Bungie is turning the corner on some of Marathon’s season 2 launch week woes. In addition to extending the free-to-play period by a few extra days, the studio also confirmed it will be giving Marathon away for free to people who purchased the Deluxe Edition upgrade for game at a discount, not realizing they’d have to pay to unlock the base game later on.
This all started when Wario64 shared an apparent deal to get Marathon‘s $60 version for just $14. Because Marathon was free to download for the first week of season 2 which began on June 2, anyone looking at the Deluxe Edition on the PlayStation Store would have seen that it was available for just $14 more. And since the Deluxe Edition includes the base game as part of the bundle, some players thought they might have discovered a clever work around to get Bungie’s extraction shooter at a steep discount.
Bungie has since fixed the language of the listing on the PlayStation store to clarify that players will still need to purchase the base game for an addition $40 once the free period is over. But players who had already bought the Deluxe Edition and would soon become locked out of it weren’t please. To try to put the whole thing to bed, Bungie has now confirmed it’ll just give those players Marathon for free.
“For those of you that made this purchase before the messaging was posted on the store page, we’ll be granting you the base edition of Marathon at no additional cost,” the studio posted online on June 5. “This is in addition to the Deluxe Edition content. More info on timing will come soon.” It continued, “Going forward, please note that if you’ve downloaded Marathon during the Open Play Week but have not purchased Marathon, purchasing the Deluxe Edition upgrade will only grant you access to the Deluxe Edition content for the duration of the Open Play Week.”