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Okay, two very different companies that chose two very different paths. How is it possible that one of Valve's games could be compared to one of Bungie's?
I'm not a gamer in the truest sense, (heck I can't even finish Marathon:Infity), but I here is my point of view anyway.
Lets start with the most apparent and "surface" similarities. You play a nameless security guard in Marathon. You start the story with practically no background info or briefing. In Half-Life, you start as an anonymous scientist entering the infamous Black Mesa facility.
Gameplay is alike, too. Marathon emphasized puzzles and tactical use of ammunition. Ammunition was extremely rare, and melee combat for weaker opponents was often used. What's Gordon Freeman's favorite? The headcrabs fear the crowbar. Then wrack your brains on some more puzzles, yay! But don't get too careless. You're not invincible. Health stations in Marathon ocurred literally once a level. Health stations in Half Life actually ran out after a fraction of health.
The Marathon armory, such as the magnum superpistol, the bullet hose AR with the underslung grenade launcher and the awesomesauce rocket launcher reincarnated into the Freeman's arsenal.
In the storyline, you saw the various species and generously dished out the pain, leaving a goopy mess behind you. You fought bravely, eventually setting fire to the alien homeworld. (Although in Marathon that didn't happen in the original trilogy, S'pht were not enemies unless..yeah..)
In other words, the "look and feel" of the two games.
Of course, many of you would say that these "similarities" occur in many other games, it is too broad to single out Half-Life.
What matters most to me is the correlation between the two stories. Remember in Marathon when you read the last terminal, still hungry for answers even as you teleported out? Then, you would wake up in the next game from seemingly cryo sleep- the world went on while you were in that place...sleeping. Who the heck was Bernhard Strauss? Who was G-Man? I think some of you can even draw correlations between HL characters with Marathon's.
Okay, maybe that was a bit weak. But think back. Many video game devs now are catching on to this concept. Was there anything the like when HL was released, two years after the first Marathon in '96? Dicuss below!