Subject: Bungie Says: Chill Out From: bungie1@aol.com (BUNGIE1) Date: 1996/03/18 Message-Id: <4iled5$emn@newsbf02.news.aol.com> Sender: root@newsbf02.news.aol.com Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364) Reply-To: bungie1@aol.com (BUNGIE1) Newsgroups: alt.games.marathon Salutations, Mac Gamers- There's been a remarkable outbreak of hostility and confusion online in the last few days, thanks to a single Web page advertising that Marathon 2 is available for Windows 95. I figured I owed it to you all to set a few things straight. To answer the obvious question: yes, we're porting Marathon 2 to Windows 95. Contrary to what's been published on a certain Web site, it is not currently available, and we have yet to set a release date for it. We weren't planning to announce it until later this month, and it's too bad that a certain mail-order house felt it necessary to preempt the official announcement for the sake of grabbing a few pre-orders. We were especially concerned about how this particular product was announced because we were keenly aware that some Mac users might get the wrong idea about us. Now that it's actually happened, I feel compelled to correct the wild speculation which has sprung up on the net. Bungie is NOT abandoning the Mac and has no plans to do so. We love the Mac as much as anyone else. We will always love the Mac. We will continue to develop totally cool games for the Mac. Now these games will start appearing on other platforms. That's all. The hysteria on these newsgroups amazes me. "Bungie's betrayed us...Bungie's abandoning the Mac...we'll get the Mac version of Infinity six months after Windows users have it...To Bungie, we're second-class citizens," etc., etc., ad infinitum. Chill out, folks; NONE of that stuff is true. I can understand that Mac gamers might feel worried after seeing a number of other game companies halt Mac development. The reason other companies stop Mac development is that they don't have a grip on what Mac users want. Bungie does. The lesson here: other game companies don't understand Mac users. Bungie does. Buy your games from Bungie. We did the port for a number of different reasons. Suffice it to say that we have big things in the works, and there's no point in limiting ourselves to any one platform. Great things are afoot at Bungie HQ, and the only difference between Bungie in 1995 and Bungie in 1996 is that Mac users won't be the only ones to enjoy the fruits of our labor. It's a business decision, a logical next step for a company in our position. Loyalty to a particular brand of computer has nothing to do with it. Like I said, there's exciting stuff in the works. We've expanded our office space and hired more programmers. We're confident that the Windows 95 version of Marathon 2 will allow us to grow even larger, and produce even cooler games for Mac users - and others. To recap: Is Bungie porting Marathon 2 to Windows 95? Yes. Is Bungie abandoning Mac development? No. What will this all mean? More cool stuff for game fans everywhere. Hope this is clear. -Matt S. Bungie Software |