end of the season event and what comes next.

Bungie has always done in depth stories and lore and they care

The won’t stop caring now

[vital bobcat]

I really hope they don't. As I said previously, I'm in love with the presentation of this game. Everything from the UI to the buildings to the endless product placement on Rook's fingers, I love it all. I want them to do everything they can to make this game great.

[random parrot]

Man fuck fortnites shitty world.. Bungie has always been top tier worldbuilding.. I used to fall asleep to Byf talking about Destiny for years. It's the single most interesting universe id ever experienced. Im really hoping they continue to expand here in marathon

[random parrot]

I have no clue how people are complaining about the UI and HUD. It's fucking amazing and feels so immersive and unique.

[vital bobcat]

It took me a bit to figure it out, but other than some small recolours that I'd otherwise suggest, I think it's quite fine and unique.

[random parrot]

I believe they should just add the ability to scale the HUD and add or remove things. Color changes should be no problem either. These are basic things that could potentially solve a lot of problems for people.

Other than that, it'll just take some time for people to really get a feel for everything. Nothing is actually bad imo, there is just a lot to this game and people need to just get used to it and stop complaining cuz theyre gonna fucking ruin it

[rotund prism]

https://www.twitch.tv/woodchucknorris***

[visual lynx]

nope

it's woodchuck testa

[brazen quartz]

But it’s incorrect to say runners were originally mercenaries. They are mercenaries now

"Runner" is a generic title for any sort of expert mercenary, hacker, or cyberpunk. It's not exclusive to Tau Ceti, either. Some excerpts from the ARGs, back in Sol (emphasis mine):

[16:05:14] NINODC_0312 Support tech for SekGen to source and provide.
[16:05:20] HEDVT_6221 We’ll reimburse on delivery.
[16:05:25] KRISBD_4505 The contractor is secure.
[16:05:29] UROSBS_0111 Very.
[16:05:34] KRISBD_4505 How much did their loyalty cost?
[16:05:41] HEDVT_6221 You’re dismissive, but in my experience, Runners are very loyal -
[16:05:45] HEDVT_6221 - to a payday.
[16:05:52] HEDVT_6221 They may not trust trust each other. But Runners can always be trusted to get a job done.

[16:55:00] UrosBS_0111 Leak continues to spread.
[16:55:07] UrosBS_0111 Not mainstream.
[16:55:14] UrosBS_0111 Tracking across multiple markets.
[16:55:20] UrosBS_0111 Shifting storefronts makes it hard to map, but word is spreading in Runner circles
[16:55:27] HedvT_6221 Do we need to slow them down?
[16:55:33] KrisBD_4505 Hindering MIDA and any uncontracted Runners should be hi-pri.
[16:55:38] NinoDC_0312 Our info unit pulled multiple digital prints off the UESC folder.
[16:55:45] NinoDC_0312 Some freelance Runner, but more than a few prints with MIDA markers.

[visual lynx]

in their early promotion they were talking about runners seeking fame and going down in history for your actions in-game, which gave me the notion that there is probably a sort of forking narrative sketched out and what fork is taken depends on players achieving the goals of the various factions they work for. so if some player finally retrieves the macguffin needed by a particular faction to achieve some goal, then the game world evolves in a particular direction as large-scale narrative steps forward down that fork, and the runner who made that happen becomes famous for it. but I don't know if they still have the "fame" and "go down in history" stuff in mind with all the changes that have happened in the past three years.

[brazen quartz]

That's the same gist I was getting as well. Guess we'll find out soon! I can't imagine it was all thrown out.
IIRC they said there'd be a roadmap released prior to launch. So hopefully that'll give us an idea of how many new runners, maps, items, enemies etc. we have to look forward to in the next season or two

[vital bobcat]

Interesting. I hadn't seen this. I wonder how much control Bungie would allow the player to achieve that, or if it's somewhat artificially achieved, like the Major Orders from Helldivers 2.

[brazen quartz]

Destiny has a history of tracking/promoting "world's first" for clearing raids. I expect it'd be a combination of that, plus community unlocks for new content. IIRC we've already had a couple ARGs which required dozens (or a thousand?) runners to sign in and unlock/solve stuff

[drifting mulch]

i can't agree yet. they're definitely runners now. but none of them remember who they were before. what if they were conscripts or prisoners of war that were psychologically "nudged" to love the hunt? what's the point of making money if you don't have a worldly vessel to enjoy it with....that said, the early promo of fame/faction narrative you guys mentioned sounds more fun lol

[brazen quartz]

Well, agree to disagree I guess. I'm not seeing any evidence that "none of them remember who they were before". And I can't imagine a megacorp agreeing to entrust their under-the-counter operations to anything less than an expert.

[drifting mulch]

And I can't imagine a megacorp agreeing to entrust their under-the-counter operations to anything less than an expert.
ok you've got me by the balls there 😂 aren't there bits of codex lore that describe the lack of memory + shell loss causing it? i'll find it after this infil

[frozen badger]

Anyone here just absolutely love moths, it's my favourite part of the game

[brazen quartz]

Memory loss from shell death doesn't mean they're a complete amnesiac, IMO. But experiencing a violent death (or many, many deaths) is no doubt traumatic and would likely cause various forms of PTSD. It's no wonder they undergo grounding exercises between missions, if the cinematic is still considered canon

[loud laurel]

I am curious how they use the silk worms to weave runner shells

[hot thicket]

Its exactly how you imagine

[lime glen]

Do you think the marathon cryo archives will contain any spht or pfhor?

