---

Back in December 1994, Bungie Software gave the Mac gaming world a swift boot to the knickers, which it so desperately needed, when it released the first-person, 3-D shoot-'em-up sci-fi blockbuster "Marathon." Hankerin' for the sort of kicks blowing apart the heads of mutants "Doom" and "Doom II" brought to the PC, Macintosh gamers revered "Marathon" because it was a gaming tour de force which just so happened to eclipse all other titles in the genre.

The game was staged mostly aboard a crippled colony ship named the Marathon, her halls and loading docks overrun by hostile alien warriors called Pfhor. As the vessel's lone security officer, it was your duty to puree alien scum and recapture the ship. The highly detailed, texture-mapped graphics, three-channel, active stereo-panning sound effects, and digital soundtrack finally provided Mac gamers with a title they could show off to their PC buddies. Best of all, Bungie had released "Marathon" as Mac-only; the rumor was a PC port would never be realized. Finally, the reprisal Mac gamers had been seeking lo these many years.

Well, it's over fifteen months later, PC gamers are still wondering if they'll see a "Marathon" port before the end of the millennium (they will), and Bungie has improved upon the original product with a sequel worthy of your software dollar: "Marathon 2: Durandal."

M2 takes place amid the ruined exteriors and interiors of an ancient civilization. You've been shanghai-ed by the Marathon's now-rejuvenated miscreant supercomputer Durandal; it's got business to take care of in the far reaches of the galaxy and you're the person for the job. Yeah, I know: Who cares? Just lemme kill somethin'...

This time around Bungie enhances the "Marathon" experience, providing eye candy by the sackful -- breathtakingly exquisite levels, new hoards of alien species, improvements to the ambient sound, an ability to swim and engage in limited combat underwater/underslime, and revamped weaponry including, but not limited to, the most raucous sidearm in shoot-'em-ups, the double-barreled shotgun.

A barely tolerable novelty in "Marathon" becomes a more integral part of your M2 adventure: the BOBs. In the first game, the BOBs ("Born on Board"s) mostly ran around in a panic saying silly things, getting slaughtered by the aliens in the meantime. In M2, the BOBs become your partners in alien extermination (they're armed this time), transported in and out of hotspots at Durandal's bidding. The BOBs really start having a good time, though, when they're convinced you're a traitor and turn on you, and when a hearty handful are assimilated by the Pfhor. If you've yet to experience first hand the pants-wetting petrification of meeting a roving gang of assimilated BOBkin for the first time, I shan't ruin it for you.