Personally, i am not a big UT fan. i loved the original unreal though. it seemed to be very clearly from marathon fans, since, though the story wasn't really deep, the storytelling was similar in style to marathon( carry around a text translator, and when you find a book or sign, it displays the english text. almost the same, really) not to mention that unreal had the best gameplay feel of an FPS since marathon.
as for halo, it seems like that is the logical successor to the marathon legacy. made by the same people, gorgeous, like marathon was in its day, fantastic story, and, if nothing else, is at least set in the same universe as marathon even if the stories never cross(which, for the record, i believe they will eventually). some would argue that halo doesn't have the same story depth as marathon does, but remember: the first marathon story was about a supersoldier defending humans against alien invaders while being jerked about by a good AI and a bad one. it took two more games and countless third party scenarios to bring marathon to the point it is at now. halo is new. give it time.
and quake, well.... yeah, quake is kinda crappy.
don't get me wrong: marathon is and always will be my favorite game of all time, in part because it is pretty much the first game i ever played and have been playing it consistently ever since then. but we can't say that it is the only good game, or that other games don't deserve a similar following.
as for the reasons that the marathon community is small, i offer this: it was (mostly) only released on one of two systems that were popular at the time, and it was on the one that would ultimately lose the popularity war(because pc companies fight dirty). it was made by a small(then) indy game company, and for mindlessly violent action, it couldn't really compete with doom. and if the movie and game industries have taught us anything, its that mindless hyper-violence will always outsell a good story.
which is ok. mindless hyperviolence has its uses. but there will always be those of us who, most of the time(yeah, i play doom every once in a while) prefer a good story.
