Marathon 2: Durandal (Xbox 360)

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Description

Following the events of the original game, the Pfhor aliens have been defeated and the A.I. known as Durandral has been freed from it's containment. 17 years have passed and Durandral has assembled his own army from the colonists of Tau Ceti, including the Security Officer. Traveling across the galaxy, Durandral finds the home world of the S'pht, a Pfhor slave race, who Durandal liberates and who now worship Durandral as their Messiah. Durandal is searching for the location of a legendary lost tribe of S'pht who may hold the key to his mad quest for... well, whatever he's madly questing for. Unfortunately, the Pfhor dislike Durandral's presence and begin attacking his army.

Marathon 2: Durandal is the sequel to the first Marathon. Although the engine is similar to Doom in most respects (2.5D maps, bitmap sprites instead of polygons, etc.), Marathon 2 distinguishes itself with such features such as: a rudimentary inventory system, ambient sound, multiple fire modes for each weapon, allies who aid the player, enemies belonging to different factions which will attack each other, a more developed plot (gradually narrated to the player at various computer terminals scattered throughout the levels (much like System Shock's e-mail transmissions)).

The game's engine has gained a number of improvements over the original Marathon. It now displays in a much larger portion of the screen, supports maps with four times the complexity and adds support for liquids and swimming. All liquids use oxygen when the player is submerged and some also do damage. Many levels have mechanisms allowing areas to be flooded or drained, changing the depth of the liquid.

The other major new feature is a bunch of new multiplayer modes. The entire single-player portion can be played cooperatively with up to eight players and the game adjusts weapon and monster placement accordingly. In addition to "Every Man for Himself" mode (essentially deathmatch), it now includes "Kill of the Hill" where the object is to occupy a designated spot on the map more than anyone else, and "Kill the Guy with the Ball" where the object is to hold a skull the longest, the player holding it being unable to fire weapons.

Screenshots

Alternate Titles

• "Marathon: Durandal" -- Xbox 360 title

Part of the Following Groups

• Graphics Engine: Marathon 2
• Marathon series

User Reviews

A classic finally comes to a platform people actually own and play games on

Ace of Sevens (4229)

The Press Says

TeamXbox	Aug 01, 2007	7.9 out of 10	79
IGN	Jul 31, 2007	7.4 out of 10	74
PAL Gaming Network (PALGN)	Aug 28, 2007	7 out of 10	70
FileFactory Games / Gameworld Network	Aug 08, 2007	65 out of 100	65
GameSpot	Aug 02, 2007	6.5 out of 10	65
Game Positive	Aug 29, 2007	6.4 out of 10	64
UOL Jogos	Aug 02, 2007		60
Eurogamer.net (UK)	Aug 07, 2007	6 out of 10	60
Boomtown	Aug 09, 2007	6 out of 10	60
Xboxdynasty (XD)	Aug 16, 2007	5.7 out of 10	57

Forums

Topic	# Posts	Last Post
Kids these days	2	Zovni (9360) Aug 06, 2007
Coming to XBLA	5	Ace of Sevens (4229) Jul 18, 2007

Trivia

The Marathon logo is used repeatedly in Bungie's more recent xbox/pc game, Halo. Bungie must really like that circle/circle motif

Related Web Sites

• Aleph One (SourceForge project page of Aleph One, an open-source game engine based on Marathon 2's source code)
• Marathon Central (A comprehensive hub for almost all the Marathon related resources on the internet. Includes detailed maps, walkthroughs, and even spoilers and speculations on the game's story)
• Marathon Open Source (Home of the open source development on Marathon)
• Postmortem: Freeverse's Marathon 2: Durandal (Feature about the Xbox 360 port of Durandal written by Mark Levin.)
• X360A achievement guide (X360A's achievement guide for Marathon: Durandal.)