Screenshot by Destructoid
Danger vs. reward, solo vs. group, rat vs. sweat. It is all right here.
We’re lastly about two months away from Marathon’s launch, and I’m starting to fall for the hype.
Bungie’s Marathon is an extraction shooter like Escape From Tarkov or ARC Raiders, but it surely places a twist on it with class-based characters referred to as Runner Shells. These Shells have tide-turning talents like Triage, which might heal allies, or Thief, who can use a drone to steal loot from different gamers. However I feel the largest addition to the sport is a Shell referred to as Rook.
A brand new Developer Insights video launched right now highlighted Rook, which was not current in the course of the recreation’s maligned alpha exams final 12 months. That is described as a Scavenger class that doesn’t get to carry any of its personal loot into the sport, and it’s mainly the massively widespread ARC Raiders‘ free loadout.
One of many downsides of extraction shooters (whereas additionally being one in all its fundamental attracts) is that many gamers on the informal finish don’t need to lose their gear, or typically they simply need to play with out a lot consequence. The free loadout in ARC Raiders, and now, I feel, Rook in Marathon, are good for that and an enormous draw for newer followers of the style vs. weathered veterans who yearn for realism and hazard.
Choosing Rook will spawn you right into a match already in progress, and it’ll at all times be a solo expertise. “You threat nothing, and something you’re taking out is yours to maintain,” stated Bungie’s Runner crew lead Kevin Yanes. And you already know what? Hell yeah. Shedding my stuff sucks. Let me hold my stuff with little threat concerned.
And I do know I’m not the one participant who feels this fashion. ARC Raiders giving gamers the possibility to threat nothing whereas doubtlessly gaining some cool stuff has been an enormous attract that recreation, and the primary motive why I’ve had a lot enjoyable with it, too. I’m not a hardcore extraction participant, and neither are the overwhelming majority of players that Marathon is attempting to focus on.
If you wish to sweat it out in a bunch of mates, then Marathon has that, too. Weapon and sophistication mods, together with higher weapons and equipment, are yours for the taking, and if you wish to take care of another sweaty gamers or hardcore PvE endgame foes, then you definately’ll want to take action. However having the choice to at all times fall again on Rook is essential, and I feel it may find yourself being one of many fundamental options that helps the sport discover its footing.

I do not know if Marathon might be a industrial or monetary success, however I do assume that Bungie has been saying and doing a variety of constructive issues since final 12 months’s alpha take a look at left a bitter style in gamers’ mouths. Let’s hope the complete recreation realizes that form of potential when it comes out someday in March.
Revealed: Jan 15, 2026 11:58 am