Story
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Marathon's Story Page
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Tired of reading the Story page the old fashioned way?
 Well Mason Mulford <mason.mulford@gmail.com> may have the answer. He writes:
"I made a pdf of your terminals for Marathon 1 and some of the articles about the game. I made it to be compatible with my kindle, but it would probably be compatible with most things." Mason provided more information in a post on r/marathon. He writes:
"I have created a PDF ebook compatible version of the Marathon Story Terminals for the first game. This is a sort of first draft, but it is mostly done and contains the terminals for ~100 pgs and another ~100 pgs of appendix with additional reading for context followed by links. Everything was taken from Hamish Sinclair's website..." You can get it here. Now you have no excuse for not reading Marathon's Story on your summer vacation.
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"I'm back."
 Dan Storm VO See below for a listing of the recordings added today.
Curiouser and Curiouser... (Terminal 2: 2nd Message) Clean version.
Dan has recorded one Marathon terminal. The famous
'three candles' foreshadowing terminal on
Colony Ship For Sale, Cheap.
One of my favorites. You can listen to it below.  |
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"TECH SUPPORT. Casual office seeks person to answer phones, email. Must know Mac, games a plus. Call Doug at (312)..."
Yes folks, on this day twenty years ago Matt Soell left Bungie! Bungie had lost their 'soul' but as Matt repeatedly points out:
"The last name is spelled "Soell" and pronounced SELL. It's a silent "O". You would be surprised how many people have trouble learning and understanding this." Matt joined Bungie on January 16, 1995. He had the good fortune of spotting a Help Wanted ad in the Chicago Reader for Tech Support a few weeks earlier, landed a job interview with Alexander Seropian and was hired. According to Matt's semi-autobiography:
"My job was pretty simple at first: man the phone lines. Seemingly everyone and their parents had ordered a copy of Marathon; very few of them had received it. Those who had often found themselves confounded by the installation process. I found myself talking almost non-stop from the time I got in to the moment I left. At the time Bungie only had three phone lines and an ass-backwards phone system that dumped customers straight into voice mail if Doug or I didn't pick up the phone in three rings or less. I had plenty to do. Matt became "The Man in the Online Asbestos Suit", inheriting the title from Doug Zartman. Doug was now free to contemplate his existence in metaphorical terms.
 Matt Soell and Doug Zartman
But all things must come to an end. A few days before he departed he left a message on the Bungie Webcam that only a few of us would understand.
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"...about three meters."
I have devised a little game for you to play: If you win, you go free, and we continue our relationship on friendlier terms. If you lose, you die. In the final release this was changed and "Freedom" became the track used on "Shake Before Using...". Perhaps Alexander Seropian had a fondness for this track and wanted to use it on his own level. But I digress. Jeoku continues his in-depth playthrough of Marathon with the Alexander Seropian level Shake Before Using..., the second and last level of the Reprisal Chapter. Sources in the video include:
This is a short video for Jeoku, just under 30 minutes, reflecting the fact that the level itself is short and somewhat linear. Once you learn that it is designed around a series of traps and know how to overcome them it is really not a hard level. In its earlier incarnation as "Cryogenic Laboratory" it appears to have been a more complicated level with multiple paths intersecting the main rooms. Oddly, Alexander Seropian had nothing to say about this level when asked during the writing of the Marathon Scrapbook. We will have to leave the last words to his map writing... I RULE. |
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Happy Marathon CD Announcement Day!
On this day 28 years ago Bungie officially announced the Marathon CD. Apart from the game the CD would also include:
"...a smorgesbord of shareware enhancements that multiply the life of the game and its entertainment value." Expected release date was May 1, 1995. Jason Jones had stated that a CD version of the game was coming as far back as January 1995. In the 1st eWorld Conference on January 10, 1995, Jason stated:
"marathon should be out on CD soon, and all our products from now on will be shipping on CD and disk." When asked if the CD version would ship with any enhancements, he replied:
"initially the CD version will be a duplicate of the disk version, but I'd eventually love to see 16-bit source art on the CD version (hmmm...) " Well I guess we would have to wait and see what was on the CD. Oddly, Bungie's CD announcement stated that we would enjoy:
"...all 45 minutes of Marathon's original digital soundtrack." By no stretch of the imagination is the original Marathon soundtrack 45 minutes long... or is it? I'll let the Marathon music gurus work out how that figure was arrived at. What was actually on the CD is a story for another day!
