level. The great thing about these terminals was that while players were reading them,
though they could no longer see the game-world, the game-world was still very much
active and players could be attacked by aliens or drowned by rising water. This some-
times gave the reading of the terminals a certain urgency, keeping the players’
game-world tension active. Of course, players were able to control the text by flipping
forward and backward through the screens, rereading the text at whatever speed they
wanted. Bungie’s subsequent game,Halo, drew a lot of its strengths from ideas first
introduced inMarathon.Haloalso featured excellent in-game storytelling through the
teammates that accompany players on various missions, the computer AI that speaks
to players through their body armor, and events that happen in the game-world. Unfor-
tunatelyHalodid not include anything as novel asMarathon’s computer terminals, an
in-game technique, but instead featured cut-scenes, an out-of-game technique.
Damage Incorporatedused a combination of NPC behaviors and dialog to give play-
ers some sense of character about the teammates who accompany them through the
game’s various missions. Players were able to pick from among thirteen different
marines the four they wanted to accompany them on a given mission. Each of these
marines had a distinct personality and would communicate this through the dialog he
spoke during the missions themselves. This dialog might include the response to a
directive from players, a comment about the nature of the mission itself, or a response
to the players’ particularly effective killing of an enemy. Furthermore, different team-
mates could react differently to being taken on different missions. Some of the marines
were less mentally sound than others and if taken on too many missions they would
become “shell shocked” and run around the level at random, muttering gibberish all the
while. Other marines would have moral objections to some of the missions on which
the team was sent. As a result, these rogue teammates would rebel against players and
their other teammates in certain circumstances, shouting their disapproval for the task
at hand as they went on a murderous rampage. Thus, a combination of dialog and NPC
behaviors created a group of teammates with real personalities, almost all of which was
communicated during the gameplay itself.
214 Chapter 11: Storytelling
TheMarathongames
allow players to log
onto computer terminals
scattered throughout
the levels, where they
can read more about
the game’s complex
story. Pictured here:
Marathon 2.