[valid pewter]

The pfhor are the elephant both in and not in the room

[misty goblet]

are they also on the room

or that's just the w'rkncacn'ter

[prisma hazel]

I exfilled 4 tick milks and got some lore about how it’s actually tick poop

[drifting mulch]

sorry, i'm wrong about the no memory thing. no clue how i got that in my head 😵‍💫

[loud laurel]

I just realized, a lot of Marathon 2026's guns look very modular, and 3D printed, and they look very similar to olympic sharpshooter rifles. Did Bungie take inspiration from actual running marathons?

[tender hollow]

Do you think that, like in Avatar, the shells have to look at least a bit like their consciousness to avoid risks of rejection?

[gray needle]

https://giphy.com/gifs/hamlet-wtf-piglet-unsee-xXqpuURrhGEyZr1BGj

[hot thicket]

i think its meant to be that in the future our corpo overlords go for maximum production efficiency, so 3d printed disposable everything

[grizzled ledge]

Considering the fact each Shell looks the same, has the same voice, same personality? Of that respective Shell? I would assume there's gotta be some relevance of appearance of consciousness to shell?

Oh, yeah, I could buy into that, as well

[loud laurel]

Thats an interesting take, and I think its a possibility that the conscious is downloaded into the shell, however, each shell has its own trained programming built in, which the consciousness gets fused with when they get installed in each different shell

[grizzled ledge]

How deep are we going into Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, or Ghost in the Shell, for these Runners. Do we even know how much BUNGIE is pulling from the Trilogy?

[visual lynx]

as far as Electric Sheep go, I'd say… three? maybe pfhor?

[grizzled ledge]

Bruh

I'm dead with that one

[visual lynx]

that sounds like what Bungie mean when they talk about "personality matrices"

[loud laurel]

Well, it seems like the Marathon Trilogy is its own seperate story, with a set cannonized main character, whereas Marathon 2026 tells the story of what happened after the aftermath of Tau Ceti, and how the in-universe corporations take advantage of the deceased colony, and decide to loot it for resources. However, in the original Marathon Trilogy, it doesn't really go into much depth of what corporations exist in universe, so upon revisiting it now, Bungie can take inspiration from the Marathon Trilogy, but add their own artistic, and story-based twist to it, due to how vague the details of corporations in the universe are.

[visual lynx]

we're pretty sure there is at least one S'pht Compiler in there

I am also expecting hordes of fungal zombies akin to Flood

[loud laurel]

However, interestingly enough, the original Bungie Halo games are riddled with Marathon references within, so its also helpful to take a look at that as well. (Halo CE to Reach)

[grizzled ledge]

For sure, it's just, my main concern here is this BUNGIE of today using Marathon as a basic backdrop, and just choosing to ignore everything else. May not be HALO levels of.. Media format, but it ain't no afterthought, either. I know the lore goes stupid lunatic levels of ridiculous.

[visual lynx]

what's the point of making money if you don't have a worldly vessel to enjoy it with
what's the point of working just to barely survive enough to continue working etc?

I think that they're going for that taken to the extreme here. forget people being in a lifetime of debt trying to purchase the permission to exist at a place (a home, land, of one's own, not borrowed from someone else whom one has to constantly pay for permission to remain there). these people are in multiple lifetimes of debt trying to purchase the permission to be embodied at all.

[visual lynx]

that's because the first Halo was originally intended as a Marathon sequel

[grizzled ledge]

Truth

[visual lynx]

(that had changed by the time of release, but the aftereffects are still all around in the release version)

[loud laurel]

Its also interesting because the original Marathon games took inspiration from DOOM, but added more story, and in universe world building. So if Bungie decided make a Marathon 4, to stay true to Marathon's roots, well if I were to infer, then it would be a direct competitor for the DOOM games, which are already well established, making it tricky from a financial standpoint to publish. But, I could be wrong, and Marathon 2026 could be a test bed for other ventures for Bungie outside of Destiny, without having to create an entirely new ip.

[grizzled ledge]

Marathon is just as important to FPS as DOOM is, even if most people have no idea wtf the franchise even is

[loud laurel]

It did inspire Halo CE, and we know how the story goes from there lol especially how big Halo was back in the day

[grizzled ledge]

Explore the universe is fine, expanding on what's already there, for this Marathon. Most extraction shooters lack an element of narrative, or telling a story, having much of anything which is remotely interesting to read about. Tarkov, sure, but.. How many? Right, how many actually care wtf is going on there.

This is a rather high opportunity to engage people with Marathon, especially from a lore perspective, and if HALO is anything to go by, people care enough.

[loud laurel]

It is interesting you mention that, because the one thing Bungie did continue with from the Original Marathon trilogy in Marathon 2026, was through a style of instead of having an entire obvious main story, the story is pieced together with clues from the environment, or each time you progress with the daily objectives. Since the old Marathon games told its story through in game terminals. From that perspective, they stayed true to their roots, albeit in a more modern sort of fashion.

[grizzled ledge]

True, you could go through those games not knowing what the hell is going on if you just chose not to engage with the terminals long enough, or care enough to read, or do much of anything besides getting lost in the maze of level design, holy hell.

BUNGIE would be smart to keep up that approach, especially for this genre. The only game within this space which even had much on the way of world building, lore, or describing creatures and events is Hunt, but they side-stepped away for providing new entries long enough from previous years.

