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[Sohurmk833]

Welcome to upside down world, where the 'fascists' point and laugh at the corporations and the 'socialists' go to bat for them.

Who knows, maybe GAF was the real socialist safe space, after all? Where you could still criticise a billion-dollar corporate entity without facing **checks notes"" 'Nuremberg-style trials'.

The blackrock founded socialists of Reeesetera and their California millionaire friends. The world has never seen a group standing more for the common people.

 

[Thebonehead]

That forum is curated toxicity

 

[icecold1983]

The way this is trending, Im confident I was right. This will be a 5-10k concurrent user game within a few months,

 

[PeteBull]

When you you think Bungie ends development on Marathon?

If we take ending of development as leaving skeleton crew only and no meaningful updates, then it very likely will end in under a year after launch.
All good tho by then horizon 600lbs gaas will be brand newly launched so u will have branch to jump on, or in case of one of its characters 200yo tree's trunk

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

You live in a parallel reality, where is this compelling genre you're talking about, it's an in-game mode stretched to its limit to serve as a new genre and it's not pulling the numbers to be called compelling at all, this ain't BR and Bungie is not serving first in this race to win over mainstream popularity

Marathon is a mistake

Just tell me when you think Bungie is going to end development. You almost sound...afraid.

 

[CentralScrutinizer]

I always knew I'd be taken out by firing squad.

 

[EN250]

Just tell me when you think Bungie is going to end development. You almost sound...afraid.

Afraid of what man? Lmao, I didn't bet on this failure, what are you talking about...

I don't know when it's going to happen, I only know if there is not a substantial player base and you know, trending upward not down like it's doing theses days, it's going to get shutdown at some point

In 3 days it'll be a month since release, if it's not gaining new people now, it's not gonna happen later...

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

Afraid of what man? Lmao, I didn't bet on this failure, what are you talking about...

I don't know when it's going to happen, I only know if there is not a substantial player base and you know, trending upward not down like it's doing theses days, it's going to get shutdown at some point

In 3 days it'll be a month since release, if it's not gaining new people now, it's not gonna happen later...

You're afraid of Marathon and the genre itself. It's plain as day to see.

The longer Bungie works on Marathon, the more it has a chance to turn it around. I can hear it in your voice.

Extraction is the omega genre. We all know it, though some are not willing to say it out loud.

 

[Von Hugh]

You're afraid of Marathon and the genre itself. It's plain as day to see.

The longer Bungie works on Marathon, the more it has a chance to turn it around. I can hear it in your voice.

Extraction is the omega genre. We all know it, though some are not willing to say it out loud.

 

[Zacfoldor]

Edit: Also wiping faction progression is a mistake. Does anyone really want to do that again?

 

[cormack12]

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

In 3 days it'll be a month since release, if it's not gaining new people now, it's not gonna happen later...

I just think the only people who say things like this are stuck in 2008.

Marathon is essentially an early access game. If you look at the history of Live Service titles you'll see development impacts player population to large degree. Marathon definitely needs help, and it may never get it, but you people are wetting your pants at what further development might lead to.

You doth protest too much.

 

[Timberwolf25]

I just think the only people who say things like this are stuck in 2008.

Marathon is essentially an early access game. If you look at the history of Live Service titles you'll see development impacts player population to large degree. Marathon definitely needs help, and it may never get it, but you people are wetting your pants at what further development might lead to.

You doth protest too much.

You do know April Fools Day was yesterday right?

 

[The Mad Draklor]

Marathon is essentially an early access game.

So Bungie is utterly incompetent.

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

You do know April Fools Day was yesterday right?

It's not rational to think my position is anything but reasonable.

Marathon is in trouble (we agree), but Bungie has reems of new, high quality data to right the ship and likely a runway to be able to do it.

Most of the people in this thread still don't understand the "A delayed game is eventually good, a bad game is bad forever" quote and how it applies in modern games.

So Bungie is utterly incompetent.

No, it's just that you don't understand Live Service and what continued development looks like.

 

[CentralScrutinizer]

No, it's just that you don't understand Live Service and what continued development looks like.

And Bungie does? At this point it's safe to say Destiny was a fluke because they've done nothing but prove they have no idea what they're doing for years.

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

And Bungie does? At this point it's safe to say Destiny was a fluke because they've done nothing but prove they have no idea what they're doing for years.

