Other Bungie Games





Marathon Trilogy


Story


Set in 2794, Marathon places the player as a security officer aboard an enormous human starship called the U.E.S.C. Marathon, orbiting a colony on the planet Tau Ceti IV. Throughout the game, the player attempts to defend the ship (and its crew and colonists) from a race of alien slavers called the Pfhor. As he fights against the invaders, he witnesses interactions among the three shipboard AIs (Leela, Durandal and Tycho), and discovers that all is not as it seems aboard the Marathon. Among other problems, Durandal has gone rampant and appears to be playing the humans against the Pfhor to further his own mysterious agenda; ultimately leading the S'pht, one of the races enslaved by the Pfhor, in a rebellion.


Seventeen years after the events of the first game, in Marathon 2: Durandal, the artificial intelligence, Durandal, sends the player and an army of ex-colonists to search the ruins of Lh'owon, the S'pht homeworld. Lh'owon was once described as a paradise but is now a desert world after first the S'pht Clan Wars and then the invasion by the Pfhor. He does not mention what information he is looking for, although he does let it slip that the Pfhor are planning to attack Earth, and that being on Lh'owon may stall their advance. Marathon 2 brings many elements to the game that can be considered staples of the series such as: a Lh'owon-native species known as F'lickta, the mention of an ancient and mysterious race of advanced aliens called the Jjaro, and a clan of S'pht that avoided enslavement by the Pfhor - the S'pht'Kr. At the climax of the game, the player activates Thoth, an ancient Jjaro AI. Thoth then contacts the S'pht'Kr, who in turn destroy the Pfhor armada.


Marathon Infinity, the final game in the series, includes more levels than Marathon 2, which are larger and part of a more intricate plot. The game's code changed little since Marathon 2, and many levels can be played unmodified in both games. The only significant additions to the game's engine were the Jjaro ship, multiple paths between levels, a new rapid-fire weapon that could be used underwater, and vacuum-enabled humans carrying fusion weapons (called "Vacuum Bobs" or "VacBobs"). The player traverses multiple timelines, attempting to find one in which the W'rkncacnter is not freed. In one timeline, the player is forced to destroy Durandal, and in another Durandal merges with Thoth. At the end of the game, an ancient Jjaro machine is activated that keeps the W'rkncacnter locked in the Lh'owon sun.


Elements of the plot and setting of Marathon are similar to The Jesus Incident by Frank Herbert and Bill Ransom. Both stories take place aboard colony ships orbiting Tau Ceti, where sentient computers have engaged crew and colonists in a fight for survival. While Ship in The Jesus Incident has achieved a higher level of omniscient consciousness, Durandal's rampancy parallels the “rogue consciousness” from Herbert's earlier Destination: Void.


Gameplay


Throughout the games the player accesses computer terminals through which he communicates with artificial intelligences, receives mission data, and gets teleported to other levels via "Jump Pads". Though contact with computers is how they are primarily utilized, they are a fundamental storytelling element; some terminals contain civilian/alien reports or diaries, database articles, conversations between artificial intelligences and even stories or poems. Messages may change depending on a player's progress in a certain level. The ultimate goal of most levels is not to merely reach the end but to complete the type(s) of objective(s) specified: extermination of all or specific creatures, exploration of a level or locating an area in the level, retrieving one or more item, hitting a certain "repair" switch, or preventing half of the civilians from being killed (a mission only present in two levels in the first game).


Most levels contain platforms, defined as anything able to change its height. Though it is generally used to describe lifts, doors are included in this category. Doors may or may not show up on the player's automap and are usually opened with the action key. In cases where they are damaged or locked they can be opened by special designated triggers or switches. Switches control various functions such as lifts, doors and lighting and come in the form of manual switches that can be toggled with the action key, stations for computer chips or breakable circuitry. Some switches are "tag" switches that execute multiple functions at once or those that must be activated as part of "repair" missions. Another notable level feature is teleporters, able to send players who use them to different parts of a level or to other levels. Aliens are unable to use them.


