Talk:Marathon Trilogy/Archive 1

Archive 1

Frog Blast the Ventcore???

seriously does that quote need to be a major part of the article. c'mon it WASN'T a major part of the game nor was it used as a major plot device. If nobody gives me a really good reason on why that should stay, I'm reducing or removing it. -RRR

Because it's the game's trademark. Reference to that, it references only to Marathon. There's a whole army of insider jokes and such referring to it, and as such it should be included. ~Helwer7

okay, so I removed most of the information regarding the quote. It wasn't a major part of the game and it only acts as a small part of most of the bungie games. Such a thing would only confuse readers who may not be familiar with Marathon or any other bungie games, and since encyclopedias are supposed to educate readers about certain topics, we shouldn't mislead them and suggest that the phrase "frog blast the ventcore" is one of the more important subjects that involves the game. Instead, I took it from being a major headline, and in its place I put "Phrases in the game". I added "they're everywhere!" because that phrase is more common, and has more insider jokes that refer to that quote.

There are more interesting subjects that should have more detail then the mention above (such as Lh'owen, Admiral T'Fear, Robert Blake, the Pfhor Scoutship, Leela, Tycho, and maybe even the Jjiro Station"

Let me know about any thoughts you might have on it RiseRobotRise 08:39, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

Cleanup

I suggest that we split this article into four separate articles, one for the series collectively and three for the games. It also appears that we should clean up everything just a bit because though there is some great information, this looks like a mess. The three infoboxes look ugly on the same page and grossly space everything out, and I feel that there is too little of a focus on the games themselves, but more on the plot and everything else. Let's do something about this! 67.164.214.150 03:02, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

I agree; this article is getting way too long and a little too spread out. æle ✆ 20:48, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

I've moved M2 and M∞ off into their own pages but I don't know how to go about M1 exactly. Should this page be transformed into a Marathon 1 only page and a new page created eg. called something like "Marathon Series"? Splatg 02:04, 12 January 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I think that we should do that. This article is inconsistent. Oklonia 06:37, 21 January 2006 (UTC)

Yes, look at Halo (video game series) for inspiration if need be. Only one-paragraph or so summaries are necessary on this series page. Gspawn 18:37, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

I have just separated the Marathon (one) section into another article: Marathon (computer game), based on the previous one by Splatg, and added a chapters section with screenshot. i also removed the 'cleanup' template from the main article. Yaco 05:17, 5 March 2006 (UTC)

The "Plot" section needs to be retitled as "Rampancy" since it mentions little to nothing about the actual plot of the three games and how they fit together. It has been too long since I've played it to write up a reliable summary but it seems like there should be at least a mention of the races involve and the role they played in the story as well as the three Marathon AIs and of course the main character and what he actually does in relation to the plot. Tungsten72 (talk) 21:56, 25 June 2009 (UTC)

Open request for aid

I'm continuing to edit the page pretty heavilly - removing a lot of stuff that doesn't belong on a Wiki in the depth given - but I don't want to be seen as vandalising.

Let's try and mute this down. We don't need to have individual paragraphs on the pistals and shotguns in the game, since they aren't fundamentally that different than, say, Doom's shotgun. Sure, Durandal says it reloads weird or whatever, but in terms of gameplay, it ain't worth mentioning.

Scumbag 07:19, 3 November 2005 (UTC)

Keeping It Simple For The Ignorant

I'm a pretty hardcore Marathon fan, but some of you need to remember that most people who read this aren't. As such, I removed some information and detail from the synopsises of M1 and M2, simply because the flotsam and jetsam of the series wasn't entirely important on the Wiki.

For example? I removed a bit describing how Durandal made the S'pht attack Leela to shut her down. It's much more streamlined to say that Leela was shut down.

I hope this isn't offensive or anything.

Scumbag 19:09, 28 October 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for the edit, it needed it.

Fictional spacecraft?

I removed this from the fictional spacecraft section, but it was re-added with the reason that the game revolve heavily around fictional spacecraft (and I can sort of see the logic behind that). My reason for removing it however was that whatever the game focuses on the article itself does not make this particularly clear. There is no particular information about any fictional spacecrafts. This is just my opinion naturaly, but I feel the categories an article is a member of should be reflected in the article itself. I feel that the fictional spacecraft section should be reserved for articles that are actualy about fictional spacecraft (or at least have a significant section on the topic), not just every movie, book or game that involve fictional spacecrafts in general. The Red Dwarf article for example include some info about several of the ships in the series, so IMHO it "qualifies", while this article currenly only contain info about the game. I might simply be narrow minded though. Any other opinions on what is required to "qualify" for inclution in various categories? In my mind adding articles like this to fictional spacecraft is like adding The Fast and the furious to the Automobiles category because the movie largely revolve around cars. That might just be me though...

