The game I want to examine for this exercise is Bungie’s Marathon. For some context, Marathon is an extraction shooter by genre. Gameplay consists of loading into a map with your inventory, then searching for loot while contending with ai controlled enemies and fellow players to acquire more loot. Once satisfied the player can go to an extraction point allowing for them to escape the map with their loot. What I would call the key mechanic of Marathon is that if at any point you die, your inventory is dropped, and other players are free to pick it up. This is where Marathon’s loot progression comes in, as you have successful runs, you gradually accumulate stronger loot.
Marathon’s rarity system for weapons is highly customizable and granular. Instead of having assigned rarity tiers, Marathon’s weapons have their rarity assigned based on mods equipped to the weapon. This means you can take a weapon all the way from the lowest to the highest rarity if you manage to extract with it enough, and develop a kind of emotional attachment to it. The last mechanic I’ll talk about is how quick Marathon’s time to kill is. In Marathon having better gear gives you the edge over your opponents, but with proper strategy and the element of surprise, it’s possible to beat fully geared teams with a fresh inventory. This creates this dynamic where you go on a sort of streak of successful runs, slowly building up your inventory, only to lose it all eventually. I think the really unique aspect of this loop though is the way it manages to keep challenge fun alive at every step of the way. On an early runs of the loop you’re fighting enemies stronger than you keeping you on your toes, forcing you to strategize. Once you get further into this loop, you have the pressure of losing your whole inventory, and having to start the loop all over again. This means the game constantly has you at the edge of your seat. In almost every run of Marathon there’s a moment where I feel myself completely focused with my heart pounding, a feeling I love from challenge games, but also one that is reserved for climactic moments.
