6 responses so far ↓

• 1 Jamo // Apr 27, 2008 at 4:12 am

  go read the novels, especially the PREQUEL novel. without ruining it for you, he was not a volunteer.

• 2 Dastardly Josh // Apr 28, 2008 at 3:21 pm

  It would be hard to make a game out of the prequel novel, though I’m sure they could go further back to the start of the human/covenant war. That would be a fairly compelling game.
  I’d really like to see Marathon and it’s sequels get a reboot like they’re ding with Bionic Commando Rearmed.

• 3 Norm // Apr 30, 2008 at 11:03 am

  As Jamo said, Master Chief’s origins are well explained in the Halo novel series. Which is not to say that they can’t just turn those stories into a game but I think that’s fairly unlikely.

  Better to create another branch in the Halo universe from which they can pluck succulent franchise millions concurrently with the inevitable Halo 4.

• 4 bean // May 14, 2008 at 2:03 pm

  A prequel to Halo would be pretty fantastic, which would seemingly be a prequel to Halo, and a sequel to Bungie’s first shooter Pathways Into Darkness (the predecessor to Marathon 1) though I’d like to say as a huge fan of the Marathon Trilogy, the story goes a bit deeper than “who is awakened from a cryostasis every time the ship’s AI needs a hero to step up and battle alien evil”.

  Check out the old Marathon Story page if you’re interested: http://marathon.bungie.org/story/

• 5 AEmmott // May 14, 2008 at 4:21 pm

  Much as Penny Arcade joked about Gabe looking for narrative links between the Star Wars universe and the Soul Caliber universe, I think trying force plot connections between Halo and Marathon is a fun exercise, but ultimately canonically false.

  But as a Marathon fan, allow me to geek out:

  First, Halo absolutely could not be a prequel to the Marathon story simply because of the human histories. Yes, humanity is outclassed by the Covenant in Halo, but Marathon begins aboard humankind’s [i]first colony ship ever[/i]. First space ship to ever leave the solar system, for that matter. Somehow I think these people [i]precede[/i] the Pillar of Autumn.

  Ultimately, the only way to make these two universe’s work together is to just put an indefinite number of centuires between the events of Marathon and the events of Halo. At this point Halo would be the sequel to Marathon in much the same way that World War II would be the sequel to Roman conquests.

  Really, the Halo universe was just the Marathon universe reimagined. Halo was “Marathon 4″ in terms of game design, but not in terms of narrative. (That is actually literally true, from the weapons to the multiplayer options - and ultimately this is what the article you linked to was trying to say, but the writer was too fixated on proving its “sequelness” that he forgot to make a cogent argument). IMHO, Halo traded narrative for better gameplay, and in a fashion that made it more marketable.

  The greater structures of the story are similar between the two worlds, and the Halo games, especially the first, are [i]replete[/i] with Marathon in-jokes. But that’s about where the connection ends.

  Realisitically, what happened was this:

  In the mid 90s a smalltime developer named Bungie made a set of games that should of revolutionized the FPS genre. And they knew it too. And their fans knew it. Something all Marathon fans have in common is the agony of trying to convince their friends that this game they were playing blew DOOM out of the freaking water. And not just because it “had a story” too. For the time period, the Marathon games were just better. Period. (Having played them again recently, I feel the gameplay doesn’t quite stand up to modern standards - but what FPS would? And the story is still great). If you don’t believe me, consider that all of the multiplayer options present in Halo were pretty much invented in [i]1995[/i] and weep.

  But these games were released on Mac, so no one noticed. Fair enough.

  Bungie makes some other games, but eventually returns to what they did best - FPS. They go in knowing that the mainstream won’t notice if they just reuse a bunch of material from Marathon, so they airlift every game mechanic in the series that would still count as innovation in 2001 and bring the rest up to modern standards. They reimagine the story, and simplify it greatly so that frat boys won’t be scared away.

  And you have Halo.

  No, if events of the Marathon universe are going to see video game light again, it’s not going to be in a Halo game. Much as they airlifted Marathon’s game mechincs into a different series, it might be interesting if they chose to airlift Marathon’s narrative into another. Maybe remake Marathon as a Mass Effect-like space opera RPG. Expand the universe, fit the story of the entire trilogy into ONE GAME so that it feels epic enough, and set up the die hard fans for what they’ve always wanted: a sequel.

• 6 Ziabatsu // May 14, 2008 at 11:04 pm

  As far as the intro of Marathon. You actually start outside a docking bay after just barely managing to get your shuttle docked and get your Security Officer out of the shuttle bay before Durandal went crazy and depressurized it.

  However Marathon 2 and Marathon i both start with the computer pulling you out of stasis when it needs you.

  It should be noted that The guys at bungie are a big fan of the “Hero of a thousand faces” myth.

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