--Sherool 08:56, 13 May 2005 (UTC)

I think that it should remain. The Marathon is a pretty unique idea for a fictional spacecraft; it's the hollowed out Deimos moon of Mars converted into an enormous interstellar colony ship. And the entire game takes place on the Marathon and includes a ton of information about the ship; it's obvious that a lot of work went into designing it and its systems -- heck there's even an entire multi-page terminal explaining how the various types of doors work :P Argyrios 00:01, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Fair enough, the reason I objected to the category at the time was because the article didn't make that point clear though (either that or I'm just slow). I don't even think it mentioned that the ship had the same name as the game. Hence my comment (and original edit). To someone unfamiliar with the game (such as me) the article didn't seem to have any relation to spasecrafts, the original aurhor must have simply taken that for granted. After the most recent edit the relevance is a lot more obvious, thanks for clairifying. --Sherool 19:14, 15 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Is the Security Officer Mjolnir Cyborg X?

Since the game never makes it clear whether or not the Marathon Secuirty Officer is the missing Mjolnir cyborg (although it does drop numerous hints that he might be), the article shouldn't make spesific reference to him as such. Whether or not the character is a cyborg is still sometimes debated on the Marathon story page, which is linked to from the article.

--Stiv

You have got to be kidding me. This was resolved ages ago; of course the player is the tenth cyborg.

Read entirely through http://marathon.bungie.org/story/you.html and by the end, you will see that there is a consensus on the issue. The evidence is overwhelming.

For me, the best evidence is this secret terminal from Bungie:

SMUG INTELLECTUAL. Formerly-rampant human- coded AI with a sense of humor seeks bipedal oxygen-breathing cyborg for serious relationship in the galactic core. I've got cool guns if you like to break stuff. No yuppies. MRa2572 (5/23).

SLEEPING BEAUTY. Long-deactivated extraterrestrial personality construct in search of gullible carbon-based cyborg (< 20% machine) to confuse, irritate and teleport randomly around an abandoned desert planet in the core. All answered. MRa268' (5/30).

GOD'S GIFT TO NEURAL NETS. Traitorous extremely-rampant reprogrammed human AI with no sense of humor seeks elusive, heroic cyborg of uncertain manufacture (you know who you are) for mindgames and long walks in hard vacuum. MRa2261 (5/16)

DAMSEL IN DISTRESS. Captured and partially-disassembled human-coded AI trapped on alien homeworld seeks succor from a tall, dark and handsome cyborg with big guns. Let my rescue be the basis of a lasting relationship. MRa4451 (5/23).

<Requiem For a Cyborg (Terminal 2)>

Hope this helps clear it up. Obviously, "Smug intellectual" is durandal, "sleeping beauty" is thoth, "god's gift" is tycho, and "damsel in distress" is leela... and "cyborg" is you. Argyrios 04:09, 9 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Trivial Information

Deleted both the most recent addition and my own final sentence of the Hulk section; both sentences are trivial, and getting into a level of detail inappropriate for this article. Plus the most recent addition mentions one of the weapons, the Zeus class fusion pistol, for the first and only time in the article, seemingly assuming that the casual reader knows what the hell that is, which is, ah, what we like to call "bad." Speaking of which, a "weapons" subsection might not be a bad idea if someone wants to write it. Argyrios 01:37, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Also, a weapons subheading in the article would be the ideal place to discuss, broadly, which units the weapon is and is not effective against -- but still, I think not down to the level of the individual flavor of unit type, like lava fl'ickta... that level of detail, if made consistent, would make the article unreadably long and choked with inconsequential details. Argyrios

OK, added weapons section Whitepaw 08:23, 2005 Jun 21 (UTC)

Good addition :) Argyrios 22:14, 21 Jun 2005 (UTC)

The information was added back in recently. Wikipedia is not a game guide. A unit having an immunity to a certain weapon is by no means unique, not even in the marathon world -- the hunters are immune to flamethrowers, as are I think lava fl'ickta, and bullets do not hurt juggernaughts. These are all details that are not encyclopedic. Please do not re-add the detail. Argyrios 06:26, 22 Jun 2005 (UTC)

You are right, but I just thought it's complete ineffectivess against this baddie on one extreem went well with the fact that the fusion pistol is the only thing that can get through the sheild on the other. Splatg 23:46, 22 Jun 2005 (UTC)

I hadn't seen that you were making this comparison. I think that the information could be re-added, but only in the context of serving to illustrate the way Marathon's weapons have situational as well as absolute strengths and weaknesses, where the invulnerability shield and lava fl'ickta are used as contrasting examples that specifically uphold this explicit point. If you wish, please feel free to delete the sentence about the shield and add a short paragraph that uses the shield and lava fl'ickta to make that point. It's a good point to make and I'd do it myself, but you take a crack at it first if you want. Sorry for misinterpretting. Argyrios 00:03, 23 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Hammer, Forge and Anvil

Can someone add stuff about Hammer and Forge and Anvil? They were all kick ass editors that were amazingly easily to use - i wish all games these days released such powerful tools with their CDs.... JoeSmack (talk) 16:11, Jun 21, 2005 (UTC)

Refresh my memory, what was Hammer?

whoop, my bad, there is no Hammer. for a really poor but actually related article, see semantic memory. JoeSmack (talk) 23:30, Jun 21, 2005 (UTC)

I just added a Forge and Anvil section. I think it covered most of the details, but feel free to change it. ChauSara 03:01, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

Pictures?

