Bungie’s Marathon reboot will reportedly cost $40, despite the recent failure of Concord, a similarly priced Sony game, as development is “too far along” to make the game free.
That’s according to Forbes’ Paul Tassi, who, citing a “source with knowledge of Marathon,” claims that Bungie’s uncertainty about monetization reached a fever pitch after its free-to-play, live-service shooter The Finals underperformed. The subsequent success of Sony’s live-service shooter Helldivers 2, which launched with a $40 price tag, reportedly finally convinced Bungie and Sony that this was the right approach for Marathon as well.
That was, however, before Sony’s second live-service shooter of 2024, Concord, adopted the same $40 monetization approach and proved so commercially disastrous that it was pulled from sale after just two weeks, with players getting their money back. But despite Concord’s failure, Bungie and Sony reportedly still plan to release Marathon with an initial price of $40 – complete with “standard cosmetic store/battle pass stuff” – “unless something seismic happens”, simply because, says Tassi, development is “too far along to go back to free-to-play”.
In addition to discussing Marathon’s monetization, Forbes’ report also includes a number of gameplay details. For example, the extraction shooter is said to adopt a class/hero system largely similar to Apex Legends, but with a greater focus on personalization. Characters are said to each have a handful of unique abilities, like double jumps and quick revives — but the emphasis is said to be on customizable weapons and gear, universal character implants, and gameplay buffs earned via XP and changeable skill trees.
According to Forbes, it’s a shift from the game’s original vision, which changed when Joe Ziegler replaced former game director Christopher Barrett this spring — after Barrett was reportedly ousted from Bungie for inappropriate behavior. Barrett’s original vision for Marathon was to echo Destiny 2’s Dreaming City, with puzzles and secrets to solve — but those elements “just didn’t come together in practice.”
It’s also been claimed that Marathon (which will reportedly retain the well-received visual style seen in the announcement trailer) won’t get a “significant” reveal until spring of next year – despite the development team “really, really wanting to bring more to players and talk about it.” Forbes adds that the stakes are high if Bungie gets Marathon right, given Sony’s lack of goodwill following its recent failures. However, “Bungie will release Marathon in 2025 with enough content and a high enough quality bar.”
Bungie named Marathon a top focus in July, following its decision to lay off 220 staff members. The layoffs followed 100 layoffs last October, with many former and current Bungie employees calling for the studio’s CEO, Pete Parsons, to step down.