Agree to disagree.

 

[CuNi]

Marathon is essentially an early access game.

IMHO the term "early access" should only be allowed for indie sized and AA at max studios.
If you are a 100+ developer studio, you have no right to release a unfinished game

 

[The Mad Draklor]

No, it's just that you don't understand Live Service and what continued development looks like.

Look like absolute shit then.

But please, do go on with signal boosting this thread over the OT.

 

[falconhoof]

 

[Mondai]

You guys are just jell ass that this game be BLASTIN

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

IMHO the term "early access" should only be allowed for indie sized and AA at max studios.
If you are a 100+ developer studio, you have no right to release a unfinished game

The term is not relevant. Continued work is what's important here.

But please, do go on with signal boosting this thread over the OT.

Please God, never give me a burden so large that it results in me caring about signal boosting certain message board threads over others.

 

[BurningNad]

Holy shit. That's actually crazy.

Personally, I was always interested in Hunt, I've owned it since probably 2021 or so, and was always kind of I guess intimidated to give it a shot. I think playing Marathon has gotten me over that intimidation and I might actually give Hunt a real shot now lol.

That being said I DON'T want Marathon to fail. I'd like a bunch of stuff to change but I feel like it can exist. I know the fact that it's GAAS means it's been written off by many people forever no matter what, but I'm not as against it as others are. I'm still playing it, but I've kind of cooled down on it. Waiting for the new shell and maps to start coming through.

 

[Plague Doctor]

Bear in mind that for Marathon it should still be in the new thing honeymoon phase. Hunts been around.

200+ million to develop. 3.6 billion to acquire.

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

Now compare it to Hunt launch aligned.

 

[The Mad Draklor]

Please God, never give me a burden so large that it results in me caring about signal boosting certain message board threads over others.

Yes, yes. Keep going with the copium.

 

[Fake]

 

[CuNi]

Holy shit. That's actually crazy.

Personally, I was always interested in Hunt, I've owned it since probably 2021 or so, and was always kind of I guess intimidated to give it a shot. I think playing Marathon has gotten me over that intimidation and I might actually give Hunt a real shot now lol.

That being said I DON'T want Marathon to fail. I'd like a bunch of stuff to change but I feel like it can exist. I know the fact that it's GAAS means it's been written off by many people forever no matter what, but I'm not as against it as others are. I'm still playing it, but I've kind of cooled down on it. Waiting for the new shell and maps to start coming through.

To be fair, to me it feels like Hunt was better before they ported it to the new CryEngine.
The UI since then has been awful and all that Dev-Time did nothing since they barely implemented any of the features they promised and said are a reason they need to do the port.
I really hope it gets something like a second wind as I really enjoyed that game, but I'd need to see things like "Match-Map" implemented first before giving it a shot again.
Also, IMHO not a big fan of the bullet drop.

 

[HeisenbergFX4]

It's not rational to think my position is anything but reasonable.

Marathon is in trouble (we agree), but Bungie has reems of new, high quality data to right the ship and likely a runway to be able to do it.

Most of the people in this thread still don't understand the "A delayed game is eventually good, a bad game is bad forever" quote and how it applies in modern games.


No, it's just that you don't understand Live Service and what continued development looks like.

I truly hope you are getting reimbursed somehow by Bungie for all this effort you are putting forth

 

[Bernardougf]

I truly hope you are getting reimbursed somehow by Bungie for all this effort you are putting forth

I think the only thing more embarrassing for Bungie aside Marathon is having this lunatic as their biggest simp.

 

[Majima Everywhere System]

Holy shit. That's actually crazy.

Personally, I was always interested in Hunt, I've owned it since probably 2021 or so, and was always kind of I guess intimidated to give it a shot. I think playing Marathon has gotten me over that intimidation and I might actually give Hunt a real shot now lol.

That being said I DON'T want Marathon to fail. I'd like a bunch of stuff to change but I feel like it can exist. I know the fact that it's GAAS means it's been written off by many people forever no matter what, but I'm not as against it as others are. I'm still playing it, but I've kind of cooled down on it. Waiting for the new shell and maps to start coming through.

Now show Marathon and Division 2, the gentleman's game.

 

[calico]

The games 'press' is all in on trying to salvage this situation and it appears to be having no noticeable impact.

 

[rkofan87]

When you you think Bungie ends development on Marathon?

