Following the full gameplay reveal for Bungie’s extraction shooter Marathon, it’s been reported that the game will be a “premium” release that players pay for, but the exact pricing has not been made official yet.
Marathon Won’t Be Full Price, But Players Will Still Have to Pay
In a lengthy Marathon impressions piece on GameSpot, Tamoor Hussain writer wrote that Marathon will launch September 23rd as a “premium product, meaning players will be asked to pay full price.” Hussain also confirmed that the game will feature a seasonal content model with its own battle pass, three maps at launch (a fourth coming later), and a persistent story.
Before players panic about having to pay $70 though, it’s already been reported that Marathon’s price point won’t be close to that figure. Forbes gaming writer Paul Tassi, who’s long covered Bungie and Destiny, stated on X that they’ve received confirmation that Marathon is not $70, and will be “not even close” to that number. The official Marathon account has since confirmed that the game will be a premium title, but not full-priced, and stated that more details would be announced in the summer.
As Tassi wrote in an earlier post, releasing closer to $30 or $40 “of course still comes with its own risks.” Several players reacting to the reveal that Marathon won’t be free-to-play immediately are already making comparisons to Concord. Concord, a multi-player shooter released in 2024 as the debut game for Firewalk Studios, launched at a $40 price point for its standard edition. Sadly for Firewalk, the game received luke-warm receptions from critics, and failed to establish any sort of reliable player base. Within two weeks of launch, the game was shut down, and Firewalk Studios was closed two months later, in what’s considered one of the biggest launch disasters in gaming history.
While Bungie has the distinct advantage of a far more impressive track record to boast, Marathon will still face the same challenge: attaching a premium price point for a game that will compete in a saturated market of free-to-play titles.
How much will you pay for Marathon when it launches? Let me know what you think in the comments, or check out the GPlayr forum.
For more GPlayr coverage about Marathon, check out our guide on how to access the game’s closed alpha.