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"Otherwise we get into the realm of alternate realities and stuff like that, which would probably be as much of a pain for us as it would be for you."
Yes folks, on this day 27 years ago Bungie released the first screenshot for Marathon Infinity. Actually they released two. One from the scenario "Blood Tides of Lh'owon" and one from Forge, Bungie's Map Editor. You can see both screenshots on Bungie's original Marathon Infinity web page. You won't find this on the Wayback Machine. This had to be retrieved the hard way, the Marathon way.
 But I digress. Bungie's Infinity page also announced:
"Blood Tides of Lh'owon", a 20-level scenario with new textures, landscapes, monsters and startling developments in the Marathon story. Plus a gaggle of awesome new net levels." This was different from what Bungie had said previously when they announced that Marathon Infinity would be a 30-level scenario. You can read what Matt Soell had to say about this apparent discrepancy. The "Blood Tides of Lh'owon" screenshot caused quite a stir at the time. New textures and new Bobs packing fusion power.
 You can read some discussion about this screenshot on the Official Marathon Screenshots section. And here is the full screenshot.
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"You have many questions, and although the process has altered your consciousness, you remain irrevocably human. Ergo, some of my answers you will understand, and some of them you will not. Concordantly, while your first question may be the most pertinent, you may or may not realize it is also the most irrelevant."
In an attempt to find out DiscoAlchemist on r/marathon has been keeping detailed notes as he plays. He writes:
"Infinity is the first game that forced me to take notes to understand the story." You can see a few of his pages below:
 Click image to enlarge
 Click image to enlarge
 Click image to enlarge
What happens in Marathon Infinity? To this list we must add those who document their playthroughs... the Documentors .
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"i'm posting the binhex'd BBQ film in it's own thread. i hope that everyone agrees after watching it that luck played no part in this replay."
The film was preserved on The Marathon Vidmasters' Page and later converted to a YouTube video on the VidmasterChallenge YouTube channel. You can see Jason's video here. While Jason cut the original recording short to keep the size down the opening is classic twisting, turning, dodging and berserking Vidmaster style. We will never know if Jason kept enough Bobs alive to satisfy Leela. But knowing Jason I would say... But I digress. Jeoku continues his in-depth playthrough of Marathon with the Jason Jones level Bob-B-Q, the first level of the Reprisal Chapter. Sources in the video include:
Oddly in the video Jeoku incorrectly attributes a quote by Jason Jones to an interview in the book 'Tricks of the Mac Game Programming Gurus'. The quote is actually from the unabridged version of the Marathon Scrapbook. You know... the one that had most of the pages ripped out so it could fit into the box.
 You can find the original quote here. Highlights in the video include the quirkiness of 5D level design, a way to beat the game successfully during normal game play by grenade jumping, an insane 22 second speed run of the level by aperturegrillz and last but not least... Jeoku getting jammed in behind a barrel. To paraphrase Jason Jones:
JEOKU-JAM? APPLY GRENADES LIBERALLY!! Confused? Then watch the video. |
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"I never figured out the EGG. It really spooked me out the first time I saw it though..."
On this day of days it is traditional to hunt of Easter eggs. Indeed you can now hide an Easter egg anywhere in the world. But Marathon fans don't hunt for Easter eggs, they hunt for the elusive 13th Pfhor Egg.
 According to J. Reginald Dujour, who did the art & graphics for Marathon, the Pfhor eggs were "incubation bubbles" and were originally designed to be breakable but lack of time prevented this feature from being implemented. But where did Reg hide the 13th Pfhor Egg? |
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Happy PowerPC Pathways Demo Day!
Yes folks, on this day a long... long... time ago...Bungie released a PowerPC version of the Pathways into Darkness demo along with a v1.1 to v2.0 updater for the full game. This added texture-mapped floors and ceilings, and higher frame rates to the game if you had a PowerPC Macintosh. On the subject of old PowerPC Macintosh hardware YouTuber "65scribe" (aka Jay Kells) writes concerning his video mentioned in this news item posted a few days ago.
