Gadget Mania

The Marathon Trilogy is a science fiction series of first-person shooter computer games from Bungie Software, originally released for the Macintosh. The name Marathon is derived from the fictional giant interstellar colony ship that provides the setting for the first game; the ship is constructed out of what used to be the Martian satellite Deimos. The three games in the series — Marathon (1994), Marathon 2: Durandal (1995), and Marathon Infinity (1996) — are widely regarded as spiritual predecessors of Bungie's Halo trilogy.
Story

Set in 2794, Marathon places the player as a security officer aboard an enormous human starship called the U.E.S.C. Marathon, orbiting a colony on the planet Tau Ceti IV. Throughout the game, the player attempts to defend the ship (and its crew and colonists) from a race of alien slavers called the Pfhor. As he fights against the invaders, he witnesses interactions among the three shipboard AIs (Leela, Durandal and Tycho), and discovers that all is not as it seems aboard the Marathon. Among other problems, Durandal has gone rampant and appears to be playing the humans against the Pfhor to further his own mysterious agenda; ultimately leading the S'pht, one of the races enslaved by the Pfhor, in a rebellion.

Seventeen years after the events of the first game, in Marathon 2: Durandal, the artificial intelligence, Durandal, sends the player and an army of ex-colonists to search the ruins of Lh'owon, the S'pht homeworld. Lh'owon was once described as a paradise but is now a desert world after first the S'pht Clan Wars and then the invasion by the Pfhor. He does not mention what information he is looking for, although he does let it slip that the Pfhor are planning to attack Earth, and that being on Lh'owon may stall their advance. Marathon 2 brings many elements to the game that can be considered staples of the series such as: a Lh'owon-native species known as F'lickta, the mention of an ancient and mysterious race of advanced aliens called the Jjaro, and a clan of S'pht that avoided enslavement by the Pfhor - the S'pht'Kr. At the climax of the game, the player activates Thoth, an ancient Jjaro AI. Thoth then contacts the S'pht'Kr, who in turn destroy the Pfhor armada.

Marathon Infinity, the final game in the series, includes more levels than Marathon 2, which are larger and part of a more intricate plot. The game's code changed little since Marathon 2, and many levels can be played unmodified in both games. The only significant additions to the game's engine were the Jjaro ship, multiple paths between levels, a new rapid-fire weapon that could be used underwater, and vacuum-enabled humans carrying fusion weapons (called "Vacuum Bobs" or "VacBobs"). The player traverses multiple timelines, attempting to find one in which the W'rkncacnter is not freed. In one timeline, the player is forced to destroy Durandal, and in another Durandal merges with Thoth. At the end of the game, an ancient Jjaro machine is activated that keeps the W'rkncacnter locked in the Lh'owon sun.

Elements of the plot and setting of Marathon are similar to The Jesus Incident by Frank Herbert and Bill Ransom. Both stories take place aboard colony ships orbiting Tau Ceti, where sentient computers have engaged crew and colonists in a fight for survival. While Ship in The Jesus Incident has achieved a higher level of omniscient consciousness, Durandal's rampancy parallels the “rogue consciousness” from Herbert's earlier Destination: Void.
Gameplay

Throughout the games the player accesses computer terminals through which he communicates with artificial intelligences, receives mission data, and gets teleported to other levels via "Jump Pads". Though contact with computers is how they are primarily utilized, they are a fundamental storytelling element; some terminals contain civilian/alien reports or diaries, database articles, conversations between artificial intelligences and even stories or poems. Messages may change depending on a player's progress in a certain level. The ultimate goal of most levels is not to merely reach the end but to complete the type(s) of objective(s) specified: extermination of all or specific creatures, exploration of a level or locating an area in the level, retrieving one or more item, hitting a certain "repair" switch, or preventing half of the civilians from being killed (a mission only present in two levels in the first game).

Most levels contain platforms, defined as anything able to change its height. Though it is generally used to describe lifts, doors are included in this category. Doors may or may not show up on the player's automap and are usually opened with the action key. In cases where they are damaged or locked they can be opened by special designated triggers or switches. Switches control various functions such as lifts, doors and lighting and come in the form of manual switches that can be toggled with the action key, stations for computer chips or breakable circuitry. Some switches are "tag" switches that execute multiple functions at once or those that must be activated as part of "repair" missions. Another notable level feature is teleporters, able to send players who use them to different parts of a level or to other levels. Aliens are unable to use them.