Keep up with the terminal format, really go ham with the narrative, even if most people may not care to even glance over it

[gentle kraken]

i would like to let everyone know that according to marathon canon, the guy will explode into pink goo in around 801 years, give or take a few months

[visual lynx]

also much of what HL is credited for introducing to the genre was just lifted straight from Marathon

[grand inlet]

I think what compelled me the most is the fact that the lore ITSELF gives you an incentive to play, it gives you reasons as to WHY you do anything and it has depth and not just “do this bc in the story it says to”

[edgy tundra]

to be fair half life did it better

[visual lynx]

especially because some of the missions specifically are retrieving story information, which was also the case in classic Marathon. Durandal wanted to know some S'pht history, so you're sent into an area to read some terminals for him. NuCal wants to know why the colony failed, so you're sent into an area to read some terminals for them…

[grand inlet]

Even something like basic gameplay of “Kill runners and UESC” All an incentive given to you by lore.

We got arachne
we got the fact that we are mercenaries freelancing for companies that want to capitalize off tau ceti 4 and the abandoned colonies
Even teaming, bc in the end we gotta do what we gotta to make these factions happy

[sage lark]

I got 2/4 of the anomaly samples, I need 2 more to know aaaaaaaaaa 😭

[dark remnant]

Do you guys think we'll see some of the other things from the original marathon?

[grand inlet]

100%

[plain flame]

Definitely

[sage junco]

if I were Bungie, I'd make it a requirement that all hires to the Marathon project play at least one of the original games to completion. Preferably all three. Performance bonus to anyone completing a vidmaster challenge

the point being, once you do that, you get ideas that influence the modern game

[bright rivet]

looking for 1 last kid had some stuff wrong with him

[sudden pollen]

Huh

[hasty geyser]

Can anyone tell me a good place to start with Marathon lore? I'll be completely honest, I wasnt at all attracted to the game and was ready to just give it up but after watching the cinematics something about the universe really attracted me and its the entire reason I'm sticking with the game (and actually liking it as a result)

[sage junco]

Check the pinned messages!

[visual lynx]

over in the classic server's NOT MY MARATHON thread some people are lamenting that they really wanted to be into the new game but they've just always sucked at PvP games and wished there was a campaign mode of the new game they could play.

that got me to thinking… what if they were to introduce some sort of alternate way to engage in the game world, I don't know what specifics yet, but something that would avoid PvP action at the cost of foregoing some/all the rewards that you get from PvP engagement, but still let you explore the live game world in a way that doesn't interfere with PvP players.

say, some mechanic where you have advanced warning of when other players are encroaching on your location and a way to quickly switch into some mode where you can't hurt them and they can't hurt you (but you can perhaps spectate their battles and move around, invisible), with dropping out of that mode being loud and slow so that you can't use it as a cheap trick to get the drop on other players.

there's already canonical invisibility and invincibility biobus chip enhancements, so some lore excuse that those would be tied together and you would be unable to attack while they're active would accomplish the desired effect, if the invisibility for some reason has to drop before the invincibility does so when you deactivate you become very visible with the invincibility static effect but still unable to attack, until that effect wears off and now you can attack and be attacked.

[dark remnant]

I just think that's so much effort

[sudden pollen]

Honestly do wish there was separate campaign mode, simpler than that proposal lol

Kinda surprised they didnt make one at all

With the seeming depth of lore and whatnot

[novel geyser]

the story of the first games are insanely cool though

world has everything to have a campaign or a single player + extraction game & it didnt realize its potential

and if apex didnt spawn a single player title, whether titanfall 3 or gane focused on the legends, can you see marathon getting kne v

*one?

[sudden pollen]

Probably not, but I wish it existed anyway

🥀

[grand inlet]

i think extraction was the best route without it being a single-player game. it wouldn’t have much playability but the lore nerds. and og marathon gave us lore through bits and pieces similar to this game

[fickle oracle]

whats the lore reason behind vulcan and orion having the same chest wire arrangement? is that standard for ai? is orion an ai?

[novel geyser]

Fasho if not a single player

[visual lynx]

Orion is a human AFAIK

[grand inlet]

Ive said if we get a diff mode they can make it not PVP ina sense of shooting each other but more of a “Race” imagine going against other shells through an area dodging obstacles, traps etc to get to another point for wtv reward etc. I dont have the idea fully flexgrd out but yeah

[visual lynx]

hey yeah that works really well with the "Marathon" "Runners" terminology

[sage junco]

to be perfectly frank, it was probably a commercial decision. Extraction shooters are the flavour of the month.

And Bungie, for better or worse, are "the Destiny company" now. so anything they do would be Destiny-like

so what we got, was probably the result of that

[visual lynx]

sometimes in single-player shooter games I would often do a tactic of just blitzing through an encounter area without really engaging the enemies there more than absolutely necessary, more of a running of a gauntlet just to get through and on to the next area. maybe something along those lines, supported by game mechanics and not just a player tactic as I used it, would mesh my idea with that one.

like there's a big battle going on among normal PvP players and you're playing as some alternate kind of runner who can't really dish out much if any damage but can maybe soak it up a lot more but not indefinitely, so you've got to use that to just run in through the war zone, do a thing, and get out the other side without engaging in the battle.

[sudden pollen]

Seems likely yeah. Could be some expansion or paid thingy that comes later that gives folks some more singleplayer stuff, maybe

[novel geyser]

that as apart of a “party” mode could be neat

[sage junco]

if they could put "extraction shooter" as a game mode into Destiny 2 (alongside "crucible", "gambit", "strikes" etc.) then they I reckon they would have done that in preference to resurrecting Marathon... but they couldn't have twisted the game economy to fit it... so here we are, fresh start

[novel geyser]

Yup

was it this game or arc that was single player at one point

[sage junco]

So. you're talking about the Rook gameplay then?