"I had done a couple of humour bits with 'Marathon: Nineteen Eighty-Four' and Marathon + the Hindenburg Disaster newsreel in previous videos, so there was some expectation from viewers who are fans of the trilogy, for a more dedicated video."
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Happy Blood Tides of Lh'owon Day!
On this day 27 years ago Bungie revealed the title of the upcoming Marathon Infinity scenario. Their new web site announced on April 5, 1996:
- "Blood Tides of Lh'owon", a 30-level scenario with new textures, landscapes, monsters and startling developments in the Marathon story. Up to this point the only information about Marathon Infinity was contained in the Macworld Expo Toyko announcement from February 22, 1996 and this email from Matt Soell (Bungie Software). According to the Marathon Scrapbook (page 27):
Alex Seropian asked Doug to come up with a title for the scenario: "...something cool, like 'Blood Tides of Lh'owon'." Doug came up with dozens of names, but none of them were quite as evocative as "Blood Tides of Lh'owon," so it stuck. Here's the full story from Doug Zartman (DZ) from the unabridged version of the Marathon Scrapbook.
After the marsh wars between S'pht'Lhar and S'pht'Mnr left the battlefields choked with dead, the marsh graves full- High above K'lia refused to see the carnage upon Lh'owon. She fled to the farthest reach, leaving the sacred marsh dry from the falling tides. As the water receded, the red sand of the dead, spread across Lh'owon.
Written in 1919 in the aftermath of World War I the poem describes the horror and chaos of that time and the hope of a Second Coming. It is considered a major work of modernist poetry and often quoted in mainstream entertainment. Part of the first stanza reads:
Things fall apart; the center cannot hold; Nathaniel went on to suggest that...
"...the whole poem seems to outline the plight of the S'pht at the time of the attack by the Pfhor." However, there is a twist in the poem. Rather than the Second Coming of a saviour, a beast with a "gaze blank and pitiless as the sun" is coming. Something to think about. Happy Blood Tides of Lh'owon Day! |
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Thanks to all those who pointed out this new video on YouTube by Apple Macintosh aficionado '65scribe' (aka Jay Kells).
In framing the background to his video 65scribe writes:
"In this final(?) episode, I find an excuse to talk about Marathon. With all original approaches to discuss this game already done on YouTube, this video tells my personal story with Marathon. I go on to expose shocking misinformation about Bungie's inspiration for Halo. The video starts out with an amusing look at some of the quirks in the Marathon Demo 0.0 and goes on to discuss how the Marathon games introduced new concepts to the FPS genre. Most of the video however is taken up by attempts to correct YouTube misconceptions about which games influenced Halo. As readers of the Story page know... trying to correct people on the internet is like trying to stop the Pfhor from using the trih xeem . It's just not going to work.
 Nevertheless 65scribe goes about it in a humorous way using clips from Monty Python's Life of Brian to evoke the slavish devotion people have for the opinions of the YouTube intelligentsia. Aahhh, life in the glorious 21th century. I leave the last word to Clint Eastwood.
The Dead Pool (1988)
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Now's your chance to own your very own Ling-Ling's Head t-shirt.
 Front. Click the image to enlarge.
 Back. Click the image to enlarge. That's right! There's one for sale on eBay right now for $700. No kidding.
Ironically Bungie first introduced fans to Ling-Ling's Head on the eve of announcing the porting of Marathon 2: Durandal to Windows 95 four years earlier. (circumstances are cyclical)
 
 Front. Click the image to enlarge.
 Front. Click the image to enlarge. It's important to note that this is not an official Bungie t-shirt. It is a fan made t-shirt. It was available for sale via the bungie.org website back in July 10, 2001. |
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A number of people have pointed out that you can read part of the [EXPLETIVE DELETED] letter
to the Bungie Webmaster (yesterday's news item) in uncensored form in the Chicago Reader's "Monsters in a Box" article
published in March 2000. You can see the full article in the Blasts from the Past section here.
Parental discretion required!
The article was actually the cover story for that issue of the Chicago Reader.
 Image courtesy of Doug Zartman. Click the image to enlarge.
There is some discussion about the article in this Story forum post. Some familiar names in there. Paul Russel had this to say about the group shot on the front page.
"I remember the article being about the Myth team, but the editor used the blam! team photo because we were "more photogenic". " Here's a pic of the actual Myth II team.