I'm going to give them a little bit of leeway 6 months to a year

 

[sodstall]

Now compare it to Hunt launch aligned.

IMHO the term "early access" should only be allowed for indie sized and AA at max studios.
If you are a 100+ developer studio, you have no right to release a unfinished game

Tarkov along with its "1.0" launch doesn't get brought up enough regarding these topics

 

[Fake]

Its just a matter of time now...

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

I'm going to give them a little bit of leeway 6 months to a year

Yeah, I'm in the same boat. If they can't figure it out in that time frame, it probably wasn't meant to be.

 

[falconhoof]

Now compare it to Hunt launch aligned.

As you wish. I added Division 2 in there as well.

Dunno what we're supposed to take from that though. Hunt didn't exactly release to the world with a massive publicity push. I can line it up to Arc release as well if you want?

 

[Cakeboxer]

Its just a matter of time now...

They havt to react somehow, the question is what they're going to do. Discount? PS+? F2P on all platforms? Just pull the plug entirely? The game does seem to have a small fanbase.

 

[mdkirby]

Unfortunately for not fault of bungie or marathon this game/studio became the pinnacle of the gaas strategy/push by Sony ... for Sony fans pissed about this whole thing and feeling that this strategy fucked up this gen (which it did) seeing marathon fail is the ultimate "boss" .. it would be the final nail on the coffin of sony gaas shift.

If this will hold true or not .. it remains to be seen.. but the ill feeling towards marathon comes from the idea that if it fails, gaas fails, sony push fails... its over. And then Sony can comeback to its former self.

100%
I'm so sick of seeing so many studios wasted on Gaas slop, much of it immediately flops, much of it cancelled before release. This terrible chasing greed has ruined countless studios, many sacrificed on its alter, many thousands of job losses and lives ruined…and that's before you even get into the endless crunch it creates at the games that succeed, or the grossly exploitative addictions these games prey on.

Burn it all to the ground. The whole thing is an abomination that is destroying the industry, and the lives of developers and the public alike.

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

Dunno what we're supposed to take from that though. Hunt didn't exactly release to the world with a massive publicity push. I can line it up to Arc release as well if you want?

It depends on what your goal is.

If you want to dunk on Marathon you'd compare it to ARC Raiders. If you want to provide more interesting context, you'd compare it to Hunt.

Hunt shows you two things that are more informative.

1. That a low number one month after release isn't a death sentence - updates & improvements do build player populations.

2. Marathon should probably be 2x of what Hunt does. That's about what they need to shoot for.

But you could also compare ARC Raiders to Roblox if you think that's informative too.

 

[Mortisfacio]

As you wish. I added Division 2 in there as well.

Dunno what we're supposed to take from that though. Hunt didn't exactly release to the world with a massive publicity push. I can line it up to Arc release as well if you want?

Division 2 isn't as fair, though. The game launched on Steam almost 4 years after it came out.

 

[falconhoof]

It depends on what your goal is.

If you want to dunk on Marathon you'd compare it to ARC Raiders. If you want to provide more interesting context, you'd compare it to Hunt.

Hunt shows you two things that are more informative.

1. That a low number one month after release isn't a death sentence - updates & improvements do build player populations.

2. Marathon should probably be 2x of what Hunt does. That's about what they need to shoot for.

But you could also compare ARC Raiders to Roblox if you think that's informative too.

All we can really do is follow the current trend. We don't know what Sony's goals are for the project because they haven't told us. We can make informed ideas about it, which would be to be above a certain threshold, though that number is high guess work.

We can look at other, possibly, similar projects to see what their expectations were. Such as Anthem where it failed to meet EA's sales expectations, and though that didn't outright kill the game, it certainly deprioritized it and put it on watch, with Anthem 2.0 being the hail Mary attempted at resuscitating it.

I have strong doubts that Marathon performing today the same as Hunt is what Sony would like to see. I'm going to guess that Marathon cost the same/similar/more than Arc, and much more than Hunt did, certainly by launch.

What I'd like to be is informed of the state of Marathon in 2026 as it exists in the realm of GaaS such that when we get news about it from Sony/Bungie we can feel like we understand more about what that news is.