This article is crying out for some pictures, but as we can't have "fair use" pictures on Wikipedia any more, does anyone know what licence the Trilogy was released under? GPL like the Marathon 2 code, or something else? Whitepaw 09:52, 2005 Jun 22 (UTC)

Where does it say that we can't use "fair use" anymore? Last I checked that only applied to commons. You do have to justify it, and aparently images can't be larger than they appear in the article itself (hmm, I seem to have violated that one a couple of times bu uploading unedited screenshots), but IHMO screenshorts from a game is justified in an article about the game, so unless there was a recent policy change I'm not aware of I think screenshorts in the article are ok under "fair use" (if the beforementioned steps are taken). Naturaly the ideal solution would be to obtain an explicit permission from Bungee to use screenshots from theyr games. See the Wikipedia:Boilerplate request for permission page for ideas on how to formulate a letter/email to them. --Sherool 17:15, 22 Jun 2005 (UTC)

Only the commons? OK, I must have gotten slightly mixed up when I read this and then saw the big blue box on the upload page (which, you're quite right, only says the commons). I've emailed Bungie now. Whitepaw 18:07, 2005 Jun 22 (UTC)

OK, a quick update: no word from Bungie, and I'm not going to risk it myself. They could always be added later if possible. Whitepaw 11:00, 2005 July 12 (UTC)

Inforbox or not?

Marathon Infinity
Marathon Infinity box
Developer(s)	Bungie Studios
Platform(s)	MacOS
Release	1996
Genre(s)	FPS
Mode(s)	Single player

I was considering adding the Computer Video Game infobox template to the article (see example to the right). Was thinking one infobox in each of the apropriate sections about the various Marathon games. Unfortunately I don't know most of the info needed to populate the template properly myself (this one is just a quick example and probably have a few mistakes), so I figured I'd just run the idea by you here first. --Sherool 7 July 2005 07:56 (UTC)

I think the idea of the info boxes is good. I don't believe it would be a good idea though to have multiple info boxes on the one page. It would probably work better if seperate pages were created for each game, but do we have enough content to justify seperate pages for each of the installments? Or if we indeed want to do that.Splatg 7 July 2005 08:41 (UTC)

If we have only one infobox, I think it should be of the Trilogy Box Set release. --Whitepaw 11:03, 2005 July 12 (UTC)

Whether or not there's much content, the games could each have a small article to itself. This article could be renamed to Marathon (game series) or something on that order. --OGoncho 18:12, 30 July 2005 (UTC)

I think we might have to consider splitting up the article, it is getting kind of long and having it all in one is probably restricting how much we can say about each of the individual games. Splatg 00:35, 31 July 2005 (UTC)

I added an info box for this page. --RiseRobotRise (talk) 07:01, 5 June 2010 (UTC)

Shotgun & Pathways

the shots continue through their target after impact, and continue to hit any entity on the other side, only stopping when they hit a wall or their range limit.

This doesn't agree with my experience, and the only significant difference (in the "Standard" physics model that comes with the anvil download [1]) between the "Pistol Bullet" and the "Shotgun Shot" are that the SS "Can toggle control panels". In particular, neither are "Persistent and virulent" (Anvil Help: If this box is checked, the shot will continue until reaching its maximum range or a wall, regardless of how many mobile targets it hits until then.). Of course, enemies don't absorb more bullets than it takes to kill them, thus one can kill several in a line with one shot, but that's different, and seems intuitive anyway.

Pathways Into Darkness is proven to actually be the prequel to the Marathon series, as stated in the Marathon Scrapbook

"Marathon was origonally intended as a sequal to Pathways [2]" may prove that it was originally intended to be, but implies that the final product was not, right? Also note that "The first version ... was canned because it looked too much like Pathways Into Darkness" [3]. Frencheigh 07:18, 11 October 2005 (UTC)

Jason Jones: the important thing about the hint book epilogue was to make all the player character's artifacts from the pyramid disappear from circulation before the marathon story begins. A better argument would be that Pathways was released the year before the first Marathon. (I know the sentence you're talking about isn't in the article anymore, but I figured I'd answer anyway.) --DocumentN (talk) 17:49, 29 May 2009 (UTC)

Firearms

I just thought I would add this section to the talk page so that we could keep any firearm/weapons debate or discussion here.