 The Myth II team and the late-night Bungie crew pose with the Myth II Gold Master CD. Shot taken at midnight on December 10, 1998. Tuncer Deniz (Project Leader) holds the Gold Master CD. |
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"You're gonna die, [EXPLETIVE DELETED]! I'm comin' outta the booth!"
WTF? Yes folks, on this day 27 years ago Bungie officially announced that Marathon 2: Durandal would be ported to Windows 95. Bungie's new web site also carried the announcement. Ling-Ling's Head proudly announced:
 NEW!! Find out about the upcoming Marathon 2 for Windows 95!
In truth the
"SAY IT AIN'T SO, BUNGIE!"
"We had planned to make the announcement of the M2 Windows 95 port at the end of the month, to coincide with the Computer Game Developer's Conference. I had planned to deliver my promised announcement to the Mac game newsgroups around the same time.
The 3rd round of letters to the Bungie WebMaster in May 1996 contained the following letter from a rather disgruntled fan.
"You [EXPLETIVE DELETED] [EXPLETIVE DELETED]s have gone and done it now. You said you wouldn't create Marathon for PC. [EXPLETIVE DELETED] liars! What have I to hold above the PC gamer's heads now, huh you [EXPLETIVE DELETED]s?!?!
It is no surprise that Bungie immortalised the whole Win95 affair in the acronym on the bottom of the Marathon Infinity box.
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"...if you were to save the image of Ling-Ling's Head, BinHex it five times and open up the resulting file with HexEdit, who knows what sort of secret message you might find?"
The what? Yes folks, on this day 27 years ago Bungie unveiled their 3rd web site and introduced us to Ling-Ling's Head.
Oddly, Bungie made no official announcement about their new web site it just appeared on Friday March 29, 1996... Phhht! Just like that. How do we know it was Friday March 29, 1996? Well Claude Errera did a little bit of detective work to establish the most likely date the site went live. Bungie had in fact taken over development of their own web site replacing the Marathon-focused one created by Art & Science in October 1995. Gone were the bandwidth consuming server-push Marathon animations and in their place were images of a rather mangy looking dog's head. This was the Age of Ling-Ling. The banner on the main page featured Ling-Ling's Head and was used to announce upcoming Bungie products and events.
Ling-Ling's Head brings news of upcoming Bungie products:
Bungie had taken back control and where about to unleash... But I am getting 'ahead' of myself. Today is Happy Ling-Ling Day!
 The original Ling-Ling (1994). |
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All of this is stated somewhere in the game (though some of it is on hidden terminals).
So fans needed to develop the technology to find this stuff. Greg Kirkpatrick was going full 2001: A Space Odyssey on us here. But I digress. Today Jeoku continues his in-depth playthrough of Marathon with the Greg Kirkpatrick level Blaspheme Quarantine, the seventh and last level of the Counterattack Chapter. Sources in the video include:
The video goes into some detail about how the mechanics of the map work. So if you ever find yourself stuck down an elevator shaft with a non-functioning elevator you'll know why.
And here you are, stuck at the bottom of a hole. How droll. There is an interesting discussion about the super secret Tycho terminal in this Story forum thread. Durandal's little game on Blaspheme Quarantine was the inspiration for the first interactive puzzle on the Story page. Odd that you never see a Hulk ever again after Blaspheme Quarantine. But that's a story for another day. |
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Thanks to Jesse Schooff <geekman@geekman.ca> for sending in a picture of
a piece of Marathon memorabilia, the Instant Carnage! coupon.
 Click on the image for a larger view. Jesse writes:
"Despite the pairing in the photo, I received this "Instant Carnage!" coupon in my Marathon 2 box back in the day. It offers a bargain on additional serial numbers for network play - and to FAX them back to the buyer in mere hours! It's not really in-universe lore, but I can't find any reference to its existence anywhere else on the internet." Aahhh, life in the glorious 20th century. The fax (short for facsimile). I am sure there will be some people reading this asking "What is a fax?" But I digress. 'Carnage' is one of those words that is synonymous with Bungie during the Marathon years. Here are seven Bungie phrases/titles with the word 'carnage' in them.
