I first played the original version (or at least close to it) of this scenario back around 2005 or 2006. Of course I didn't understand the story at all. I guess that can happen when you're an impatient teenager, but I remember really liking that I was playing a new Marathon scenario, and it was really fun to check out. I finished it with the sense of "That was interesting....but what just happened?", but to be fair, that's pretty much how Infinity was for me, for the longest time too.

Didn't really play it again for a long time until either last year or early this year when I was told to check out 1.2.1 which was the newest at the time, and I was totally amazed by it. How advanced and updated the levels, and just so many other things looked, and some things I actually did remember from that first version looked a lot better and let's say "more alive" afterwards. You could really see just how much work was put into this.

When the 1.3 previews rolled around. I decided to check them out because I'm the kind of guy who is always interested in seeing how something has changed from last time. While I know 4 previews can be a bit much, each one brought something new to the table, and I loved it. The new usage of color just about everywhere compared to 1.2.1 really stood out to me, as well as the updated monsters, and updated landscapes. The work done on those was phenomenal. I also like how some parts of some levels where in 1.2.1 I would be like "It would be cool if you could get in there." Then low and behold, 1.3 does just that. The usage of tracks switching up for a lot of the levels was a fantastic idea to give some variety.

The use of sounds in general are put to VERY good use for all of the levels, and especially for making all platforms ambient, which plenty know I talk about. Being the sound freak that I am, that was one of the first things I noticed from 1.2.1 when I watched some of the demo videos, and I was so glad to hear it.

I am glad that some terminals were broken up in to different ones too because while reading can be nice, just one LONG terminal can be a bit tiring, and I'm glad that was taken care of. I'll admit, I do miss the ability to get a boatload of fusion ammo on that one level, but that did not really affect my play too much for Preview 4. In fact, it was actually more fun to use some of the other weapons for a change. On that note, it's nice that on TC, there's plenty of ammo. I know, some will say it's excessive, but still, the fact that you actually HAVE it is nice. This is where some other scenarios really miss their mark; there's no carnage because there's nothing to fight with! Fists? Sure, good luck with that, and while this has nothing to do with Eternal specifically, please, DON'T enforce ammo limits on TC players. That never should have become a thing.

Side note, I love how The Midpoint of Somewhere came to be. I always found that level cool, and was really happy to see it become something with combat, and a lot more involved. Fantastic addition. Honestly, all the additions from Preview 3 to Preview 4 are good ones.

I'm definitely understanding the story a lot more than I used to. Do I now fully understand it? Nope :P but maybe that's part of the enjoyment. Each time I play it, I hope to understand more, like I did with Infinity.

It's awesome how far this scenario has come since the mid 2000s, and the work put into it since then really shows. A fantastic job all around.

Note: I played through version 1.3 Preview 4.

Eternal is a massive 52 level campaign that’s essentially a love letter to the original Marathon trilogy. It’s a ton of fun and adds a lot of new content in terms of graphics, weapons, gameplay tweaks, and sound. In terms of quality I would say this is definitely one of the top three Marathon 3rd party campaigns.

Graphically the textures, weapons, and enemies have all been redone and they actually look much better than the original. There’s lots of new terminal art and it is of superior quality. Your motion spotter looks different; even the main menu screen has a new look. All Eternal textures look good, but the neon fluorescent Pfhor textures in particular look phenomenal.

There are also a bunch of cool-looking new weapons that are fun to use and generally handle well.

Gameplay tweaks: Oxygen now auto-replenishes in oxygen-filled environments, which is a great quality of life improvement! Your motion spotter now includes a compass, and the auto-map now tracks enemies, items, and even projectiles.

Eternal features a useful secrets counter. This tracks how many secrets are on the current level, plus how may secrets you’ve had the opportunity to find overall.

The campaign features autosaving by default. It can be disabled under the “Environment-Plugins” option.

Eternal has branching level paths. In the fourth level of every chapter there will be exits to two possible successor levels. I had mixed feelings about this. On the one hand I feel it’s good to give the player choices (or the illusion of choice, since all of the paths eventually merge back together).

But on the other hand, I felt the execution had some problems. For example, on “Sakmet Rising” it is highly likely that the player will run into a Hathor terminal shortly after starting the level, which will whisk the player off to the “Remedial Chaos Theory” level. The player might not even realize they have a choice of going with Hathor versus staying with Tycho and completing the remaining 90% of “Sakmet Rising.” It’s just so counterintuitive, and it means that anyone intending to play every Eternal level had better start by finding a spoiler guide so they can plan out exactly how they’re going to do it. I would suggest either making the branching paths more obvious to the player via terminal text, or getting rid of the branching paths entirely and making the failure path the normal path.