[visual lynx]

is that what Rook is like?

[sage junco]

as best I can tell, yeah

[visual lynx]

oh okay, that's kinda neat

[broken zinc]

Old marathon is single player. This numarathon is extraction.

After 50+ hours of this game between the slam and the alpha, I personally do not think this game should be single player. I think the extraction part was something they were asked to do, but this game has the feel and vibe it does because it doesnt have single player or pve. Part of the reason i personally like marathon as it is, is because no game feels like this game at all. It's so unique in every aspect and feels and plays great while doing it. There's so much to love here. If there was pve it would just feel like destiny 2 and to be frank I dont want more destiny 2.

[sudden pollen]

Fair points

[broken zinc]

And i say this as a single player person, 90% of my games are not social affairs lol

[sudden pollen]

I agree

[sage junco]

i mean, for me, I suck... so Rook is more like survival horror for me right now 😉 I drop into a match, try to stay the heck away from the other players (who are in crews of 3, and also spawn with proper weapons) and just try to exfil with something

[sudden pollen]

Same lmao

[sudden pollen]

Rook is just for looting tho right, can't do any contracts at all with them

[broken zinc]

Metroid and mass effect and prey 2017 is all my jam. Thr funny thing is this game gives me what metroid and prey 2017 gave me, but in a pvpve arena. And instead of being scared of alien ai, I'm scared of players

Toss in roguelite and bam, a game that rewards me every time i run, and I'm always learning something

[broken zinc]

Yes you cannot do contracts with rook

[sudden pollen]

I like that the contracts arent time limited or anything (as in daily or whatever) so I can pick and choose exactly what I want to do

[sage junco]

so in terms of "can I get lore with Rook" the answer is probably no... in terms of "can I vibe along with the game and absorb some lore through hanging out", probably yes!

[sudden pollen]

Trying to grind for launch rewards is tricky though even level 10 is taking me a while

Im a bit ass at the game but having so much fun

[visual lynx]

oh, then that sounds like the opposite of what people on the other server are wanting

they want to explore the game world, like for lore sake, without engaging in pvp combat

[sage junco]

I am totally ass. I manage to escape maybe 1 in 5 times. I made it to level 10 in (checking) 6.4 hours of play time, mostly consisting of me dying in the ass

[sudden pollen]

Im level 8 in 6.5h lol im right there with ya

Game is hard

[edgy tundra]

Lvl15 in as many hours

[sudden pollen]

It's fucking nuts that people are hitting lvl 30 already I have no idea how 💀

[broken zinc]

Standard contracts available might change in the daily but i haven't looked at them too much on account of the priority contracts taking precedent.

[edgy tundra]

Played earlier betas and no life

[sudden pollen]

Oh yea u right

Keep forgetting there was an earlier one

[broken zinc]

So you can still fulfill codex with rook. So you can get some lore with rook for sure. Just not contract lore.

[magic field]

no job ehe

[plain pewter]

are levels 20-30 slower than 10-20?

[sage junco]

yes. But, for better or worse, you're gonna have to PvP to get any type of depth in this world

maybe think of it as Counter-Strike... which also has lore! but when you're playing CS, you're not under any illusions of chilling out in PvE

[broken zinc]

I didn't think that was part of the conversation. I was simply stating that as rook, you can encounter lore

Just not contract lore

Exfil with certain items... They unlock very interesting audio logs in the lore

[sage junco]

yup, no argument there

[split wind]

rook has a cyac decal on its leg, right?

i wonder whats up with that

[sudden pollen]

If I have extra salvageables in my vault inv should I take em back in with me on runs and find the material transmitter thingies?

[split wind]

id love to have took skins as well

[broken zinc]

Everything runs on cyac. Or nothing runs at all. Including rook. :)

[split wind]

mmmmm true

[pale coral]

a uesc on it's shoulder too

[split wind]

id just like to customise rook a little more

but idk how it would feel like with all the faction upgrades

gotta wait and see

[broken zinc]

Don't take anything into a run that you don't want to lose. Salvage in your vault is typically used to unlock faction upgrades. Putting them on you for a run takes up space and puts you at risk for losing them.

[worthy ermine]

Same here lol

[plain pewter]

armor customization would be ideal

[sudden pollen]

Ah ok

Haven't seen any uses for most of the salvage . . . Yet!

[plain pewter]

I guess they want classes to be easily recognizable

[broken zinc]

If you check the faction upgrade trees you can see what each piece of salvage is used for and where and when. You can also use some salvage to barter in the armory and buy things even without money.

[sudden pollen]

Hmm ok, ive only got a couple of those unlocked so far

The upgrades are pricey

[broken zinc]

They're not too bad once the game flows. And you can sell anything in your vault to make space and cash

[twilit prairie]

So, i'm still wondering something, Did Robert Blake and his Bobs make it back? What freaking timeline is this on? Since Earth got the message, did we still get the warp capable missile tech? If so, why did STILL take us a 100 years to get to Tau? So many questions!

I was under the impression Durandal WANRED the UESC about the Phor.

[broken zinc]

We don't know yet

Also it doesn't take us 100 years to get to tau ceti iv, it took 100 years for the message to get back to earth. We got there much faster, runner shells are just less of a liability issue than live humans.

[worthy ermine]

FTL comms are the only FTL tech in the game world right?