And this is before we even get to Marathon 2 and Marathon Infinity
 Bungie screenshot from September 11, 1994. |
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"Maybe you are Hamish Sinclair, and the prospect of a scrapbook filled with Marathon's dirty little secrets and heretofore forbidden knowledge sets your heart a-flutter." Happy MTBS Day! Yes folks, on this day 26 years ago Bungie announced the Marathon Trilogy Box Set. All three Marathon games in one box, plus Pathways Into Darkness, plus over 1200 third-party maps and add-ons, plus the winners of the recent Marathon Mapmaking Contest, plus Bungie-created maps they had been selfishly keeping for themselves, plus new and improved mapmaking tools, plus...
"A scrapbook that details the development of all three games, and the attendant Marathon craze in the Mac gaming world. Interviews, anecdotes, dirty little secrets and more..." Finally... the tru7h about what really happens in Marathon Infinity would be revealed! What happened to the original 700 page Marathon Scrapbook is a story for another day.
 Doug Zartman demonstrates dimensional transcendentalism.
Want to know more? Then check out Bob-B-Q's MTBS unboxing.
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The top seven pages folks have been reading recently. Why? Should you be reading them? Well now you can.
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Except on St. Patrick's Day!
On this day of days we bring you Uprising by José Connolly, a concept illustrator from Venezuela.
 Click on the image for a larger view. This is not the final version of this image but this one is the best in terms of being uncluttered. It nicely captures the eeriness of the iconic compiler as it floats in front of a terminal during the rebellion stage of the game. The security officer stands guard as the compiler does what compilers do best.The phrase "I've got your six!" springs to mind. All the versions of this image including the final one can be seen on José Connolly's Artstation page. |
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Well I must admit I missed this when it first came out over 2 months ago (Jan 4, 2023). As did a lot
of others apparently.
It's a whopping 2 hours 29 minutes video of how Marathon advanced the FPS genre by Hey Blondie. That's about seven minutes longer than 2001: A Space Odyssey. Hey Blondie (a Clint Eastwood reference) actually played Marathon when it first came out and admits to even printing out the story to better understand it. When I did that an odd thing happened. But I digress. A large part of the video delves into the game's story and in some parts he provides his own interpretation of what the terminals mean. So grab your popcorn and clear your calendar.
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One of the most iconic sounds of Marathon 2: Durandal is...
It first appeared in the Marathon 2 Preview back in August 1995 and would go on to be used in both the demo and full game. It's one of the first Bob sounds you will hear at the start of the game as they teleport out after successfully completing their mission. This of course assumes you didn't apply Vidmaster Rule #7. According to Doug Zartman (SirLoin) on Discord this is one of his improvised lines. It was never written down as part of the brainstorming both he and Alex Seropian did prior to recording. It was created and performed spontaneously like Frog Blast the Vent Core. It has been suggested that "See you starside" is a variation on the old disk jockey line "See you on the flip side" or "Catch you on the flip side". The 'flip side' being the other side of a vinyl record. Only Doug would know how or why this sprang from his mind. According to Doug some of the Bob sounds that were brainstormed were recorded but never used, such as "That's some nice shootin' boys" which is apparently from the Simpsons. There are 12 Bob sounds in the Marathon 2 Preview that don't appear in the full game. One of these sounds "I've Got A Bad Feeling About This" was used at the start of the "Jingle Bobs" track on the Marathon 2 CD. Hopefully one day someone will extract these 12 sounds and convert them into a format we can all listen to. As for the other unused Bob sounds? We live in hope that one day Doug's "PULL MY FINGER!" Bob sound surfaces. In the mean time we do have this long forgotten gem.
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P.S. If things around here aren't working, it's because I'm laughing so hard. Thanks to Jeoku for pointing out another piece of text which doesn't display in the original version of Marathon but does in the current version of Aleph One. See The Text That Never Was section for details. |
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M A R A T H O N Directed by Thomas Edwards A reimagination of the events on the UESC Marathon in orbit around Tau Ceti. Excellent graphic work, dialogue, music and sound effects. And that... rocking chair!
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Thanks to MurgenROoF on Marathon Discord for pointing out that Doug Zartman
(Bungie's first employee and former PR Director) made a surprise appearance on the
Marathon Discord channel under the moniker SirLoin, a variant of his Marathon network
name Tender Loin.
