2023-05-25 08:00:57
Apple is not the only one that presents news during these weeks: the video game industry is holding its own events in which they announce their new projects, and the one from Sony broadcast yesterday just before going to sleep made many Mac veterans jump out of their chairs suddenly.
And it is that in that event Bungie introduced Marathonresurrecting the franchise that marked the childhood and adolescence of many Mac veterans who played the original series released in the 90s. You may not know anything about it, but it created a niche of fans that still lasts today.
Marathon, the father of Halo
Marathon was a trilogy of games developed by Bungie, of the FLS type (First Person Shooter), back in 1994. The games were prepared to run on the classic Mac OS, even being distributed on disks Floppy. Its textures are very reminiscent of those of the original Doom: basic three-dimensional environments and enemies made up of 2D images moving and changing to emulate the third dimension.
The difference that made Marathon stand out from similar games was not because of its graphics or its gameplay: in addition to achieving a very successful atmosphere for the time, it was also there was a very elaborate story behind its levels. You were a soldier who went to a colony ship called Marathon, invaded by unknown forces and with the artificial intelligence that controlled its systems failing for strange reasons.
TIME named Marathon one of the 100 Greatest Games of All Time
The story that unfolds from this approach throughout the three installments of Marathon is worthy of a movie saga or a series of several seasons: rebellious artificial intelligences, alien forces eager to conquer the universe and civilizations that have been enslaved. by mechanical entities. You didn’t just want to complete each level: you were also dying to know what happened at the end far beyond defeating the boss.
Even today that story can be enjoyed by playing the original games, which you can do for free since the developers released the source code of the entire saga making it free for macOS, Windows and even Linux. A warning in advance: completing the levels involves solving puzzles that require a lot of patience. oh and you can too play them on ipad If you prefer.
Many consider Marathon as the precursor to Halo, a saga also developed by Bungie that was presented in an Apple keynote and has ended up becoming an international benchmark. None other than Time magazine considered Marathon as one of the best 100 games ever released in all of history. Many of us remember him fondly.
A deserved comeback, but not on our platform… for now
And that is why yesterday a server jumped out of the chair after seeing the Marathon trailer that you can see just above: it seems that Bungie have decided to relaunch the name of this saga in the form of a multiplayer game that will use the universe of the original saga for your scenarios.
The bad news is that It doesn’t seem like this new Marathon can be played on Mac: Your website mentions the PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X / S and PC as compatible platforms. A sign of how the scene of the gaming at Apple it has changed to be something not as high a priority as before. But there’s a silver lining: Engines like Unreal Engine 5.2 have gone native to Apple Silicon and that’s a very good step into the future.
Perhaps, I dare say, what we see at WWDC 2023 can give us hope about seeing more games like this new Marathon on Mac in a few years. Although we will have to wait, because at the moment Bungie has already said that until 2025 we cannot count on a release for the platforms that have been confirmed at the moment.
In Applesphere | Apple does not give up on gaming: it wants to approach it in another way
1685002775
#Marathon #90s #Mac #classic #returns #video #games #front #door