Over two hours of Bungie’s Marathon Closed Technical Test gameplay footage has leaked online, showing a new map, hazard event, cleaner UI, and noticeable visual upgrades.
Bungie has quietly been hammering away at Marathon for months now. Since the studio delayed the game earlier this year, we have been hearing about regular monthly closed playtests, with small groups jumping into early builds under strict NDA while Bungie tries to figure out what works and what does not in its extraction shooter.
Last month, the devs went a step further and opened the doors to the public with a week-long Closed Technical Test on PlayStation, Xbox, and PC. According to Sony, around 80,000 players took part in that October session.
Just like the earlier tests, this tech test was locked behind a strict NDA. Players were only allowed to talk inside private Discord channels, and sharing any gameplay outside of those spaces was not allowed. Even then, a few clips were posted online during and shortly after the test ended, and those were quickly taken down.
Now, it looks like a ton of gameplay has leaked online, showing the clearest look yet at what’s changed inside this October build.
New Marathon gameplay leak shows Outpost map, Heat Cascade event, and cleaner UI
The latest batch of footage first showed up on YouTube from a user going by “零一分享”. That channel uploaded five separate gameplay videos from the October Closed Technical Test, all recorded from the NDA build.
The clips showed different maps, menus, and full matches from start to finish. They did not last long. All five videos were quickly taken down after copyright action from MarkScan Enforcement, the firm that often handles takedowns for Sony.
The Game Post dug a bit deeper and found that the same user has uploaded the footage elsewhere, too. On their Bilibili account, they have not only the original five videos, but four more from the same test. That is a total of nine videos from the Marathon October technical test, adding up to more than 132 minutes of raw gameplay. At the time of writing, those uploads are still live.
The footage covers all three maps that were playable in this Closed Technical Test: Dire Marsh, Perimeter, and Outpost. Perimeter, the map that was already available in the April Closed Alpha, is back, and compared to that older footage, this version looks noticeably better. Lighting and visuals are cleaner, and the environments feel less dull.
The real standout is a new map called Outpost, which Bungie has not shown in any official material yet. Outpost looks smaller than Perimeter and leans hard into indoor combat, with a lot of tight hallways and rooms that push players into close fights.
On this map, the footage shows a mechanic called Heat Cascade Protocol, which we reported in our exclusive report in September. During this event, fiery particles fall outside for a short time, slowly draining your shields and health if you stay out in the open. It effectively forces teams inside or into cover and adds another timing layer on top of the usual extraction pressure.
Across the nine videos, we can see a mix of different loadouts, including sniper and shotgun setups, as well as some new weapons. You can watch the leaked videos below, but keep in mind that this is early test footage from an NDA build, so anything shown here can still change, and the uploads are likely to be taken down soon.
It’s also worth keeping in mind that there’s a fourth “endgame” map set on the UESC Marathon itself, called Cryo Archive. This map briefly showed up on the playlist selection screen during the Closed Technical Test, but it wasn’t playable and was quickly removed.
Outside of this leak, Bungie is preparing for another smaller community playtest running from December 12 to 16. Slots are limited, and the whole thing is under NDA again. On top of that, The Game Post recently reported that Bungie is working on a new Marathon ViDoc planned to show updated systems, visuals, and a look at where the project stands after months of testing.
What do you think of these leaks? Does the new footage make Marathon look more promising? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below!
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