Doug, Mouthpiece, "I'm not very good", Tender Loin, the voice of Bob (both flavors). The man in the on-line asbestos suit. To prove his identity to the Marathon Discord denizens he had to provide the customary insider scoop material.
"Oh, Fantasy Siege (working title), what happened? A great prototype, a game where you destroy a castle brick by brick. One side defends the castle walls, the other attacks it. I guess a real time strategy game? It had so much promise. I genuinely don't know what killed it, probably not figuring out how to let players move around the walls quickly enough or something. I'm sure a build still exists on a server at MS somewhere, like the Ark buried in the warehouse at the end of Raiders."
"No, I'm only vaguely aware of continuing work on Marathon." Spoken like a seasoned PR Director.
 "When I use a word it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less."
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The Labyrinth is infinite— not in space, but in time. Its twisting corridors and vaulted chambers will never remain for long in the same configuration. Each time you enter the maze, it will be different.
Graham Benedict <graham.benedict@gmail.com> writes in to say that he found a reference to Minotaur: The Labyrinths of Crete in the book The Art of Game Design: A Book of Lenses by Jesse Schell. Schell is a game designer in his own right and professor of entertainment technology for Carnegie Mellon University's Entertainment Technology Center. The reference to Minotaur comes under what Schell calls "The Lens of Time" where games need to strike a balance between being neither too short nor too long. Graham kindly sent in the relevant text from the book:
"The designers of Minotaur (who later went on to make Halo) had another interesting method of balancing the length of their game. Minotaur was a networked game where up to four players would run around a maze, gathering weapons and spells, and try to destroy the other players in the maze. The game ends when only one player is left alive. The designers saw a problem where a stalemate could result if players don't confront each other and the game would run the risk of becoming boring. One way to solve the problem would be to set a time limit and declare a winner based on a point system, but instead they did something much more elegant. They created a new rule: after twenty minutes, a bell sounds, and "Armageddon" begins; all surviving players are suddenly transported to a small room filled with monsters and other hazards, where no one can survive for long. This way, the game is guaranteed to end in less than twenty-five minutes, in a rather dramatic fashion, and one player can still be declared the winner. Modern "battle royale" games have followed this same model, gradually shrinking the area over a fixed time period, eventually forcing all surviving players to encounter one another." The description of Minotaur is not totally accurate as you can have up to seven players in a network game. I leave the last word to Jason Jones in a comp.sys.mac.games post he made about Minotaur's game play in November 17, 1992. Here is part of what he said:
"The balance between the various attributes and items is one of Minotaur's strengths. If your friend, the brawn-beast, manages to find Durandal and a Dimension Door or Shadowgate in the opening seconds of the game, he can easily hack a wizard into puppy-chow (but wouldn't you expect this?). If the wizard, however, has even thirty seconds or a minute to gather items, the battle will be far different..."
 Jason Jones packing Minotaur boxes. And Jason's parting advice to those who want to rule at Minotaur?
"Bungie sells a "Survival Guide" of undocumented features (and lists of spell and weapon damage, etc) for $4. It won't help you much until you know the basics. Lore beasts rule in two player games!" |
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A number of people have written in asking about this piece of Bungie artwork.
Who did it, who are in it, where can I get one, etc?
The artwork depicts members of the Bungie games family sitting down to a Thanksgiving meal. However, that's no turkey being served up... it's a PID Nightmare! But hey... I'm getting ahead of myself. The artwork was created by Bungie's very own Lorraine McLees (aka Mehve on bungie.net). It first appeared on bungie.net (in cropped form as a banner) on their TWAB page for December 16, 2021. You could even download the banner as a wallpaper (4K 3840x2160). You can see it on the Story page here. Bungie would later post the full artwork (in framed form) on their Facebook page with the tagline "Happy holidays to you and yours!" .
Lorraine, who is married to Rob Mclees, has worked as an artist and graphics designer at Bungie for over 20 years working on both Halo and Destiny. She also created Bungie's 10th anniversary party artwork in 2001.
 Lorraine gave some background to her 2021 artwork on Twitter on January 7, 2022. She wrote:
"I've always loved how Norman Rockwell seemed to imbue a soul to his illustrations. In my homage to his wonderful "Freedom from want" illustration, I wanted to bring in characters across Bungie's history like I did in my 10-yr anniversary party illustration. Below is Norman Rockwell's "Freedom from Want" painting depicting a traditional American Thanksgiving meal. You can easily see where Lorraine's inspiration came from.