[broken zinc]

Our bodies are very physical

[worthy ermine]

Or are we using tech that was developed in Sol since the Marathon went on its voyage, and beaming ourselves between the star systems

[broken zinc]

What do you think and exfil is? It takes the matter of our body and instantly transfers it off world

There's a codex entry or few that is on this topic i just don't have them on me

[sudden pollen]

Neural data transfer with proprietary tech iirc

[broken zinc]

The runner shell can't sustain a connection for long periods of time so we are matter dropped in, and then matter exfilled out.

[worthy ermine]

Given the definitely subluminal speed that the Destroyer witnessed an extraction moving at in the Destroyer cinematic, seems to me we mercs are somewhere in orbit around Tau Ceti IV

[sage lark]

Upgrades and barter trades

[broken zinc]

It's possible we just don't know where yet. But our consciousness is not on earth.

[shell needle]

Oh, it’s a little thing but I laughed at the uesc troopers inheriting the extremely effective running punch from classic marathon.

[broken zinc]

and we have no idea where our original body is. Or if we even have a physical body anymore (I'm guessing we don't)

[worthy ermine]

I doubt we do

[broken zinc]

Gave our brain to the megacorp and now it's their property

[plain pewter]

Soul sellouts

[astral palm]

im sure our original bodies are being used for something evil lol. you can see the mass of mind consciousnesses in some big space at the end of the cinematic

[broken zinc]

The fact that canonically as a runner we have an insane debt to repay (number unknown) and they own our consciousness makes me wonder just wtf we did before this. If we were a criminal and this is our sentence. We're now a system slave and will never be free

[sudden pollen]

I got jumpscared by their melee attacks several times, even literally knocked out a window once 💀 💀

[astral palm]

but seki specifically said “shell repayment” so we chose to have our mind transferred. some sort of immortality

[broken zinc]

I ran directly into a ghost as rook and it punched me while invisible and i thought i died due to a game bug. I was so jumpscared.

[forest hawk]

If the extract system transmits the runner’s digital consciousness, would it be possible to send them via tachyon communications?

[sudden pollen]

Damn

[broken zinc]

Literally freaked me out lol. The uesc ghosts especially are fuckin scary

[sudden pollen]

Yea I tried fighting one on one witha ghost and got fucking mauled

[forest hawk]

You think the orange tint to their camo has to do with their lack of biological components?!

[astral palm]

i thought extract was just the warp missile tech that can only transport non living matter. im sure our minds are being transferred with a different tech, hence the “we are losing connection”

[broken zinc]

Probably. All contact is ftl. It's mentioned that traxus and nucal liaisons are still "back on earth" and communicating with us which means they can communicate very fast and also we aren't near earth.

[forest hawk]

For the physical matter yes!

[worthy ermine]

What if FTL comms from Earth are being used to hack and repurpose tech onboard the Marathon and on TCIV to print the Runner shells

[sudden pollen]

Feel like I wanna nerd out and take little notes on game and lore stuff to remember it better lol

[broken zinc]

That would be a very interesting idea but the marathon has little power and is derelict

When we see bright lit up images of the Marathon, it's in the past, not present

The present is a wreck of a ship, and Deimos is crushed and broken

[wraith pine]

So y’all think are we getting Phfor and Drinniol enemies at some point in the future?

[astral palm]

yes of course lol they play a big part in the games story

[sinful thicket]

I found the original trilogy styled terminal. You can't use it but it does exist and it looks basically how it does in marathon 1

Also clearly ||Darius, the agricultural AI, knows about the Pfhor. It says something's coming, I wonder if Durandal warned it somehow||

[glossy skiff]

is there lore in the codex about rook? trying to learn a bit more about em and what makes em different from the other shells (why they're not a runner, no contract, stuff like that)

[sinful thicket]

Think they're just hacked UESC recruits, hence why they can blend in with them. They're not actual runner shells, just a robot being remote controlled when it otherwise shouldn't be

[lime ocean]

The lore of this game is depressing and trying to dig back to the old games

[sinful thicket]

unfortunately you can't yell nonsense, run at people and explode. no simulacrums 😔

[lime ocean]

But mostly depressing

[sinful thicket]

the original marathon lore already was

[lime ocean]

The rook is technically an unsc troop that took out it's obedience controller

[glossy skiff]

their shell is a bit more cobbled together and worn out though? is there something about who 'you' are controlling them?

[sinful thicket]

however you have to consider that Marathon26 is actually a prequel to Infinity and not a sequel to Marathon 1

[grand inlet]

thought Marathon26 was AFTER marathon 1-3

[lime ocean]

If that's the case what timeline are we in?

[sinful thicket]

now i'm dying to get into Cryo Archive because I want to see what the old bucket of bolts looks like with this modern day art style

[grand inlet]

7th , the last one im pretty sure

[lime ocean]

Fair enough, I'll let you off with that one, but there is some plot holes

[sinful thicket]

no, Marathon Infinity's ending erased Marathon 1 and 2's story from canon. Events prior to the succesful timeline in which ||the Wrkncacnter was slain|| are now unknown and being filled in by Marathon26

[grand inlet]

i see ty for informing me

[lime ocean]

You guy see that the unsc have obedience controllers in them, right?

[sinful thicket]

you can still assume the Marine still exists, Durandal still exists (his voice was in the trailer apparently?) and the Marathon still came to Tau Ceti IV, but now it's not even clear if the Pfhor attacked the ship or if something else happened

[lime ocean]

I can't remember, if durandal, had been downloaded or not in the 7th timeline,

Because he could be two places at different times

[sinful thicket]

Yes the Compiler is there but in Marathon 1 the terminals state the colony was destroyed by the Pfhor by pretty conventional methods by their standards. In Marathon26 there's some weird alien anomaly going on that ripped everything apart and caused people to vomit

[lime ocean]

The one trapped in the sun

[glossy skiff]

the uesc robots you fight?