As the player combats enemies, he will inevitably take damage and must replenish health by means of special panels that recharge his suit's shields. There are three types of such panels, recharging single (red), double (yellow) or triple (purple) shields. Occasionally a full "colour bar" of shield power can be recharged instantaneously by obtaining a powerup canister.


In Marathon 2 and Marathon Infinity, the player can swim in four different types of media: water, sewage, lava and acid/plasma — the latter two are damaging to health. Levels of the original Marathon did not contain media capable of swimming in. However, some did have floors textured with orange lava or green goo that will inflict damage on the player when standing upon them. When the player is submerged in liquids, the run key can be used in order to swim. In liquids or in "vacuum" areas, the player's oxygen depletes and it must be recharged using a special oxygen recharge station. Should the player lose all oxygen or health, he dies and is sent back to the last pattern buffer (a special terminal that according to the storyline saves molecular data) at which he saved. Because some levels do not have these devices, dying results in having to complete the entire level again.


Gravity is fairly low on some levels, and the correct application of the flamethrower or alien weapon allows the player to hover. "Hopping" with the grenade launcher or rockets can be used, but usually involves a fair amount of damage to the character.


The heads-up display has an inventory, health and oxygen bars, and a motion sensor. The motion sensor displays alien creatures as red triangles and friendly humans or robots as green squares; it tracks their motion relative to the player, represented by a square in the middle whenever the player moves. The brightness of the middle square represents how still the player is and how well he can be tracked. On some levels the motion sensor is erratic due to magnetic artificial gravity fields.


Marathon has five difficulty settings: Kindergarten, Easy, Normal, Major Damage, and Total Carnage. Differences involve the omission of some creatures from each level and creatures marked as minor in the game's physics model are promoted to their major versions or vice versa. On higher difficulty levels, creatures attack more frequently and have more vitality and on the highest setting (Total Carnage), the player is allowed to carry an unlimited amount of ammunition.


The Marathon Trilogy has received wide praise for its multiplayer mode, which was unique in that it not only had several levels specifically designed for multiplayer — as opposed to contemporaries that used modified single-player levels — but also because it offered unique gametypes beyond the deathmatch. Games can be free-for-all or team ordeals, and can be limited by time or number of kills, or they can have no limit whatsoever. The host of a game has the option of setting penalties for suicides and dying (once dead, players cannot be revived for a certain amount of time). The motion sensor (which displays a player's enemies as yellow squares and teammates as green ones) can be disabled and the map is able to show all of the players in the game. Upon the preference of the host, maps can be played with or without aliens. The difficulty level of each game is preset by the gatherer.


Marathon network games can be played over AppleTalk Remote, LocalTalk, TokenTalk, Ethernet, and more recently, a LAN network or the Internet. If a player's computer has a microphone, it is possible to use it to communicate with other players.


Every Man For Himself

This is the standard deathmatch. The winner is the person or team with the greatest score. A player loses a point if he dies but gains a point every time he kills. This is the only gametype present in the original Marathon; Bungie planned on adding the ones included in sequels, but could not due to time constraints.

Cooperative Play

This style of play has players assisting each other in completion of certain levels. Scores are based on percentages of how many aliens they kill. It has received little popularity.

Kill the Man With the Ball

In this game, the objective is to hold the ball (skull) for the longest amount of time. If holding the ball, a player cannot run or attack unless he drops the ball by pressing the "fire" key. The motion sensor, if enabled, acts as a compass to point players in the direction of the ball. This mode was succeeded by the Oddball gametype in the Halo series.

King of the Hill

Players try to stay located in a specially marked area for the longest amount of time. It was originally planned for a pedestal to indicate the location of the Hill but in the final version was indicated by a compass on the motion sensor.

Tag

The first player to be killed becomes "It." If a player is killed by "It," he becomes the new "It." The winner is the player who is "It" for the least amount of time. This might be a predecessor to the Halo gametype "Juggernaut", but in reverse.

Myth (computer game series)


Gameplay


General


Players control small forces made up of a number of different units possessing their own strengths and weaknesses. In the single player game, these were limited to units representing 'The Light'; but multiplayer allowed players to control units from both sides of the conflict.


