Before Bungie took the video gaming world by storm with Halo, they made a great game call Marathon for the Macintosh. The first game in the Marathon Trilogy was released way back in 1994 and at the time, the Mac didn’t have a very large catalog of games to choose from. When it was released it was technically more sophisticated than rival FPS such as Doom, but because it was exclusively available for the Mac, it was largely eclipsed by the competition.
Programmer Daniel Blezek has faithfully recreated Marathon for the iPad using Bungie’s own original source code. It’s available now for free, but if you want the HD version complete with higher resolution textures, then it’ll cost you $3.99. This version of Marathon also includes a Master Chief Mode for $.99, that let’s you start at any level, have access to all seven weapons, infinite ammo, instant shield recharging, invulnerability and the ability to instantly save at any point during the game.
The game originally shipped on floppy disks and the system requirements are like something out of a history book. According to the original Marathon manual, “Marathon requires a 256 color capable Macintosh Computer with a 68020 or better processor, system 6.0.5 or higher, a hard disk, and about 3 megabytes of available RAM. For Network Play, System 7 or higher is required. Advanced features such as 16-bit graphics and background music require extra memory.” The Mac has come a long way since then.
Marathon is not yet available for the iPhone or iPod Touch, but it should only be a matter of time before it turns up there as well. Considering the modest system requirements for the game, it should translate well on a smaller screen. Hopefully, Daniel will be able to port the rest of the series to iOS at some point in the near future.
Source: Marathon 4 iOS
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