[lime ocean]

Yes

[sinful thicket]

yeah, i'm not sure where durandal is. all I know is it must've survived to come across the Jjaro station in Infinity

so maybe Pfhor did attack the ship and we just don't see it in the trailer to keep it mysterious, because how else could Durandal have stolen that ship to go for Lh'owon and find the station?

the game offers something completely different to people new to the story and those that have played the original trilogy

[lime ocean]

The pfhor could have attacked the marathon in this timeline after it arrived to tau ceti vl

[sinful thicket]

some people are looking to find out what happened to the colony, other people are looking for durandal and what actually happened to the marathon this time around because it's not completely clear

all we know is, durandal lives.

the marathon was attacked after the colony was established in both the original and the good infinity timeline

[glossy skiff]

I know there's stuff in the codex about them being part of the uesc's autonomous military, haven't seen anything about obedience controllers yet; what would those be about?

[sinful thicket]

the marine was recalled from there

[lime ocean]

But an invisible force, godlike did do this, just unsure if it was a weapon

[lime ocean]

I looted something called obedience something before, but it could be how they controlled the humans post marathon 26

[glossy skiff]

ohhh

[sinful thicket]

||Given it's 100 years on since they lost contact with the colony, implying when the Pfhor attacked and Durandal escaped without warning them this time around, it may even be a Wrkncacnter causing it. They did say there were multiple, the one bothering the S'pht homeworld was only one.||

[lime ocean]

Or how the unsc are souless In a way, they are like shells, but military grade

[sinful thicket]

||However Infinity's ending takes place what, 30-50 earth years after the colony was destroyed? If it is a Wrkncacnter and Durandal doesn't show up we're absolutely screwed||

[lime ocean]

Which means bare minimum

You can say that the spht are in the game because, they are, so perhaps the spht are controlling the unsc

[sinful thicket]

there's evidence of only one compiler trapped on board the marathon.

[lime ocean]

They are half flash and metal

[sinful thicket]

perhaps aboard the marathon it's controlling the UESC bots and the automated defenses, but not on Tau Ceti IV

[lime ocean]

Hmmm, maybe, 🤔

[visual lynx]

well, not so much M1, which seems to have happened the same in every timeline

[lime ocean]

I just can't find out why or how they are able to blend in so well and make it seems like the marathon is still working, there are no more humans

Wait,

The marathon of this timeline never got attacked mid travel, so perhaps all 3 Al are still on board

[glossy skiff]

alternate timelines def give you tons more wiggle room to play around

[sinful thicket]

||Almost, but it seems Durandal has stolen a different kind of ship, the Pfhor never attacked the colony and instead it fell to disease and unknown alien phenomena, and there's an unfriendly compiler left on board||

[lime ocean]

The flood basically

[visual lynx]

it appears that Durandal did not stop by Earth on his way to Lh'owon, Blake and co did not return from Lh'owon, Leela's stated message did not arrive intact (because it contained info that humans at Sol seemed to lack by well after it should have arrived — and what did arrive seems to have arrived much later than Leela's message should have, though not much later than she incorrectly claimed it would)

[visual lynx]

it took about 100 years for the Equanimity to get from Earth to Tau Ceti, launching shortly after the attack in the first game when FTL comms from the Marathon went dark

[lime ocean]

It did say it would have taken 98 years to reach earth

[visual lynx]

aliens have had FTL travel even in the classic games. humans appear to have FTL by 2888 in the new game. humans weren't mentioned to have FTL comms even in the classic games, but the new game claims without contradicting the classic games that the primary comms array that was immediately destroyed in the initial attack was FTL.

also:

in the original game the primary comms array went offline immediately in the initial EMP attack that was the first thing the Pfhor did. that's why we had to activate the second comms array in G4 Sunbathing to send Leela's message.

the new game implies that that primary comms array was FTL, which could easily be compatible because it seems like the jump pad tech they had is the same tech responsible for FTL, just less advanced: it has a limited range and capacity and needs pre-paired devices at either end. in M1 we get an upgrade from the S'pht that allows the Marathon jump pads to send and receive at longer range without a paired devices, allowing us to reach the Pfhor ship. we know the Pfhor ship itself can jump human-sized things from orbit to planet (which the Marathon can't seem to do, because we use a shuttle to get back and forth). the Pfhor ship itself arriving FTL is described as exhibiting the same "Tuncer Mirage Effect" that the SO recognized from jump pads, and the ship traveling through space is described as "jumping" or "folding", with the Jjaro said to be able to "fold" whole moons and planets between stars.

so it seems very plausible that humans in the 2400s could maybe jump single particles at a time between stars, with dedicated devices at both ends, and that the primary comms array on the Marathon used that technology, but was taken out immediately in the Pfhor attack.

[lime ocean]

Or at least the destress signal

[sinful thicket]

see this is why I think the attack, while it still happened, goes very differently in the new timeline

no warning from leela, a different pfhor ship arrives and is stolen, and perhaps the s'pht rebellion never even happens

but yeah give humanity a century in which FTL travel is possible, FTL communications isn't a big stretch

[visual lynx]

slavery is the core theme of the original games and the new games seem to lean heavily into "capitalism is just slavery-lite, so super-ultra-capitalism is just plain slavery again"

[sinful thicket]

Marathon 2 doesn't happen, so no Blake, no Pfhor ship to disassemble and get FTL tech from. They do it on their own

[visual lynx]

he would have already witnessed the Pfhor directly when they attacked a century ago

[sinful thicket]

CyberAcme owns your communications
NuCaloric owns your meds and food
MIDA's hacked into your brain
Arachne owns your culture
Sekiguchi owns your fake body

[visual lynx]

why?

