: I've been playing the Marathon games since they came out in 94, but I've
: never kept up with 3rd party add ons or side stories or any of the like.
: Are there any Marathon mods besides the trilogy that were approved as true
: "canon" by bungie, or perhaps stories written by bungie
: employees that weren't released in the trilogy? I've heard of Red before,
: and I thought that it was something related, but I'm really clueless when
: it comes to side stories. If I could get filled in, that'd be great.
Let's be clear about this - although there are several outstanding 3rd party scenarios based on Bungie's original Marathon Trilogy and even some scenarios that are based on the M1, MI and AO game engines that have nothing to do with Marathon, none of these has been officially blessed by Bungie. None of them is the product of a former Bungie employee (that I know of) and none of them can be said to be approved true "canon". That said, A lot of what we discuss here in the Forum and regard as canon is more our own interpretations of the kludges that underly most game development. In other words, even official canon is not always accurate, the best example perhaps being the contradiction between the time Lela said her message would take to reach earth versus the actual location of Tau Ceti. But oh how we've tried to resolve such issues ;^)
OK, I think that every 3rd party scenario has its own strengths and weaknesses. As mentioned already, Marathon Rubicon is perhaps be most true to the official cannon, much of it being based on information gleaned from the original games. Trojan, Evil, Tempus Irae and Red all take place after MI and are intended to be sequels of a sort. The oft overlooked Pfh'Joueur is an M2 sequel that takes place in an alternate timeline to MI. The best thing to do is play all of them and decide for yourself which ones fit best within the Marathon Universe that Bungie created.