As the player combats enemies, he will inevitably take damage and must replenish health by means of special panels that recharge his suit's shields. There are three types of such panels, recharging single (red), double (yellow) or triple (purple) shields. Occasionally a full "colour bar" of shield power can be recharged instantaneously by obtaining a powerup canister.

In Marathon 2 and Marathon Infinity, the player can swim in four different types of media: water, sewage, lava and acid/plasma — the latter two are damaging to health. Levels of the original Marathon did not contain media capable of swimming in. However, some did have floors textured with orange lava or green goo that will inflict damage on the player when standing upon them. When the player is submerged in liquids, the run key can be used in order to swim. In liquids or in "vacuum" areas, the player's oxygen depletes and it must be recharged using a special oxygen recharge station. Should the player lose all oxygen or health, he dies and is sent back to the last pattern buffer (a special terminal that according to the storyline saves molecular data) at which he saved. Because some levels do not have these devices, dying results in having to complete the entire level again.

Gravity is fairly low on some levels, and the correct application of the flamethrower or alien weapon allows the player to hover. "Hopping" with the grenade launcher or rockets can be used, but usually involves a fair amount of damage to the character.

The heads-up display has an inventory, health and oxygen bars, and a motion sensor. The motion sensor displays alien creatures as red triangles and friendly humans or robots as green squares; it tracks their motion relative to the player, represented by a square in the middle whenever the player moves. The brightness of the middle square represents how still the player is and how well he can be tracked. On some levels the motion sensor is erratic due to magnetic artificial gravity fields.

Marathon has five difficulty settings: Kindergarten, Easy, Normal, Major Damage, and Total Carnage. Differences involve the omission of some creatures from each level and creatures marked as minor in the game's physics model are promoted to their major versions or vice versa. On higher difficulty levels, creatures attack more frequently and have more vitality and on the highest setting (Total Carnage), the player is allowed to carry an unlimited amount of ammunition.

The Marathon Trilogy has received wide praise for its multiplayer mode, which was unique in that it not only had several levels specifically designed for multiplayer — as opposed to contemporaries that used modified single-player levels — but also because it offered unique gametypes beyond the deathmatch. Games can be free-for-all or team ordeals, and can be limited by time or number of kills, or they can have no limit whatsoever. The host of a game has the option of setting penalties for suicides and dying (once dead, players cannot be revived for a certain amount of time). The motion sensor (which displays a player's enemies as yellow squares and teammates as green ones) can be disabled and the map is able to show all of the players in the game. Upon the preference of the host, maps can be played with or without aliens. The difficulty level of each game is preset by the gatherer.

Marathon network games can be played over AppleTalk Remote, LocalTalk, TokenTalk, Ethernet, and more recently, a LAN network or the Internet. If a player's computer has a microphone, it is possible to use it to communicate with other players.

Every Man For Himself
This is the standard deathmatch. The winner is the person or team with the greatest score. A player loses a point if he dies but gains a point every time he kills. This is the only gametype present in the original Marathon; Bungie planned on adding the ones included in sequels, but could not due to time constraints.

Cooperative Play
This style of play has players assisting each other in completion of certain levels. Scores are based on percentages of how many aliens they kill. It has received little popularity.

Kill the Man With the Ball
In this game, the objective is to hold the ball (skull) for the longest amount of time. If holding the ball, a player cannot run or attack unless he drops the ball by pressing the "fire" key. The motion sensor, if enabled, acts as a compass to point players in the direction of the ball. This mode was succeeded by the Oddball gametype in the Halo series.

King of the Hill
Players try to stay located in a specially marked area for the longest amount of time. It was originally planned for a pedestal to indicate the location of the Hill but in the final version was indicated by a compass on the motion sensor.

Tag
The first player to be killed becomes "It." If a player is killed by "It," he becomes the new "It." The winner is the player who is "It" for the least amount of time. This might be a predecessor to the Halo gametype "Juggernaut", but in reverse.

