Latest news with #SacredSymbols
Forbes
25-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Forbes
‘Marathon' Isn't Canceled, But It's Bad We Even Have To Ask That
Marathon Bungie Marathon cannot stop being thrown into fresh drama every few days since its controversial Closed Alpha which led to a string of reports about things going poorly internally, capped off by a revelation that an artist had plagiarized art currently still in the game. Now, we have a worrying report from Colin Moriarty on Sacred Symbols where he says that all paid marketing for Marathon this quarter has been canceled by Sony. This tracks somewhat with what I was told a little while back, though he's getting info on the Sony side (he's trustworthy) while I'm getting it on the Bungie side. I heard the entire marketing plan was thrown out and had to restart from scratch, and plans like a new trailer launching pre-orders and a big public beta a month before launch were not happening. I didn't hear anything about all paid marketing being erased, but I wouldn't be surprised if that's where things ended up. There is now talk about whether this means Marathon is delayed or even cancelled after its disastrous couple of weeks. Delayed? I'm almost positive, yes. Canceled? It's hard to see how that could happen given that it would be Sony's second obscene live service blowup in a year. Blowing up a game on the launchpad this close to release with years and hundreds of millions invested would be insanity. It's close to what happened with Concord, yes, but the difference here is that this is Bungie, not just a storied shooter studio but one that Sony paid (an absurdly overpriced) $3.6 billion for. Marathon Bungie You can't cancel it now. It's too late. You have to roll the dice, but to do that, you need at least some sort of delay to reset the narrative and polish and add…I don't know, something to the game to make it more of a draw at launch. A delay is what I think this marketing hold means because you're not going to bother spooling up a big ad campaign for a game that isn't coming out until when? Sometime in 2026, from the looks of all this. I have been on the 'delay Marathon' train before, and I still think it's the least-worst option, but my position has also evolved into thinking it simply does not matter. Marathon's problems are too foundational, a class-based extraction game entirely unbalanced for solo play, not accessible enough for casuals, and not hardcore enough for existing genre players. Oh, and its cool art style that was the one thing it had going for it? You can't talk about that without saying 'plagiarism' in the same sentence, no matter how few decals may have been stolen. The marketing spend pull isn't a shock, but I get how it certainly sounds like that. The writing has pretty clearly been on the wall since the Alpha that this is not a game that can be released in four months, and it's not just because of some visual polish. Still, I have not heard anything internally about a delay (or cancellation, though those conversations are probably only happening at the top levels. But if Sony is making this move now, some public news may be imminent. Follow me on Twitter, YouTube, Bluesky and Instagram. Pick up my sci-fi novels the Herokiller series and The Earthborn Trilogy.
Yahoo
23-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
The Last of Us showrunner teases potential third video game instalment
The Last of Us showrunner Neil Druckmann has shared his thoughts on the possibilities of a third game in the franchise saying that he would 'jump at' the opportunity. The hit video game has been adapted into a critically acclaimed and Emmy award-winning HBO series starring Pedro Pascal, Bella Ramsey, Gabriel Luna and Catherine O'Hara. The second season began last month and will reach its conclusion with the seventh episode this weekend. While based on the 2020 video game sequel The Last of Us Part II, it's still not close to bringing the game's full story to the screen. Although a third season has been confirmed by HBO, a release date has yet to be confirmed. Details on which of the game's narratives the season will follow have not been disclosed, although it is likely to focus on Kaitlyn Dever's antagonist Abby. Speaking to the Sacred Symbols podcast, Druckmann, who is also the head of creative at video game developer Naughty Dog, has now dropped a hint that a third game could be in the works, potentially giving the show more stories to play with in the future. When asked about the possibility of a third game, the 46-year-old said: 'While I'm the caretaker of this franchise, it's important that everything is of high quality. I don't want to just make a lot of it. I want to be very thoughtful about everything we make. 'When we did the show, we teamed up with, I feel, the best TV makers with HBO and we're making the best version of that. 'If we were ever to come back to it, I want to make sure it's a story worthy of The Last of Us. I love that world, I love these characters. With the right opportunity, with the right idea, yeah, I would totally jump at it.' Druckmann's words echo those of fellow showrunner Craig Mazin, who recently said that he hopes the dystopian series will run for at least two more seasons to allow for the completion of the show's narrative. Speaking to Collider, Mazin explained that 'there's no way to complete this narrative in a third season. Hopefully, we'll earn our keep enough to come back and finish it in a fourth.' He also hinted that the third season would feature more episodes than the second. Asked by the publication about why the writers chose to end season two where it does, Mazin responded: 'We always think ahead. We thought ahead to Season 3 and Season 4, to try to get as much visibility as we can, so that we don't end up in a situation where we're sitting down and getting into details for a season and then going, 'Oh, man, if only we hadn't had that person say that one line or be in that spot or wear that jacket, this would be so much cooler.' 'So, we really do try to think things through fundamentally. The challenge for our first season was, how do we tell this big story in a way that's complete and doable within an amount of time and with the budget we have? And with this season, it was, 'OK, this source material goes way beyond one season.''