Unlike many other strategy games available at the time of its release, Myth's combat does not focus on the collection of resources and the building of armies. In contrast to the "meat grinder" style of some games - it is possible for a skilled player to defeat a much larger force with few or no casualties. This is, largely, due to the advanced physics engine the game employs. Physically modelled environments, unit interactions, and diverse unit behaviours combine to create a gameplay experience in which realistic battlefield interactions can and do occur.


Myth employs a sophisticated physics engine which greatly affects gamplay. Nearly all objects on the map, even the remains of dead units, are potential projectiles. These objects react with one another, units on the map, and terrain with nearly all expected physical behaviour; including rolling, bouncing, and crashing. Projectiles, including those fired by ranged units, have no guarantee of hitting any target; they are merely propelled in the directions instructed by the physics engine, based on the actions of the players. Arrows may miss their targets due to a randomly small degree of simulated aiming error that becomes significant at long range; or the target may simply move out of the way if the arrow’s flight time is particularly long. This aiming error may cause the arrow to hit the attacker’s own melee unit instead, causing the same amount of damage as friendly fire is a permanent aspect of the game at all times.


Formations of units are tactically important in Myth because individual units occupy physical space, and thus no two units can occupy or cross the same physical space at the same time. When placed together in formation, units can provide an effective defensive front; block an enemy force’s escape route; or exploit bad positioning of an enemy force by surrounding it. Since healing is a rare ability; units do not regenerate health; and there is no way to construct new units, hit and run skirmishes are effective and unit conservation is essential. In light of this, each point of damage can be significant.


Terrain and environmental factors are also important. Rain or standing water will put out some fire or explosive based attacks. Archers on the high ground are able to shoot farther than those on level ground. Most units will flinch when damaged, interrupting actions such as movement and attacks. This has many strategic implications: for example, if two or three melee units gang up to attack one enemy melee unit, it may flinch too frequently to have the chance to attack or escape.


Each unit has a name and gains individual experience for each kill it makes, with some monstrous units being worth more experience than smaller units. Experience increases attack rate and accuracy, as well as (for units with shields) the probability of blocking an attack. All else being equal, an experienced army will destroy a comparable force of fresh units.


Blood permanently stains the terrain and bodies do not decay. This blood-ground-smear gives battles in Myth a gritty, gory, unsanitized feel. The events of battles can be deduced from battlefield detritus, which is important in multiplayer free-for-all games and some single-player missions. Explosions and fire also scorch the landscape, and any blast may launch any debris outward, possible causing damage to nearby units.


Multiplayer


In multiplayer, the player starts with an army and may usually customize it by trading units, using point values that approximate the value of the units. Proper selection of units is an enormous strategy itself, given the goal of each multi-player game. For example: if the goal of the game is to stand guard a flag as long as possible (as it is with King of the Hill), customizing your army with only ranged units would not be wise because there would be no melee to guard the flag. Such considerations make Myth all the more realistic because of the constant amount of strategic choices.


Games generally are either "free-for-all" or FFA, where each player has his own army and competes with everyone else, or "Team," where each army is controlled by a group of players with a captain who disperses units for his teammates to control. There are many different kinds of multiplayer games, ranging from simple "Body Count" to more complicated games involving flags, balls, or animals.


The number and variety of multiplayer game types and multiplayer players are one reason why Myth has remained so popular online. For each game type, different strategies are employed.


Solo


In the single player campaign, the player starts the mission with an army and must use it to accomplish specific goals. These goals range from defending a location, reaching a certain point on the map, escorting a unit safely, or destroying an object of strategic significance. In rare cases it is possible for the player to acquire new units to bolster his forces, although this is the exception rather than the rule.


The focus of the Myth series' solo campaigns is on a smaller force out-maneuvering and out-thinking a much larger enemy force. For this reason, the importance of terrain and unit formation is particularly important. Using high ground to further the range of archers; creating bottle necks; and whittling down an enemy with hit and run tactics all become crucial strategies in the single player game.


