Marathon’s future includes duo queues, more PvE modes, and better integration

Since the release of Marathon on March 5, a lot has been written and said about Bungie’s latest shooter. Much of the discourse has been negative, predicting the game’s imminent death due to declining player numbers. Meanwhile, Bungie has said very little about its plans for Marathonother than reiterating his commitment to the game in the long term. That changed this week when the studio published a lengthy blog from game director Joe Ziegler. The post details Bungie’s overall strategy for Marathonstarting with an acknowledgment of the areas where the game fails.

“The marathon is a real challenge to learn,” Ziegler begins. “After a short tutorial, you’re often thrown into the fire to learn a lot of concepts, navigate a lot of screens, filter through a ton of loot, and build muscle memory with a lot of mechanics pretty quickly in a hostile environment where other players can shoot you down and take your stuff.”

Now having almost 50 hours of experience MarathonI can attest that the first five to ten were confusing and not very fun. But as Ziegler notes, there are other issues, including matchmaking, the endgame combat sandbox, and the fact that Marathon not really suitable for players who just want to play a relaxing match or two. To address these shortcomings and more, Ziegler says Bungie will pursue a dual strategy.

Let’s start with the second part of this strategy since it’s the one designed to solve the biggest problems in the game currently. “We want to evolve Marathon as a whole to become an experience where you can find new ways to play when you’re stressed from a hard race and just need to refresh or have stress-free fun,” says Ziegler. To that end, Bungie plans to introduce two new experimental game modes during the second season. The first will be “more focused” on PVE, “with a slight touch of PVP”. The second will exclusively pit players against environmental threats like the UESC, and will see you and your friends working with other players to complete objectives.

Beyond that, Bungie plans to introduce a rotating queue in Duos zones, so that when you just want to play with a single friend, you aren’t forced to face teams of three. During the third season, the studio hopes to improve The marathon runners integration “to make it less painful for new players”.

As for the other part of the studio’s strategy, Bungie will be doubling down on things that already work in Marathon. This includes its compelling sci-fi setting. It’s worth noting that Bungie is working on a new zone “that relies on more alien elements and warping debuffs.” He’s also working on a new exfiltration mechanic that will offer players a tradeoff between the amount of loot they can take out of the area and their safety during the match. One of the coolest things about Marathon These are all the little mysteries that Bungie has hidden in the game’s environments and Codex entries. The fact that the studio plans to further explore these aspects of the game is promising.

Some of Bungie’s planned changes will roll out during Marathon’s second season, which begins on June 2. Further changes will take the studio more time, but the blog makes it clear that it has a roadmap that will see active development of the game continue until 2027. Marathon has a difficult road ahead. Sony recently took a $560 million writedown on Bungie’s assets. Although the console maker has yet to release sales figures for Marathonhe said he remains committed to the game. Hopefully Bungie will have enough time to build on The marathon runners promising basis.