To start it off, someone had edited the last few sentences of the "Pistol" entry as such-

"The first incarnation of the Magnum Mega Class was curious in that it had what looks like a revolving chamber but was reloaded with a magazine in the fashion of a semi-automatic pistol (This could be explained by the utilization of a speed loader.The second incarnation removed the revolving chamber and made the gun look more like a modern big-bore pistol. Both are equipped with what appears to be a red dot sight or other optical sight mounted on the slide, but they are not operational in game."

I removed the sentence in parentheses and altered 'big-bore' to 'semi automatic' because 'big bore' implies a caliber >.45 ACP (which it does not appear to be, despite the misnomer with the first incarnation.) Also, the parenthetical phrase is simply erroneous - the reloading sequence clearly shows the insertion of a magazine into the pistol grip. If it had been a speed loader, the player would have to expose the revolving chambers to push the rounds in tip-first.

Also, I replaced 'short, cut down' in the KKV-7 entry with 'compact,' as it wasn't really cut down from any original form we know of, and the two seemed redundant anyway. - Wells

To Infinity Symbol, but not beyond

The Infinity symbol doesn't show up in at least my Mac, using Firefox 1.0.4 and OSX Tiger. No idea how to fix this, or I'd do 'er myself.

Missing Characters?

It looks like a few important figures are missing from the characters section: Leela, Durandal, and Tycho. Thoth should probably be included as well. I'll try and start on this soon, but wouldn't mind a little help.

Pfhor Skin Colour

In the games through various enemy and terminal graphics it is almost certainly clear that the pfhor have whiteish to light grey skin, naturally I edited the page to say this as it is never apparent they have green skin like it claims (where did that come from anyway). However someone decided to revert it for reasons unclear. Granted there are Pfhor who wear green coloured uniform, it is clearly just that, a uniform, none of the Pfhor graphics I have EVER seen have green skin. Might I bring to your attention this picture http://marathon.bungie.org/Story/bobsbigdateterm.html It clearly shows an unmasked Pfhor who has skin that is DEFINANTLY greyish white. And here's a piece of fan art showing the Pfhor's skin again: http://home.earthlink.net/~mrhook/pfhor.jpg And this page shows Pfhor fighters as they appear in game http://marathon.bungie.org/story/pfhordifferences.html Clearly wearing a green uniform but having white skin. So where did this green skin thing come from anyway? Kralex

Looks greenish to me. Certainly isn't anything remotely close to white. Enforcers clearly have blue skin, btw. However misleading "green skin" may be, "white skin" is much more so. Might be best just to take it out completely. Argyrios 06:06, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

Maybe not totally white, but definantly on the grey side of things skin. I just found three other pieces of fan art that seem to also believe Pfhor do not have green skin http://www.marathon.org/hyperarchive/pictures/marapics/webfox/killshot.lg.jpg http://marathon.bungie.org/story/GrnPfhor.html http://www.deviantart.com/view/10721119/ Granted these aren't official, it seems weird that all 4 pieces of fan art I managed to find seem to think they're greyish. And if you agree calling it green skin is missleading then, obviously, even you are unsure of what colour to call it. Kralex

Go ahead and change it to "grey" if you want, but "white" was clearly wrong. Again, enforcers, have deep blue skin and are also Pfhor, so I'm not sure whether its even useful to mention their skin color. Peace. Argyrios 18:18, 31 January 2006 (UTC)

Actually, white is much closer than green, I can tell this just by looking, in fact I had a look at just what exactly each pixel on several of the Pfhor sprites are and most point to grey, white is definantly closer to grey than green (come on, green?) Now, are we certain Enforcer's skin is blue. http://www.eyrie.org/~aerianne/marathon/enforcers.v1.jpg Marathon 1 Enforcers look like they have parts of the familiar whitish grey Pfhor skin showing, but are wearing blue uniforms. But in Marathon 2 it's harder to tell. Kralex

Yes, we are pretty damn certain. Argyrios 19:32, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

Originally posted to article by 24.173.76.138

Edit: Marathon 2 has several varieties of Pfhor, and I only know the names of a couple. What I call "Tank Tread Guys" are the second strongest Pfhor in the game besides "That Big Floaty Thing That Kicks Our Asses". They do not have legs, but in fact have tank treads instead. They throw grenades, which are easily avoided, but are capable of hitting you with a flame thrower. This is no big threat, because they will still try to burn you up if you are too far away. What I call "Priests" are pretty dangerous, because they are capable of shooting energy blasts with a slight homing mechanism. Level 14 of Marathon 2 is extremely dangerous, as a race I call "Frog Guys" swarm. I have tried every weapon on this part, and the best is clearly the shotgun. Do not hesitate to use up ammo, because plenty of shells are lying around.