It also gives us the chance to question when news isn't delivered. Such as why has there been no press release about number of copies sold? or the usual other metrics scooped up and dumped out by marketing. Best we got was the NPC kill tracker which under performed based on their own metrics. And if that was a bullshit number, then I question why Bungie didn't decide to bullshit it in other direction, award a 10:1 kill ratio to make the game seem like a massive success? I'm going to assume the number was real and Bungie were being honest about their failure to hit targets.

 

[falconhoof]

Division 2 isn't as fair, though. The game launched on Steam almost 4 years after it came out.

I know, I'm entertaining Boxy Boy. My reason for showing numbers was to show what players are doing today. In the world of extraction games players can only play one game at a time. So what does the the entire extraction player base spread look like. It would be good to add all of them in and see how the pie is sliced.

 

[OuterLimits]

Marathon has become reliant on U.S. now to make the top 50.

Meanwhile Arc Raiders is #9 with 138k around European peak times while Marathon is #66 with 25k players.

 

[Men_in_Boxes]

All we can really do is follow the current trend. We don't know what Sony's goals are for the project because they haven't told us. We can make informed ideas about it, which would be to be above a certain threshold, though that number is high guess work.

We can look at other, possibly, similar projects to see what their expectations were. Such as Anthem where it failed to meet EA's sales expectations, and though that didn't outright kill the game, it certainly deprioritized it and put it on watch, with Anthem 2.0 being the hail Mary attempted at resuscitating it.

I have strong doubts that Marathon performing today the same as Hunt is what Sony would like to see. I'm going to guess that Marathon cost the same/similar/more than Arc, and much more than Hunt did, certainly by launch.

What I'd like to be is informed of the state of Marathon in 2026 as it exists in the realm of GaaS such that when we get news about it from Sony/Bungie we can feel like we understand more about what that news is.

It also gives us the chance to question when news isn't delivered. Such as why has there been now press release about number of copies sold? or the usual other metrics scooped up and dumped out by marketing. Best we got was the NPC kill tracker which under performed based on their own metrics. And if that was a bullshit number, then I question why Bungie didn't decide to bullshit it in other direction, award a 10:1 kill ratio to make the game seem like a massive success? I'm going to assume the number was real and Bungie were being honest about their failure to hit targets.

All this is reasonable.

The ignorance of NeoGAF does not come from the idea that Marathon is struggling. Everyone is basically in agreement there.

The ignorance of NeoGAF comes from the idea that week 4 numbers are a death sentence.

Marathon is not like Concord, 2XKO, Spectre Divide, Highguard etc... There are games that struggle at launch and have relatively few creative directions to go because their formulas are so restrictive. Marathon does not suffer from that. It benefits from being in the genre of the future. Sony knows this.

I'm also of the opinion that Marathon is an Extraction x Arena Shooter hybrid with no SBMM. Arena Shooters demand SBMM. Imo, this is likely something that will get fixed within the next month or so. Personally, I won't start sweating the continued player drop until I see that aspect fixed. We all know how important SBMM is.

There's also a real difference between closed playtests and early access. Bungie is getting much better information post launch than they were pre launch because the game is now subject to real market forces.

The parade is simply being thrown way too soon.

 

[ChorizoPicozo]

4B company btw

 

[Go_Ly_Dow]

Subbing to this thread because it feels like the end is nigh.

 

[Kronark]

As we approach 100 pages on this thread, I just want to thank everyone for the experience. This thread has been quite the ride.

GaaS GaaS GaaS!

 

[StreetsofBeige]

Didnt get around to updating numbers last night as I went to bed early. But yesterday, peak was 32.8k vs 33.8k (-1k or -3%)

4 pm EST completed hour
(All time peak was launch day 88k)

Compared to yesterday (Thu vs Wed): 28.2k vs 25.5k (+2.7k or +10%)

Yesterday's peak 32.8k. If the rate holds, peak tonight will be 36k

Yesterday's low 10.5k. If the rate holds, low tonight will be 11.5k

Looks life Cryo day popped the users! First cryo day was +18%, last week was +2.5%, so far today +10%

Steam Rankings
Daily Active Users 61
Global Top Sellers 54
Weekly Top Sellers 32 (was 26 last week)
Top Rated Games 5352 (84.90%)

Dropping fast. DAU at 61

 

[diffusionx]

4B company btw

Why is every post on X immediately followed by a series of erm akshully posts

I know a likely Xbox shill posted this but it's undeniable