Editing Marathon Trilogy (section)

==Plot==
The ''Marathon'' series was among the first titles in the first-person genre to emphasize storytelling, which it accomplishes through the use of [[Computer terminal|terminals]] within game levels. These wall-mounted computer interfaces allow the player not only to learn their mission objectives and the aspects of the level map but also to become acquainted with the characters in the story as well. This narrative approach could convey much more detail than the typically terse voice acting in ''Marathon''{{'s}} contemporaries.

Set in 2794, the first ''[[Marathon (video game)|Marathon]]'' game places the player as a security officer aboard an enormous human starship called the ''U.E.S.C. Marathon'', orbiting a colony on the planet [[Tau Ceti]] IV. The player must defend the ship and its inhabitants from a race of alien slavers called the Pfhor. As he fights against the invaders, he witnesses interactions among the three shipboard AIs (Leela, Durandal, and Tycho), and discovers that they are working against each other. Durandal has gone [[#Rampancy|rampant]] and appears to be playing the humans against the Pfhor to further his own mysterious agenda, ultimately leading the S'pht, one of the races enslaved by the Pfhor, in a rebellion.

In ''[[Marathon 2: Durandal]]'', taking place seventeen years after the events of the first game, the AI named Durandal sends the player and an army of ex-colonists to search the ruins of Lh'owon, the S'pht homeworld. Lh'owon was once described as a paradise but is now a desert world due to the S'pht Clan Wars and the invasion by the Pfhor. The Pfhor are planning to attack Earth, and Durandal believes that something found on Lh'owon may stall their advance. ''Marathon 2'' added elements to the series such as a Lh'owon-native species known as F'lickta, the mention of an ancient and mysterious race of advanced aliens called the Jjaro, and a clan of S'pht that avoided enslavement by the Pfhor: the S'pht'Kr. At the climax of the game, the player activates Thoth, an ancient Jjaro AI. Thoth then contacts the S'pht'Kr, who in turn destroy the Pfhor armada; in revenge, the Pfhor deploy a weapon that causes the planet's sun to "[[Supernova|go nova]]."

''[[Marathon Infinity]]'', the final game in the series, contains more levels than ''Marathon 2'', and they are larger and part of a more intricate plot. Significant additions to the game's world include the Jjaro ship, non-linear level progression, a high-speed [[Needlegun|flechette gun]] that could be used underwater, and vacuum-suited human allies carrying fusion weapons. Lh'owon's sun is being used as a prison for an [[Lovecraftian horror|eldritch abomination]] called the W'rkncacnter, which was set free when the sun went nova and started to distort space-time. The player traverses multiple timelines, attempting to find one in which the W'rkncacnter is not freed. In one timeline, the player is forced to destroy Durandal, and in another Durandal merges with Thoth. At the end of the game, an ancient Jjaro machine is activated to keep the W'rkncacnter locked in the Lh'owon sun.

Elements of the plot and setting of ''Marathon'' are similar to ''[[The Jesus Incident]]'' (1979) by [[Frank Herbert]] and [[Bill Ransom]]. Both stories take place aboard colony ships orbiting Tau Ceti, where sentient computers have engaged crew and colonists in a fight for survival. Durandal's rampancy parallels the "rogue consciousness" from Herbert's earlier ''[[Destination: Void]]''.