Sound: There are hours of new music, and most of it is pretty good. Many of the songs are evocative of the original Marathon 1 soundtrack, in a good way. For example, Eternal has a new version of Bungie’s “Rushing” song that uses, I think, brass horns? Well anyways, it’s a really kick ass song that lends itself to fast-paced combat scenarios, which is appropriate because when you first hear it a massive firefight is breaking out on the bridge of the Marathon! My favorite soundtrack was probably “Carbon” which I thought synced well with the chaotic situation at the start of Chapter 3.

The plot: The plot did not grab me at first; much of the early exposition was irrelevant and could easily have been cut. I fear new players might try the campaign, encounter an initial wall of text with lots of technobabble, and log out before ever seeing the strengths of Eternal. However, once the plot gets moving, it REALLY gets moving! Eternal ended up having my favorite Marathon 3rd party scenario story. Looking back on it, the narrative is pretty amazing in scope, and touches upon almost every bit of lore from Bungie’s official campaigns.

Time travel is central to the story of Eternal. Yes, it is a problematic plot device for many reasons, but I became OK with it once I realized it was actually an excuse to take the player on a walk down nostalgia lane, as you’ll get to revisit some iconic locations from Bungie’s trilogy. I loved how there was always a cool new twist to those locations.

Some of the terminal text is in the form of poetry; normally I would not say that poetry is a medium that lends itself to storytelling in the first person shooter genre. However, in this case, I would argue that there are parts of Eternal’s plot that could not be effectively delivered without the use of poetry. For example, the story of the level “The Manipulated Dead” has a powerful emotional payoff, but it simply wouldn’t work if normal word syntax was used.

Eternal has a memorable antagonist. Most Marathon scenarios don’t even bother with an antagonist, or if they do it’s just “Generic Pfhor Warlord #9735” who is out to conquer humanity, and how many times have you kicked that guy’s ass? But Eternal’s antagonist has all the hallmarks of a great villain — a personal connection to the protagonist, regular interactions with the protagonist, the ability to react to any setbacks the protagonist might cause, and just a generally interesting backstory and motivation.

Level design: Alas, there are too many switches that open stuff to who knows where. Too many levels devolved into a switch hunt, or trying to find what area the last activated switch opened up. Many levels require hitting about 20(!) switches to reach the end, which means there’s 20 different places for the player to screw up and get needlessly lost or stuck. The single biggest thing that would make Eternal better would be to tone done the switch hunts, or institute some kind of waypoint system to keep the player from getting stuck because they missed 1 switch out of 20. I used the “Eat the Path” plugin to help find where I needed to go, which helped but it was not perfect.

Level notes:

Tangent Universe — A somber level as the player witnesses the defeat of the human race on a space station close to the sun; there is great music to set the mood. On this level the location of the sun is used to good effect to cast shadows.

Enantiodromia — The terminal text did a great job of setting up Chapter 2, and your fight against Battle Group One. The plot of Chapter 2 was my favorite, because it felt like I was coming into this military stalemate and just singlehandedly turning the whole thing around.

Chapter 2 — The spaceport levels had superb aesthetics; the music, plus the ambient rain and thunder synced perfectly with the idea of fighting in a far flung alien outpost as massive Pfhor capitol ships loomed on the horizon.

Chapter 3 — I loved all the callbacks to Marathon 2!

Let Sleeping Gods Die —The spiral staircase was inspired.

How deep the rabbit hole goes — The water pillar in this level was another thing that I didn’t even know was possible in the Marathon engine.

Second to Last of the Mohicans — A working conveyor belt! Another thing I’ve never seen in the Marathon engine before!

The Incredible Hulk — What a great way to explore Marathon lore. The events are mentioned in the official trilogy, but now we get to be an active participant in them.

This Cave is Not a Natural Formation — Some really great looking architecture in the initial arena and the northeast cave area.

Frog Blast the Vent Core — I liked the lighting, the bridge, and the smashed up part of the ship.

This Message Will Self Destruct — My favorite combat level. You’ve acquired an arsenal of really powerful weapons, and now you get to use them against hordes of powerful enemies.

Where Giants Have Fallen — Wow, the circular ascent was really clever! I probably could have grenade jumped up, but I wanted to take the scenic route, listen to the poignant music, and reminisce over the epic journey I just completed.

Thanks so much for making this, I had a blast playing it!