Sony Interactive Entertainment and Bungie have conducted a playtest for the studio’s upcoming sci-fi extraction first-person shooter, Marathon.
Content creator HiddenXperia took to Twitter/X to announce that he has been at Bungie all week to participate in a Marathon playtest. While he was unable to share any specifics regarding the upcoming sci-fi extraction shooter, he did say that playtesting the game has been a “surreal experience”.
Going by the YouTuber’s remarks, it seems like he is enjoying the competitive multiplayer experience that Marathon has to offer. He is a long-time Halo veteran, and his praise bodes well for the the game and its potential to attain large-scale success.
Not everything we’ve heard about Bungie’s upcoming sci-fi extraction shooter has been positive, however. During a recent episode of Friends Per Second on the Skill Up YouTube channel, guest Jason Schreier, who is known for his game industry insights, was asked how the development of Marathon had been going. In response, he said that things weren’t great based on what he had heard. Schreier mentioned that there’s a reason Marathon was originally planned for release this year in 2024. He said that the game slipped a whole year to sometime in 2025, and people he’s talked to are a little pessimistic about it even hitting its current planned deadline.
Schreier mentioned that the sentiment that has been shared with him around Marathon is not great. This is based on what he had been told a few months ago. He also said that he isn’t sure if Marathon is the right bet, given that it’s an extraction shooter, with PVP as well as PVE attached to it. He doesn’t think that’s what a lot of Bungie fans are looking for, so it is kind of a strange bet from his subjective standpoint. Furthermore, Schreier highlighted that Marathon has had a big leadership shakeup, as it lost its director a few months ago, followed by its executive producer leaving the studio.