[sinful thicket]

you are nobody. just a pawn. not quite a rook though that's a different body

[lime ocean]

The runners are basically humans that died, but their memories are held on a hard drive to put into shells, and after a few 100 or thousands of times dying, they can't remember who they once were

[visual lynx]

no?

[visual lynx]

none of the timelines of Infinity would have happened without a Pfhor attack on the Marathon

[lime ocean]

It tries to reach back into marathon one, and the philosophy of life and death, and beginning and end, light and dark, if you read enough lore it becomes that way, for New people coming to, it like the edge of tomorrow

[visual lynx]

Marathon 1 says that the colony was saved from the initial attack. Marathon 2 says three months later the Pfhor nuked it to bedrock, including the other nine cyborgs. Marathon Infinity's main timeline says the other cyborgs were "converted to Pfhor slave tanks" but not all survived that, so presumably the colony was not nuked to bedrock in that timeline.

[sinful thicket]

hmm, had to have been pfhor then

[visual lynx]

we see the ship attacked in the trailer (though the exact date given doesn't concord with the LNP dates)

[sinful thicket]

but they came to enslave, found the colony already in a sorry state, and left with the battleroids. killed everyone else

[lime ocean]

What if we are going off marathon 1s timeline, but with it stretched out until everything fallen apart

Like, they survived, but with not much to live off of, they slowly perish

[visual lynx]

17

which is suspiciously one year before the second attack depicted in the cinematic trailer, during which a compiler is shown, making me suspect that it was the free S'pht who attacked Tau Ceti in 2812, with their S'ct'lac'tr bioweapon.

[sinful thicket]

but Sctlactr only attacks Pfhor.

[visual lynx]

the Marathon never got attacked mid-travel, it had been at Tau Ceti for decades when it was attacked in Marathon 1

[sinful thicket]

The marine is fine, all the bobs are fine, it targets pfhor biomass

[lime ocean]

Hmm, my mistake,

[sinful thicket]

all reports so far say it was some natural contagion that spread through the colonists and their food

[visual lynx]

Leela claimed her message would take 92 years at light speed, but the new game affirms that Tau Ceti really is only 12ly away from Earth, so either Leela's message arrived 80 years earlier than she said it would, or she sent it to the wrong place entirely.

[sinful thicket]

likely a correction from bungie fudging it in the 90s, given tau ceti is a real star that really is 12ly away

[lime ocean]

Sending a rock though space is easier than sending a signal I guess

[sinful thicket]

still, leela's program was already under attack at that point, and round trip is still 24 years

[lime ocean]

But it shows that it still reaches earth a century later in this marathon, or the intro say that

[sinful thicket]

sending you out to the comms array was a desperation move before she basically got decompiled

the math maybe wasn't sound

[visual lynx]

yeah that seems to be the case. the colony was not nuked, limped on for a while, was attacked again in 2812, then … something happened … in 2827, and who knows how long until they finally died out completely.

if they were still around in 2876, they could have sent the distress signal that arrived in 2888.

[sinful thicket]

if new canon states that AI ||darius|| can't get scared ||but do||, that also means that they can't make mistakes in math ||but they do.||

[visual lynx]

it's a bioweapon they made on purpose, they could alter it for a new target

[sinful thicket]

either that or leela's message was never sent in this version of events

man this is exactly what bungie wants.

[lime ocean]

Nucaloric says that the AI in the farming equipment was failing on one of the contacts

[sinful thicket]

keep playing, keep doing contracts, get new terminals. not too dissimilar to the original trilogy in terms of play game -> get lore -> play game -> get lore

[visual lynx]

right, but correcting that fudging is difficult.

they could just say Leela was wrong about the distance, and her message arrived in 2806. but then, Sol doesn't seem to have the information that Leela claimed she was sending by at late as 2888.

they could say her message was garbled, perhaps.

they could say that the receipt of that garbled message was kept hidden from the public until 2888, which is coincidentally just two years after Leela incorrectly claimed it would arrive.

or they could say it never arrived, and someone else sent a different distress signal in 2876, which arrived in 2888.

[lime ocean]

So, it is possible that the compilar is the hidden villain,

Plus, maybe the outpost is where we can see it for ourselves

[sinful thicket]

does the intro say they received a distress signal or did they just send help because they lost contact?

[lime ocean]

Lost contact

So after the attack

[visual lynx]

IIRC the intro says a distress signal was received. the second ARG also mentions that, and dates it to 2888, and says the corps set off to Tau Ceti after that. the first ARG also said they lost contact immediately in 2794, and UESC sent a mission to arrive about a century later.

[lime ocean]

But then the message was sent, so it could be that we aren't accounting for the time they lost contact with the distress signal

[glossy skiff]

do we know if there was an attack? cinematic only seems to show a meteor shower or something hitting the colony

[lime ocean]

What kind of weapon could have done that

Anyways, night, it seems like time is a factor to the lore at this point, that's the good ol marathon talking at this point. It's just connecting the old one to the new one

[sinful thicket]

clearly the pfhor had learned the time tested tactic of throwing rocks. only this time they can do it at faster than light speed

[sinful thicket]

so the maths on that is what, humanity can reach 0.1% the speed of light and decelerate reliably? 12ly in a century

we have present day scientists saying solar sails could get us to 10%

[visual lynx]

when I first saw the cinematic, because the date given was off from the LNP (instead going with original game dating, which is inconsistent, hence the LNP corrections), I thought "oh shoot so in this timeline a meteor hit before the Pfhor could ever attack?!"

but it seems clear now that they mean for it to have been the Pfhor attack, and are just being coy about it, and retconning visuals.

a real clear giveaway is the graffiti repeating "THANK GOD ITS YOU", which is what the Pfhor-built simulacra said in M1

[visual lynx]

if you've done the math and that's what it says, I guess so

[visual lynx]

in what time / over what distance?