æle ✆ 20:35, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

Frog Blast the Vent Core

The Frog Blast section clearly needs to go or at least be trimmed to about 10% of its current size. It was just a joke. It was sort of funny. It isn't important or encyclopedic. Anyone agree? Argyrios 02:25, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

No. I still hear it thrown around today. JoeSmack ^Talk 05:51, 18 February 2006 (UTC)

I have left the section, but shortened it slightly by deleting something that to my mind has absolutely no relevance. Since when does speculation by some random guy in the form of what is essentially a forum post, which is then subsequently discredited, and on a topic that isn't even noteworthy enough to have its own "Facts and Puzzling Things About" section, deserve mention? That's absurd. Argyrios 10:55, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

Oops! Sorry about the multiple edits.

Thought I was doing something good, then I saw my mistake and then I kept making more mistakes. I apologize.--FazzMunkle 09:53, 19 February 2006 (UTC)

Infinity or ∞ ?

I don't think it's right to say "Marathon ∞". Bungie's own site refers to Marathon Infinity, and they don't use the infinity symbol. Stormwatch 01:19, 27 February 2006 (UTC)

Everywhere (www.bungie.net, marathon.bungie.org, the story page, etc) except on the application file the name of the game is 'Marathon Infinity'. I've replaced the symbol with 'Infinity' where I found it (Marathon (computer game series), Marathon Infinity, Template:Bungie Studios), renamed the article to 'Marathon Infinity', and used the old one as a redirect. Couldn't find the original rationale for using the symbol anywhere. This should also fix the problem with Firefox 1.0.4 on Mac OS X and probably most older / text only browsers. Yaco 01:55, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

For compatibility's sake alone, this should be a permanent change. As far as I can tell, there was no rationale, and even if there was, the benefits of writing 'Infinity' would probably still win out. Gspawn 16:58, 6 March 2006 (UTC)

Discussion continued in Talk:Marathon Infinity#The name of the game

Factual error

From the Pfhor section:

"The Pfhor's technology, while being very alien in performance and appearance, is not much farther along than human technology in the Marathon universe. The Pfhor are perhaps, however, the largest interstellar military force, challenged only by Humanity."

This is simply incorrect. At the begining of the first game, the Pfhor have a massive fleet of faster than light enabled ships, and maintain a vast intersteller empire. They are able to teleport without needing the teleportation "pads", and are able to build the simulacrums; walking bombs that look human. At the begining of the first game humanity has a single small colony (on Tau Ceti), has no FTL technology, and has no remote teleportation technology. Humanity is quite obviously very inferior, technology wise and military wise and size wise. Harley peters 04:12, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

We don't really get any picture of the series of what developments happened on Earth after Marathon left. It's probably safe to say they haven't developed FTL technology, but past that the only real information is Durandal's comment that "By Pfhor standards, Earth is a poorly defended low technology world". Which I guess supports your point, so never mind. --DocumentN 17:56, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

removed paragraph

"Not a lot is known about the Pfhor homeworld, except that it is actually much closer to the Sol system and Earth, than it is to Tau Ceti, making it a lucky matter of chance that Earth had not been invaded without warning. The planet itself, is thought to be a swamp covered marsh planet, rich in resources and oceanic and atmospheric moisture."

The galaxy map at the start of marathon two shows tau ceti being of similar, but closer distance to earth. the Pfhor homeworld is definately not "much closer" unless there is a specific refference to this in-game. Likewise, I dont recall any mention of what the Pfhor homeworld is actually like in the game. I know it didn't say anything about it in marathon 1 or 2, and I dont recal if from infinity either. Harley peters 04:11, 15 April 2006 (UTC)

How about a paragraph on how to get Marathon?

Seeing as how Bungie freewared the Marathon trilogy, why not dedicate a section to getting the Marathon trilogy itself? The game files for Mac and Windows are found at http://trilogyrelease.bungie.org. As well, we can post links to updated textures at the orbitalarm site (you should get them if you don't already have them - they're amazing). Just an idea. Also, if we're ambitious, we could post links to get the fan-made scenarios as well. On their respective pages, of course. Thoughts?

I made a page dedicated to Total Conversions you can find the link on the Marathon Trilogy page. -WeirdoYYY

Error in Enforcer data

The part where it says that Enforcers don't attack the player unless provoked is incorrect, I recall- at least for Marathon 2 and Infinity. Could someone verify this either way so it can be changed if necessary?

