Marathon (Bungie)

[skhellter]

https://x.com/pcgamer/status/1923231979472028067

[BlueMarsalis79]

Lmao, being a hater since Joe Staten departed paying dividends.

[skhellter]

I wasn't ready for the response from the masses to expand into thinking
"actually the whole game's aesthetic was stolen specifically from this artist".
It's been a very stupid day.
The whole acid design, vector graphics scene that kicked off in the late 80s, 90s with dance music album art, rave flyers, then expanded by Designers Republic into video game design. All that was here way before this artist started her work or this new version of Marathon existed.

https://www.thedesignersrepublic.com/wipeout
https://aesthetics.fandom.com/wiki/Acid_Design
https://realicozy.com/acid-design/


https://x.com/milkpack/status/1923383719047418249

[BlueMarsalis79]

Nah man, they have stolen her art entirely down to the memes she inserted in it, Bungie's got to be liquidated, it's morally correct.

[skhellter]

Someone at Bungie stole textures from her - This is also all she claimed.
The person involved isn't working at Bungie anymore.
Bungie is scrubbing those textures from the game.

You can't "steal" an artstyle that nobody owns, that's been here long before these people started making art and will be here long after this.
Everything else that's being said is silly and hyperbolic.

[BlueMarsalis79]

I don't buy it, it's rotten.

As someone who works in said industry I have seen similar before, and this just reeks of moving the blame to some rather conveniently former and unnamed employee rather than taking responsibility, damage control: f**k Bungie.

[BlueMarsalis79]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/video-games/2025/05/16/marathon-playstation-bungie-video-game/ https://archive.ph/WIOsy

"I'd kind of had to learn to shut up about these cases because they've happened so constantly over the past 10 years," she said. "It was tiring to be viewed as 'someone who complains' more than as an artist. But the response this time has been overwhelmingly understanding and I'm extremely thankful for the support."

https://bsky.app/profile/billain.bsky.social/post/3lpafkzimqc2x Another artist being directly lifted from.

https://www.ign.com/articles/bungie-shakes-up-marathon-leadership-removes-chris-barrett-as-game-director

Within the company, there is a growing expectation that senior company leadership will leave in droves in the summer of 2026 when the final payouts from Sony's acquisition of the company take effect. With this in mind, there is a strong push to get Marathon out the door before then, and let whoever takes the reins after that (be it Sony or Bungie) worry about how it's sustained.

Absolutely cremated.

Also a year ago; in another case of blatant plagiarism, Bungie declared to compensate an artist they stole from, then instead fired a random from their legal department whilst claiming it to be their responsibility.

Repeated pattern of behaviour, absolutely indefensible, all of this will certainly not bode well for their current court case either. 

Offical Marathon stream yesterday with the Art Director and it went as well as you might expect it to.

f**ked up throwing him to the wolves in this way, like who cleared this? What an awful company.

[skhellter]

Paul Tassi had a post about how the whole style was actually ripped from the stolen-from indie artist
...which had the effect of siccing the internet on the Marathon Art Director

Tassi then did a tweet about "oh actually, clearly, art director Joseph Cross has had this style since way before the indie artist started working.."

clickbait games journalism only made things worse lmao.

...if you look at the indie artist in question, you can see things that feel inspired by Cross's work, too..

[skhellter]

https://x.com/PaulTassi/status/1923857684102537508

lol, dumbass.

[BlueMarsalis79]

I think to hyperfixcate on one silly misconception, that being the style itself's invention, ignores the mountains of other issues here that's taken precedent.

[skhellter]

it's a style i've loved for years, of course i'm going to focus on it.

game is DOA. Tons of other people will explain why in better detail.

[Xenomrph]

Turning Marathon, of all f**king games, into an extraction shooter is like making System Shock 3 be a co-op platformer.

Like just make a new IP instead of trotting out the corpse of an old one and effectively confirming that no, we are never getting another "true" Marathon game ever again.

[skhellter]

You could argue that Halo is the real Marathon remake. It shares a LOT of worldbuilding elements.

From the Craig Mullins aesthetic, to the AI named after a sword, cyborg protagonist, alien empire being a blend of several different species... even the marathon logo appears in many places.
Halo also has you dual-wielding guns... which was one of the things the original Marathon game invented. And Nu-Marathon doesn't even have.

[skhellter]

the art kerfuffle helped kill the game in the eyes of many.
Now many people think the WHOLE thing's aesthetic is stolen

and it's now being called

Art Raiders

There's no coming back from this. It doesn't matter if it a small misconception.
It's now what people perceive the game as.

Ideally, a sane developer would kill this version of it.
Turn all the assets into a single player game.. you know.. like the originals.

90% of the internet seems actively hostile towards the game.

[BlueMarsalis79]

I've been violently hostile towards Bungie since Destiny's initial release, I never have to apologise for the way I acted if it ceases to exist though!