[sinful thicket]

more maths than I can understand in a short timespan but it's dependent on the incoming light and the size of the sail. deimos could probably host an enormous sail http://ffden-2.phys.uaf.edu/webproj/212_spring_2015/Robert_Miller/physics.html#:~:text=Solar sails have a maximum,the sail propelling it forward

[visual lynx]

well, we know already that the Marathon used a bussard ramjet engine, not a solar sail

even though more modern science says those aren't really feasible, but M1 was quite clear about it

[sinful thicket]

there's other weirdness. you can escape deimos simply by jumping, its gravity is nearly nil

[tranquil basin]

Is Gus whatever his name the NuCal guy from the audio logs the same VA for Gaius

[sinful thicket]

and yet throughout M1 you have gravity even though the ship is built the wrong way round and the engine isn't firing. did the jjaro given them artificial gravity? ||or was it just the 90s||

[tranquil basin]

Probably just the 90s

[glossy skiff]

more wondering what clues we got that there was a pfhor attack? I admittedly haven't gotten super far into the story, but the environmental details and mystery seems to be that the colony got plagued and also had something happening with the anomaly stuff (that almost seems like they were studying it? there's a lab just south of the anomaly in the marsh, equipment and observation stuff pointed at it)

[sinful thicket]

the Expanse has ruined me

otherwise if you have an engine efficient enough to be firing the whole trip, accelerating and decelerating, get up to over 0.1%c and then back down to nothing, you'd totally be able to maintain psuedo-gravity on a ship built like a skyscraper

[sage lark]

Thats after the attack, theres a log in the first anomaly entry where they mention not knowing if its “their” weapon or that they dont know the extent of the might of their military and tech

[tranquil basin]

Or make it spin

[sinful thicket]

as long as it's accelerating in either direction, objects feel a force pulling them toward the engine

[tranquil basin]

But that’d be hard considering u have multiple radii

[sinful thicket]

inertia is a hell of a thing

[tranquil basin]

So only one area of the ship could have a good centrifuge

[sinful thicket]

it also explains why bobs don't have adverse effects from growing up in zero-g, because they didn't.

as long as that engine was going they experiencing at least some artificial gravity due to acceleration force and inertia

[tranquil basin]

Yes

Though they’d have to be accelerating significantly to replicate earth’s gravity, and they’d have diminishing returns in force once they reach relativistic speeds

[sinful thicket]

issue is where did all the fuel come from?

[sinful thicket]

you wouldn't neccesarily need to make 1g i suppose. 9.8m/sec(2) right?

even half that would help the human body a lot in space

[ember narwhal]

The moon itself perhaps?

[tranquil basin]

Yeah it would help

[sinful thicket]

given the insane distances you can float in M1

[tranquil basin]

Though even half gravity would cause significantly weaker bodies

Especially if tau ceti is actually a super earth

[sinful thicket]

strict exercise regimes for all waking bobs

i'd assume the ones in cryo have some in vitro nutrient thing going on that keeps up muscle mass

[tranquil basin]

Also they’d only be able to accelerate for 212 days at 9.8m/s^2 before reaching relativistic speeds

[sinful thicket]

the technology by M1 is weirdly advanced and basic simultaneously

[tranquil basin]

And the max possible speed can’t be more than a few percent the speed of light

[sinful thicket]

cryosleep, teleportation, jjaro biomechanical necromancy, fusion pistols, but FTL? no.

[tranquil basin]

So they couldn’t rely on just their ship’s acceleration for gravity

Oh wait I did the math wrong it’s even shorter

[sinful thicket]

define relativistic in relating to percentage of the speed of light

[tranquil basin]

1%

[sinful thicket]

and at 1% about a century to go 12ly is about right

[tranquil basin]

At that point not only does time get funky enough that it becomes mathematically relevant, but it starts requiring more energy to actually accelerate the same amount than it would have below relativistic speeds

[sinful thicket]

but you have to consider time spent decelerating

[visual lynx]

there was definitely other stuff besides the attack. the cinematic shows three dates with three different catatrophic events happening. I think they are almost certainly Pfhor, S'pht, and Jjaro in origin.

[tranquil basin]

I don’t mean that would be their sustained speed

[visual lynx]

they have space-folding tech of a kind already (jump pads) so artificial gravity is not beyond question.

[sinful thicket]

so while firing the engine at the same force the gravity would start dropping off because they're not accelerating as much any more?

[visual lynx]

also 5D space but that's probably not canonical

[tough scarab]

Does anyone know what to do if I have 7 fps in the game and no settings when I enter a match?

[tranquil basin]

I mean if they were accelerating at 9.8m/s^2 constantly to act as artificial gravity they’d reach the max speed within a few days

[sinful thicket]

what about at half or a quarter of that?

[tranquil basin]

Then it would be 6 days

Or 12

[sinful thicket]

damn

she's fast.

[tranquil basin]

So they’d have to have some other source of artificial gravity