While I do remeber reading a terminal in M1 saying that Eforcers "had only been seen firing on other aliens" I'm quite certain that enforcers will shoot at you before you try and attack them (though the definition of "provoked" is pretty vauge (if you didn't shoot a single alien on that level would the enforcer still start shooting at you? ;). In any case I would say that that part is either incorrect or obscure enough a case that it's irrelevent and could be removed.--ASA-IRULE 08:31, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

too much information about the games

So I had to cut it down considrebly. There is a reason why we have seperate links to the other games.RiseRobotRise 06:54, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

Similarities between Marathon and the Tau from Warhammer 40,000

For those of you familiar with the Games Workshop tabletop game Warhammer 40,000, you will notice the Tau have a similar ressemblance to the style and pictography of Marathon's main character and the Bungie game Abuse's main character. Now I know Marathon came out a long time ago but it seems funny that both the Tau's logo and the Marathon logo are almost identical. In addition, the name of the planet Tau Ceti IV uses the word as well. Any thoughts?

Well, on the subject of Tau Ceti, the system is very popular in science fiction, as it is fairly close to Sol, so that can be ruled out.--Jonin Dark Wolf 18:02, 13 July 2006 (UTC)

The Halo Connection

I feel that there should at least be a mention of the Halo universe in this article, as there are so many connections, not just the Cortana Letters, but a whole host of things. For starters, there's the symbol. The Tau reference mentioned above links onto this nicely. It is the symbol for the UNSC in Halo, appearing on Halcyon- and Marathon-class cruisers, virtually everything the Forerunners ever made and some Covenant technology as well. There's also the MJoLNIR/Mjolnir link and plenty of other things. What do you guys think? El Oscuro 18:18, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree, even if Halo has nothing to do with the Marathon it's always interesting to include how references to marathon are included in other games. G134dr 14:12, 15 August 2007 (ETC)

Peer Review

All of you have done a great job editing this article. Don't you think it's time to get a peer review by a member of the WikiProject Computer and video games? They might make suggestions to improve the article even more. Dalobuca 02:12, 15 September 2006 (UTC)

Nonsense. 'Peer review' on Wikipedia is nothing more than vandallism, as they don't have the required knowledge. Scumbag 07:14, 12 November 2006 (UTC)

Copy Edit complete

I have completed the Copy Edit and removed the CE template from the top of the article page. —beverson 19:23, 3 January 2007 (UTC)

S'pht wepon

"S'pht:Minor S'pht are red and fire yellow bolts, while major S'pht are purple and fire green bolts that are guided. Transparent, nearly-invisible versions of the S'pht occur throughout the series."

While colors vary depending on monitor setting my experience is that the weaker enslaved S'pht fire a green bolt (non guided) while the stronger ones fire a yellow guided one.--ASA-IRULE 08:35, 18 January 2007 (UTC)

If it's GPL...

The article mentions the game being released under the GPL; this would mean changing the license tags for all the images from fair-use to Free, wouldn't it? I'll wait until the weekend and if no one objects/replies by then, I'll be switching them about. --Planetary 05:18, 6 February 2007 (UTC)

Only the engine, not the game content itself. æ² ✆ 2007‑02‑06t19:25z

I see. So even if we took our own screen shots from Aleph One, that would still belong to Bungie? --Planetary 02:14, 7 February 2007 (UTC)

Only if the Marathon data files are being used. If you're using a custom scenario then it depends on that scenario's license. æ² ✆ 2007‑02‑07t19:25z

Now I get it. Thanks. --Planetary 01:58, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

Increase the rating?

I was surprised to see that all the Marathon articles (Marathon, Marathon 2: Durandal, Marathon Infinity, and Marathon Trilogy) are rated at Start-Class only. There is more than enough content to consider raising the bar, and I think Marathon deserves the highest quality articles possible. I suggest using Halo: Combat Evolved as a starting point for improvement, as it is one of only six computer game (just pretend it was a computer game first) articles to reach FA-Class, and relates closely to Marathon.

Does anyone think a concerted effort to increase the assessment scale rating would be worthwhile? Lh'owon 23:14, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

I certainly agree. The article is quite well developed and is definitely more appropriate in B-class.--Planetary 01:11, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Halo

I really think marathon takes place after halo. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.161.35.15 (talk) 03:27, August 22, 2007 (UTC)

Halo: The Fall of Reach had a reference to humans having faster-than-light travel as early as 2494. Marathon was launched from Mars in 2472 as a slower-than-light generation ship. If that was in the Halo universe, why did nobody send a ship after them to give/sell them a hyperdrive, even for purely altruistic reasons? Why was Tau Ceti not already colonized when humans arrived in 2794? And if Mjolnir cyborgs exist in Halo, why aren't they being used against the Covenant? --DocumentN 17:56, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

Article on Durandal

Durandal is an important character in the series and very well developed, you think he(/she/it?) deserves it's own wikipedia page? I know the AI SHODAN from the System Shock series has her own article and Durandal is far more well developed than her as far as personalities go.

Maybe an article on how AI is handled in Marathon in general should be added. Something that merges the rampancy article into it as well perhaps?