Units in the solo campaign acquire 'experience' with each kill they make. As they acquire experience, units become more resilient, attack faster, and deal more damage. In Myth: The Fallen Lords units would retain this experience until killed or until a unit of their type did not appear in a given scenario. In Myth II: Soulblighter and Myth III: The Wolf Age, units would retain experience until killed. Therefore, with careful management, it becomes possible for a player to create an army of heroes from the inexperienced soldiers they began play with.


Units


What follows is a listing of unit types, divided into Light or Dark based on their nature. Light units get shields next to their name to denote kills, while Dark units get skulls. Light and Dark does not necessarily denote their alignment; sometimes in the campaign the player will control Dark units or face off against Light units. In multiplayer, this distinction is irrelevant, and a player almost always controls mixed armies of both types of units. "Light" and "Dark" have another meaning in multiplayer: most maps have "Light" and "Dark" variants, where the Dark variant allows control of very powerful units. It's important to note the only difference between a "light" and "dark" map is the unit selection; the actual terrain of the maps are identical. For example: the map "I'll Dance on your Grave" and "I'll Dance on your Spiderweb" are completely identical in terrain, but the latter allows access to much stronger, more potent, more damage-inflicting units. As a result, very different strategies exist for each "light" and "dark" maps. The difference in gameplay between the two maps is so great that many players were often termed "dark mappers" or "light mappers" regarding with which unit types they worked best. Furthermore, a player could have an excellent "map strategy" for a dark map, but perform poorly on the same light version map.


The number in parenthesis below is the multiplayer point cost, which gives an idea of the relative value of the unit. For the sake of brevity, some uncommon units are not listed.


Storyline


The Myth series is set in a fantasy world that was inspired in many ways by Glen Cook's Black Company novels, as it is narrated via a common soldier's journal that tells the tale of life itself coming under attack by an undead horde and its masters, the Fallen Lords. Certain Lovecraftian themes also appear throughout, and there are numerous borrowings from Celtic mythology.



Oni


Gameplay

There are ten different guns in Oni, including handguns, rifles, rocket launchers, and energy weapons. Power-ups such as "hyposprays", which heal damage, and cloaking devices, which render the player invisible, can be found scattered throughout the levels or on corpses. Since the player can carry only one weapon at a time and ammunition is scarce, hand-to-hand combat is also effective. The player can punch, kick, and throw enemies; progressing into later levels unlocks stronger moves and combos.


There are multiple classes of enemy, each with its own style of unarmed combat. Each class is subdivided into tiers well-ordered with respect to strength. As in Bungie's earlier Marathon titles, tiers are color-coded.


Unlike most console games, Oni does not confine the player to fighting small groups of enemies in small arenas; each area is fully open to explore. The fourteen levels are of various sizes, some large enough to comprise an entire building. Bungie hired two architects to design the buildings.


The Oni engine implements a method of interpolation that tweens key frames, smoothing out the animation of complex martial-arts moves. However, frame slippage is a common problem when multiple non-player characters near the player are attacking.


Plot

The action of Oni takes place around the year 2032. The game world is a dystopia, an Earth so polluted that little of it remains habitable. To solve unspecified international economic crises, all nations have combined into a single entity, the World Coalition Government. The government is Orwellian, telling the populace that what are actually dangerously toxic regions are wilderness preserves, and using the Technological Crimes Task Force, its secret police, to spy on citizens and suppress opposition. The player character, code-named Konoko (voiced by Amanda Winn-Lee), full name later given as Mai Hasegawa, begins the game working for the police. Soon, she learns her employers have been keeping secrets about her past from her. She turns against them as she embarks on a quest of self-discovery. The player learns more about her family and origins while battling both the Technological Crimes Task Force and its greatest enemy, the equally monolithic criminal organization called the Syndicate. In the game's climax, Konoko discovers a Syndicate plan to cause the Atmospheric Conversion Centers, air-treatment plants necessary to keep most of the world's population alive, to catastrophically malfunction. She is partially successful in thwarting the plot, saving a portion of humanity.


Levels

Characters

Classes of enemies and allies

Weapons and Items

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