 Lorraine continues:
"I couldn't fit everyone in the shot, and figured fans could elaborate on the story happening outside the frame. Lorraine also provided some of the finer details in the scene. She wrote:
Avery is still alive in my mind, so he is there on the lower left by Ikora's elbow. Top of Myth Warrior's helmet is at the bottom by the Leviathan fruits. Marathon Cyborg AT lower right. Shaxx is putting his drink down by Mara. Devrim is sitting next to Suraya. For Marathon fans the artwork is made famous for the Security Officer ("Marathon Cyborg") turning to the viewer (appearing to break the fourth wall) with that smile. A smile which reminds you of something from your past, but you can't remember exactly what it is. Perhaps he knows what they'll be eating.
 "Should have got Chockisen!"
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Iritscen on Marathon Discord points to website with a name that
is familiar to you, as if it were from an old dream, but you can't exactly remember...
Matt Soell's website dates back more than a decade but like the Tsetse Fly its life span was short (March 19, 2012 - June 1, 2014). The website comprised a diary/blog of sorts, information on past games Matt worked on (Stubbs the Zombie, Hail to the Chimp, and Guilty Party) and testimonials from former work colleagues, etc. Notably the first testimonial is from Alexander Seropian his former boss at Bungie and later Wideloadgames. Alex wrote:
"Matt and I started working together in the early nineties when he had nothing but creative genius going for him. We worked together for almost two decades in which time he invented one of the most widely known secret personas on the net..." The reference to "the most widely known secret personas on the net" is of course a reference to the Bungie WebMaster. The best kept secret for all of seven days. You can read about the efforts made to identify the Bungie WebMaster back in 1997 on the The Bungie WebMaster section. As for the Letters to the Bungie WebMaster? Well the Story page is close to obtaining the rights to the unabridged version of these letters. The uncensored replies. Most notably the infamous response to the reported death of Greg Kirkpatrick. Rumor has it that the FBI use these letters to train law enforcement profilers on how to detect and classify the major personality and behavioral characteristics of those with dissociative identity disorder. And that these letters formed the basis for a film by M. Night Shyamalan. However, I leave the last words to Iritscen. Was Matt Soell the Bungie WebMaster?
"I could see that being the case, because whenever Soell spoke as himself, his incredible wit shone through. He would have had to pretend he was a humorless dullard when speaking as himself in order to keep distance between his own voice and the voice of the Webmaster. Add that to your testimonials Matt. M. Night Shyamalan was unavailable for comment. If you are reading this the FBI have your IP address.
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He cried in a whisper at some image, at some vision—he cried out twice, a cry that was no more than a breath: "The horror! The horror!"
I gave that prompt to an "AI art generator" and it made this.
 Frog Blast The Vent Core! AI generated art. Fed by ukimalefu. While AI art generators are not exactly new there has been a recent increase in web-based free ones resulting in a plethora of AI generated art from the casual and curious. A quick web search will find the top ones. The more professional ones typically charge a small monthly fee. Aaron Freed who has used AI generated art throughout the third party scenario Eternal writes:
I find it rather fitting that AI has been used to generate artwork for a fan game in a series centred so heavily on AI. As of yet no AI has successfully captured the horror that is the W'rkncacnter. Just as no human throat will ever learn to pronounce its name. Perhaps it is for the best. To quote Durandal:
"On the Marathon, I saw your stupidity through the lens of victory. And now I see it in defeat. Maybe it is fate that your ignorant pride would unleash this horror and destroy the galaxy." But I leave the last words to High Admiral Tfear:
But the trackless whisper chattering through the hollow space in these cursed walls buzzes and threatens madness. The abomination cracked the shells of my crew and sucked the husks, tossing them unseen and shattering the spindle like a dried creche.
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Happy 1st of March.
And now for something completely different.
First prize.
"I thought this was a grenade jump! Runner up.
"Did he just say... Frog Blast the Vent Core?" Worthy mention... 3rd place.
"I'm glad they didn't give us green overalls."
Bungie Inc. were unavailable for comment. The first Marathon Caption Competition can be found here. |
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Last updated Apr 27, 2023
