Part of me was dreading the arrival of Marathon’s fourth map, Cryo Archive. The promise of an endgame zone that resembled the puzzle box raids Bungie is known for sounded amazing, but I wasn’t sold on the fun of getting shotgunned in the back by a kitted-up Assassin while just trying to sort out a locked door. Maybe Marathon would benefit from a purely PvE zone to balance out its ruthlessness?

I should’ve had a little more faith in Bungie. Cryo Archive is an astounding labyrinth across a haunted planet-sized spaceship that plays nothing like the other three maps in Marathon, nor like any other competitive map in shooters period. It bridges the gap between PvE and PvP brilliantly, and makes me wonder why this is the first game of its type to have this much fun with map design.

If you’ve yet to venture into the “lose everything factory”, Cryo Archive is a weekends-only event map with special requirements for entry: You must be level 25, unlock all six factions, play with a full squad of three (no Rooks allowed), and build a loadout worth at least 5,000 credits.

Bungie calls it an “endgame” experience, which is misleading, as you can play it long before you max out your rep with factions or even become particularly rich. It’s better to think of Cryo Archive as the last “big” thing to do in Marathon before you’ve essentially seen it all—though I’ve barely scratched the surface of this gargantuan map after a handful of runs.

Teams are dropped into opposite corners of the snaking cryo facility, and the first thing you learn is that doors do not simply open here. Cryo has a unique “Security Clearance” mechanic (that it forces you to figure out yourself, of course) that unlocks more of the map as you raise your clearance. Security Clearance is essentially how Bungie injects progression into this non-linear raid: the only way to increase clearance is to loot UESC bots, hack certain terminals, or steal clearance tags from other players.

I envisioned Cryo Archive would be like the first 12 seconds of a battle royale match where everyone runs to a hot zone and half of the lobby is dead before I’ve applied sunscreen. It’s actually the opposite: Unlike Marathon’s other three maps, you’re literally locked away from other teams for at least the first 10-15 minutes as everyone fights through waves of bots in the wing they’ve spawned in. It’s not until you get at least one clearance level that you reach Control, a multi-level central chamber that connects every wing.

It’s really cool how making that transition from the relative safety of cramped hallways into Control is a choice, like you’re opting into the next phase of this raid as a group. Once you’re there, yes, the PvP is as intense as I feared, but it’s not all that crowded. The map itself is massive and the sightlines are short, so in a handful of runs I’ve yet to fight more than one team at a time.

We also haven’t even gotten close to “completing” Cryo, or even solving its puzzles. Those are locked away in special vaults that require batteries (another currency unique to the map) to enter. But it’s fascinating that you don’t have to engage with that stuff to have a fulfilling match, because there’s amazing loot everywhere. It’s clear why Bungie implemented the 5,000 credit stake—within minutes of entering with a green shield and a decent gun you can easily upgrade to purple everything.

But even played as a straight “make some dough” map, nothing is straightforward. Extracting is a multi-step process that requires clearance level 3. Then you have to find a terminal that might or might not reveal an extraction point, then you have to trigger it, and then hoof it across the map to the exfil without getting lost. And wow, it is easy to get lost! Yesterday I ran into a room with too much gusto and nearly stepped into an infinite Emperor Palpatine death pit. Before that our crew rode an elevator up to a room that kills you—like it literally kills you unless you’re packing the right anti-toxicity consumables (wouldn’t that be nice to have online).

It’s terrifying. It’s confusing. It’s amazing. I dig it. It’s possible I ended up losing credits overall, but at least I escaped with a bunch of rare upgrade materials, XP, and good stories.

I’d like to see the full extent of its weirdness some day soon, but Bungie has some adjustments to make first: the weekends only thing is unnecessarily alienating to Saturday/Sunday workers and parents with better stuff to do. There’s gotta be a better way to make Cryo Archive a “sometimes” thing. And the RNG required to actually see that final boss is totally overboard, if not so absurd that I respect it. The problem is that most players will never see that final boss without following a stringent guide, which I understand is a Destiny tradition, but double sucks with the added wrinkle of “you can get ganked by randos at any time.”

And another thing: the Control room tanks my framerate. That’s not good, considering it’s the premiere PvP spot on the map. Please fix, Bungie.

Marathon is setting a high bar for interactive maps that have their own “thing” going on. We’ve come a long way from Blood Gulch’s teleporters, Terminal’s train, and that funky conveyer belt in the center of Halo 2’s Colossus. Dire Marsh has its lockdowns, anomalies, and fog. Outpost has its Pinwheel heist and heat cascade hazard. Perimeter is, well, it’s the beginner map. And Cryo Archive is something else entirely: part raid, part investigation, part puzzle box.

Marathon best weapons tier list: Our top picksMarathon best characters tier list: Top Runner ShellsMarathon Ranked: More risk, more rewardMarathon roadmap: What’s comingMarathon Lockbox Keys: How to get 'emMarathon upgrades: Which to pickMarathon DCON locations: Contract dropboxes

From PCGamer latest via this RSS feed