Development
First Stages (1994-1999)

Marathon was first released for the Macintosh in 1994 and introduced many concepts now common in mainstream video games. These features included dual-wielded weapons and real-time voice chat in multiplayer sessions. It had the most sophisticated physics modeling built into a game engine up to that time, which allowed for such features as adjustable gravity. The physics could also be altered via fan-made physics files, that could be created with third-party applications and eventually with Anvil, Bungie Software's own official editor. It is also noted for a far more sophisticated plot than had previously been apparent in first-person shooters. The sequel, Marathon 2: Durandal, was released in 1995 and expanded the engine technologies and the story universe. Notable new features in the engine included ambient sounds and liquids that the player could swim through. Compared with its darker predecessor, Marathon 2 has often been perceived to be a brighter, more vivid and more atmospheric game. It introduced several new types of multiplayer modes beyond the deathmatch and cooperative game such as king of the hill. In 1996, the game was ported to Windows 95, and the third game in the trilogy, Marathon Infinity was released for the Macintosh only, built on a slightly modified Marathon 2 engine. The game additionally came with "Forge" and "Anvil", the applications used originally by Bungie Software to create the game's levels, physics, and to import the game's sounds and graphics. Within the next few years, Marathon 2's engine was reused by other developers to create the games ZPC, Prime Target and Damage Incorporated.

Marathon Open Source Project (2000-2004)

Just prior to its acquisition by Microsoft in 2000, Bungie released the source code to the Marathon 2 engine, and the Marathon Open Source project began, resulting in the new Marathon engine called Aleph One.

Aleph One (2005-Present)

The Marathon Open Source Project was renamed, and called, Aleph One. In 2005, Bungie released the full original Mac OS trilogy for free distribution online [1], allowing Aleph One to run the games in the trilogy on any of the supported platforms (Mac OS, Linux and Windows). Marathon 2 was re-released in an updated form as Marathon: Durandal for the Xbox 360's Xbox Live Arcade on August 1, 2007. It features a new HUD that fills less of the screen, support for online play, and optional high-resolution sprites and textures.[1]

While the fundamental technology underlying the Marathon engine is by now considered rather outdated, Aleph One has added significant improvements and a more modern polish to its capabilities and ported it to a wide variety of platforms, bringing Marathon and its derivatives far beyond their Mac roots. Aleph One and the Marathon series of games are unique amongst first-person shooters for their heavy emphasis on storytelling through the use of terminals, which are computer interfaces included within Marathon through which players not only learn and sometimes accomplish mission objectives, but also learn detailed story information about Marathon. The textual form of this communication allows for much richer information conveyance than typically short voice acting in other games.

The Community

The Aleph One Community, is constantly making new things for Marathon. The game lacks certain features such as: Jumping, Decent Graphics, and game problems. The community is constantly making the game better and better even after about 13 Years. Now the community has made addons that feature: The ability to jump, HighRes Graphics, Better Online Gameplay, OpenGL Support, etc.

Online Gaming

With the continual improvement of Aleph One, true online multiplayer was added to the engine. The servers allowing online play are normally hosted by Marius.net
Reception and legacy

The Marathon Trilogy has often been looked upon as a symbol of Macintosh gaming for its innovative technologies previously unseen in mainstream games on the Macintosh platform. It was released to much anticipation and received praise from many reviewers. Marathon entered the market at a time when Doom, a PC game by id Software, was receiving much attention, and despite the fact that Marathon was technologically superior[3], it was by and large eclipsed by its competitor. After Marathon Infinity was released in 1996, players began to create total conversions using Forge and Anvil. These may use custom maps, shapes, sounds or physics files and may or may not be set in the Marathon universe. Such conversions are still created to this day.

Bungie produced a compilation of all three games of the series called the Marathon Trilogy Box Set in 1997. The collection was on two discs. The first contained all three Marathon games as well as Pathways Into Darkness, an earlier Bungie game and the spiritual prequel to the series. This disc also contains manuals for all three games, QuickTime 2.0 and other things necessary to run the game. There are beta versions of Marathon on this disc as well. The second disc of this contains thousands of pieces of user-created content, including maps, total conversions, shape and sound files, cheats, mapmaking tools, physics files, and other applications. The boxed set was also notable for removing copy protection, allowing unlimited network play, and including a license allowing the set to be installed on as many computers at a site as desired.

In January 2000, Bungie released the Marathon 2: Durandal source code under the GPL license. Various projects have continued the legacy of the series by adding enhancements to Bungie's original code, such as Internet play, support for Lua and markup language and large resolutions. The most prominent and developed of these is called Aleph One, which is compatible not only with Macintosh, but with Windows, Linux and even the Sega Dreamcast.

The Marathon Trilogy was finally released as freeware in early 2005, along with Forge and Anvil, although Bungie retained the copyright to the actual game data.[4]

In June 2000, the principals of Bungie sold their company to Microsoft, including the rights to develop the Marathon series[citation needed]; but in October 2007 they split from Microsoft and reacquired the rights.