71.58.107.29 01:28, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

• On the other hand, we have Traxus Project for storing information like that. And the character didn't really have any influence on other works to speak of, besides the Halos. --DocumentN 02:21, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
  • Yes, but then the rampancy article seems out of place without a description of what did go rampant in the game. Could you also point me to where SHODAN has had influence(at least more influence than Durandal)? The article on that character wasn't particularly helpful. --71.58.107.29 07:24, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
    • I don't think there's any way to measure that; both games are pretty unknown to mainstream culture. I had nothing to do with the creation of the SHODAN article, but the fact that there's no System Shock series wiki helps in part to justify it. --DocumentN 17:56, 6 October 2007 (UTC)

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BetacommandBot 06:44, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

Done.--Planetary 22:28, 30 August 2007 (UTC)

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BetacommandBot (talk) 04:16, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

Merge in Rampancy here

The article on Rampancy is not notable enough on its own, and as it is a theme of this video game series, it should be trimmed and placed here. True, it has occurred in one or two other Bungie games, but its natural home is still here, and I propose a merge. Judgesurreal777 (talk) 20:14, 7 July 2008 (UTC)

I don't agree, given it's similarities in other science fiction works dealing with AI's I think it should be left separate. If not for that simply because the article would have to be reduced to a small fraction of it's current size to be consistent with the Marathon article and a great deal of work and info would be lost. I wouldn't mind a smaller portion of it being included in the main Marathon article with a wikilink to the main rampancy article so a user could learn more if they wanted.--Papajohnin (talk) 04:16, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

The article in its current form is basically unreferenced, and most of the information in the Rampancy article is trivia and original research. If it has no reliable sources, it should either be merged or deleted, and I was voting merge, but if you really don't agree...Judgesurreal777 (talk) 05:28, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

I would have no problem with the merger. Rampancy is currently in a huge need of sources, only having three for an article that long is ridiculous. That being said, if the merger were to take place only the sourced info should be brought over; there is no sense in adding un-sourced speculation to this article, which is also in need of further sourcing. Blackngold29 05:39, 10 July 2008 (UTC)

• Support as the perfect place to put the content; if/when this article gets refurbished, the key element of rampancy will fit in nicely. Der Wohltemperierte Fuchs ^(talk) 17:16, 11 July 2008 (UTC)

I would reverse given that info but the Rampancy article also contains a few references to Halo(and Halo's story/article makes references to rampancy). Are you suggesting adding that to the subsection on the Marathon article or moving that to a new subsection on the Halo article? Either way, sourcing rampancy might pose difficult for Marathon as not to many sites host info on it anymore save the Bungie MSG which contains the Marathon story.--Papajohnin (talk) 02:58, 12 July 2008 (UTC)

Obviously we could have one or two references to Rampancy in the Halo series article, but it mainly concerns this game series, so it would sit in this article as a section title something like "Themes" or "Motifs", and then we could have one referenced quality paragraph on Rampancy instead of a whole article devoid of references. Sound good? Judgesurreal777 (talk) 04:25, 14 July 2008 (UTC)

Yeah that should work well, Agreed. and I might suggest that for the Halo portion to remain on just the Marathon article but with just a mention of similarities between the two games and also the specific points in Halo as to where Rampancy is mentioned(or relevant), albeit it much shorter and to the point to make cleanup easier. --Papajohnin (talk) 07:20, 16 July 2008 (UTC)

Rampancy has no similar meaning or context outside of the Marathon game, with the exception of brief mention in the Halo game, which was designed by the same game developer. If it were a common theme in science fiction I would think otherwise but I think it would be proper to merge the articles. It is, however, one of the central themes to the games plot/story line, so it does seem right that it should have it's own section of significance. That said, it seems that the "Story" section could be expanded and restructured to further emphesize the fact that Marathon had a significant backstory, which in itself made the game significantly different then it's competitors at that time. Blackfeathor (talk) 17:12, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

Your first sentence is wrong: the rampancy or potential rampancy of AI characters is a central part of the plot in Halo: Contact Harvest and I Love Bees, and IIRC escaping it is one of Cortana's motivations in Halo: First Strike. There's also a reference in Oni, although IIRC it's not clear whether it means the same thing. --DocumentN (talk) 03:11, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Actually, you only clarify my first statement as being correct. Rampancy is a plot device devoloped by Bungie and is consequently unique to their game settings. The fact that it appears in a majority of their various game's lore doesn't indicate that it exists elsewhere in a larger literary sense. My point being, if it's not common enough to exist outside of Bungie developed plot lines, then it should probably be contained within the "host" articles themselves rather then as a separate entity. Blackfeathor (talk) 05:05, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Would you also be in favor of merging Force (Star Wars) into Star Wars? --DocumentN (talk) 20:41, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Probably yes. Though I don't really have much interest in Star Wars outside of watching the movies every now and then. Blackfeathor (talk) 04:37, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Rampancy is not limited to Bungie games, though it may be called something different elswhere. I don't know what Hal 9000 was if not rampant. I might point out however, that all links to rampancy, the ones in this articl and from the Halo articles, redirect here. However, this article doesn't explain rampancy at all. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.241.81.238 (talk) 06:44, 28 October 2009 (UTC)

