Marathon’s server slam started on Thursday, and within a couple of hours, hundreds of thousands of people had either downloaded it and started playing or started watching it on a streaming platform somewhere. It picked up pace, hit more than 143,000 concurrent players on Steam alone, and then promptly fizzled.
Within six hours, the peak dropped by 30,000 players, and by the following evening, it was peaking at half the original high. Many believed the weekend would yield some gains as players worldwide came off work and into Bungie’s Marathon, but it wasn’t to be. That being said, the server slam still managed to top some titans on Steam.
Marathon Could Go Either Way
Marathon didn’t make immense waves in the gaming space this weekend, but it still beat the likes of Battlefield 6 and Call of Duty.
It’s no big secret that these two titanic franchises have had their fair share of issues in the last few months. Black Ops 7 launched to a woeful reception and is suffering immensely at the hands of a disinterested community. On the other hand, Battlefield 6 continues to flounder amidst poor updates and a slow change cadence.
Marathon will be the ‘new shiny thing’ this month when it launches on March 5, marking Bungie’s long-awaited entry into the extraction shooter space. It’s going up against some monumental competition, especially in the form of both ARC Raiders and Escape from Tarkov, but tens of thousands of people have already gotten a taste of Marathon and (likely) want more.
At the time of writing, Marathon’s server slam product had a 24-hour peak player count of 76,437 users on Steam. This is how that stacks up against other, similar games on the platform:
- ARC Raiders – 227,765
- Apex Legends – 201,571
- Marathon – 76,437
- Battlefield 6 – 71,861
- Call of Duty – 52,575
- Escape from Tarkov – 19,220
- Destiny 2 – 11,623
The discourse around Marathon has been pretty mixed. There’s enough positivity there for the game to enjoy a semi-decent launch, but only if Bungie can deliver a strong roadmap and rapid enough updates. The team has already been addressing the game’s biggest gripes, including concerns around the complex UI, the lack of PvP, and optimization issues on PC platforms.
Unfortunately, Marathon is also going to be a game that lives or dies by its viewership, such is the life of extraction games. If the creators can get hooked, they’ll retain an audience and keep feeding people into the game, but if that doesn’t happen, Marathon will surely plummet.
In the opening hours of the server slam, Marathon secured a peak of around 301,000 viewers on Twitch, and then, thanks to a huge push from popular streamers, it edged past that to hit 350,000 on Sunday, March 1. That was short-lived, though. The peak came at around 7 PM GMT, and by 10 PM GMT, only 70,000 people were watching the game.
It should be stressed that this isn’t a negative take of Marathon’s performance, as such. This is a game that could offer a sorely needed shake-up to the extraction genre, in a way that ARC Raiders managed to do in October 2025. It’s unique enough to leave a mark on the space, but the longevity of the thing is yet to be witnessed.
Do you think Marathon is going to stick the landing, or will it falter at first? Let us know your thoughts on the Insider Gaming Discord server.
For more Insider Gaming coverage, check out the news that Terminator: Survivors might not be ruined after all
Grant has been gaming for 30+ years and in the industry for 10+. You'll probably find him playing a post-apocalyptic game or an extraction shooter somewhere.
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