Marathon 2: Durandal

The Good
Even though my brother and I played the Mac version of this game and its predecessor, Marathon, it stands as a landmark in gaming...period. The atmosphere that pervaded all aspects of this ground-breaking FPS made you just want to crawl out of your skin. The sound of shell casings hitting the floor, the way you swam through water, crawling through tunnels right into an alien's face...I remember actually gasping out loud when playing this.

Most of all, this early Bungie game made it absolutely necessary to have a compelling story in this type of game. If it had reached a larger audience I believe we would see Bungie holding the esteemed place of ID instead.

Unfortunately, this game only found its way to Macheads or devotees of Bungie and therefore still hasn't received its just reward.

Oh, and let's not forget that Marathon was a NETWORK game when only DOOM and DESCENT held that distinction.

The Bad
Durandal wasn't as ground-breaking as its predecessor and was riddled with bugs. It had one of those irritating load-crash-load-crash faults that make you just want to throw it away.

Good thing I didn't. It was amazing.

The Bottom Line
This was THE one. DOOM opened the door at the same time as MARATHON. It was the "Chuck Yeager" of the early game world, a whisper, unfortunately, when DOOM was a banshee.