Marathon's Story

I see that there is a link for this website but there is no detailed description of it in the main article. This website was a significant factor for the game's fanbase and it brought to light many of the now well know intricacies of the game's story line. It was also a major participant to the initial buzz surrounding the development and release of Halo via the cortana letters. Should we write up a section which details this relationship? Blackfeathor (talk) 17:11, 25 July 2008 (UTC)

If so, "Halo Effect: An Unauthorized Look at the Most Successful Video Game of All Time" is a book that talks about it, if one's needed. --DocumentN (talk) 03:11, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

It's a start as a reference I guess but how well does it relate to Marathon, as opposed to Halo, in relation to Marathon's Story? Also, is there anything in the book that we could directly reference? Blackfeathor (talk) 03:16, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

No idea; I only really flipped through it. --DocumentN (talk) 04:01, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Computer Game vs Video Game

It seems silly but I reverted a change to the text changing the wording of the description of Marathon from a "Computer Game" to a "Video Game". Seeing as Marathon was only available on computers, I don't see any rationale for chaning it thus. If there is a larger debate concerning these definitions I am not partial to it. Blackfeathor (talk) 02:44, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm not clear on what the connection is between what it is and what platforms it originally ran on. Most computers I've used have been quite capable of running video games, as was the Apple Bandai Pippin, which Marathon was also released for. --DocumentN (talk) 04:38, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

I'm not really sure what your question is but I'll try to clarify my position if that helps. A Computer Game is a game that is primarily developed for computers whereas a Video Game is a more broad definition that could include console systems as well as arcade games, to name a few. There are distinct differences in interfaces between these different systems so I think it's necessary to maintain the classification of computer game as the game takes advantage of a computer's unique modes of interface, namely a mouse and keyboard. I suppose it would be possible to play the game using a controller of some sort but I don't think you would find the experience the same. From my own experience and from that of others the ASDF + mouse interface is often sited as superior to that of the console controller within the First Person Shooter community. I feel that this is an important distiction. Like I originally stated however, it seems silly and I'll even admit to usign the terms interchangeably on occassion. Blackfeathor (talk) 06:32, 9 September 2008 (UTC)

Does Durandal being released on the xBoxLive Arcade make it a video game instead of a computer game? - Tranchera - 29 December 2008 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.59.124.233 (talk) 13:07, 29 December 2008 (UTC)

More on content creation

Maybe there should be a mention of Steve Israelson's Pfhorte editor- which was the go to tool before (and for some people after) Marathon Infinity was released. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.191.159.88 (talk) 21:53, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

I agree. I attempted to create an article for this, but apparently Pfhorte itself does not qualify as 'notable' under Wikipedia's notability criteria (or at least, not until the article is fleshed out more). I have added at least a brief mention for now and will try to work a content creation section into a good place when I have more time.

(once we have more info the Pfhorte redirect should probably be edited to point to the right section)

I guess the main question is: do we have any good references for how much people used Pfhorte (or other editors)? From my experience, Pfhorte was the main tool used by Marathon enthusiasts and saw a ton of activity before Forge came out. It was arguably the reason that the Marathon map-making scene existed at all. Obviously the Marathon scene has died down since the game is very old, but I would argue that Pfhorte was notable for creating most of the Bungie fan-scene and the Macintosh FPS map-making scene. Unfortunately, that is all POV. I don't know any numbers off the top of my head to say how large the map-making community was (The Big House lists 20-some odd major projects). I'd guess there were maybe a couple hundred Marathon map-makers out there? Many of the fan sites have died out or been taken down since the mid 90s. I'll try to find some good references; if anyone has any please add them. --Culix (talk) 06:48, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Some links:

• Pfhorte 1.0d31 mirror
• Pfhorte v1.0d26 (direct link)
• Phforte 2.0a14 (direct link)
• Pfhorte 2.0 Guide FINAL - a comprehensive guide to Pfhorte by map maker Randall Shaw (direct link) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Culix (talk • contribs) 06:50, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I removed your link to the Pfhorte Guide. Please don't put external links under "see also". Also, the guide was written using DocMaker and consists of a Mac OS executable. Few people will be able to read it these days. (Of course, few people will be able to use Pfhorte or Forge either.) I'm not so sure the article should link to pages on mapmaking at all; and if it does, wouldn't it be better to point to something concerning Forge? The Battle Cat's Forge Tips has a few map making tutorials including a mirror of Hastur's Workshop. —Tasnu Arakun (talk) 19:44, 29 July 2009 (UTC)