What games do you marathon?

[Ziggy]

By "marathon" I mean any game that you play in one sitting, or perhaps just a few sessions, where the game was probably intended to be played in many sessions.

I've played through Super Mario World about a zillion times, but I would usually quit after each section. But last year I decided to blow through all 96 exits in one go, and it was actually a lot of fun. I never had a score that big before. So it got me thinking... What are some other games that might be fun to marathon?

I was thinking that a game wouldn't count if it didn't have saves or passwords because obviously these games were meant to be beaten in one sitting. But I was thinking about the Super Mario Bros. games on the NES. They're actually kind of long if you play every level. I've beaten the three SMB NES games quite a few times in one sitting, but always with the warp zone. I've played through every level of each game before, but on the Super Mario All Stars cart which saves progress. I've never played through any of the 3 games where I played every level in one sitting. I might have to attempt that.

It never occurred to me to try and beat Super Mario 64 in one sitting. I mean, I know that speedrunners routinely do it, but that's not what I'm trying to do. I don't even have any idea how long my typical playthrough for 120 stars takes. Maybe I'll attempt this.

SimCity doesn't really have an end, but for many years I had the goal of getting to a population of 500k on the SNES version. And then later 600k when I found out about that. But the SNES version has a bug. If you load a city, it takes a while to restore power and during that time the crime skyrockets (since the police stations don't have power) and it wrecks your population. It never seems to recover right, either. So my resolve was to get to 600k in one sitting.

Years ago when I played Metal Gear Solid for the first time, someone on this forum told me that it was a fun game for them to play through in a day. I've only played the game once, and it was years ago, so it might take me some more practice to know the game well enough to attempt to play through in a single session. But for the one time that I played through it, I was able to tell that it might be fun to marathon.

Goldeneye might be another one that I would like to marathon. I mean, I'm sure I've played a big chunk of the game in a single sitting before, but I don't believe I've ever played from start to finish in a single sitting.

I just played through Link to the Past for the first time in years. And I definitely played it in as few of sessions as I ever have. I always thought that number on the save file after beating the game was the number of times you died, but I just found out it's the number of times you've continues (so it's deaths plus save/restarts). I might want to one day try and marathon this game with no deaths.




What games do you marathon? Or, what games do you think might be fun to try and marathon?

[prfsnl_gmr]

The Legend of Zelda. The battery in my cart is a bit iffy after 34 years; so, if I play the game, I do so in one sitting. I’ve owned the game since the NA launch, and I’ve played through it nearly a dozen times. Accordingly, I can get through it in a little over four hours.

[BomberDino]

I did Metal Gear Solid but only because my memory card was iffy. I kept the Playstation on the whole time, like you had to during old times. Maybe it doesn't count because I got in a few hours of sleep. But I didn't eat.

[Ziggy]

I remember when Super Luigi first came out, someone on this forum posted that they almost beat it for the first time in one sitting but the power went out when they were at the very end of the game and lost that opportunity.

[Note]

Good question, I usually don't feel like I have the time to marathon through games due to regular life getting in the way but it's something I really enjoy when I have the time. This year I had a chance to marathon through two games.

Earlier in the year I played through ActRaiser on SNES in one sitting, which wasn't planned, but I was really getting into the game and it just so happened that the save battery in my cart died. I was pretty determined to finish the game, and was able to. However, in that specific play through I didn't build up the cities as much as I could have and it took me a good amount of tries to finish the boss gauntlet.

The second game I marathoned through more recently was Resident Evil 2 on PS1 over a weekend. I finished Leon's Scenario A in one sitting, and Claire's Scenario B in two sittings. I wasn't planning to play through it that quickly, but I got so into the game, I couldn't put it down. Had a lotta fun with that one, one of my favorite gaming experiences of the year.

Another fun marathon session I had back in my college days was marathoning through Zelda: A Link to the Past on SNES. My roommate and I played the game for a good amount of hours in just a few sessions. I started the game by myself but my roommate was watching me play and started getting into it too. Later on when I got stuck in a certain area, my roommate stepped in to help, and we ended up finishing the game taking turns throughout the sessions. Good times.

[pook99]

Its not the longest game but I do tend to play through wii punch out in one sitting (both normal and title defense mode)

Good survival horror games tend to hook me until I absolutely have no more time to play, so while I wont typically beat them in one sitting I will play for as many hours as I have available to me.

[mobiusclimber]

I typically don't do that. A few games that I really like that are short enough I've played in one sitting, like Silent Hill 2, but it's more bc it's a short game and I'm trying to find and do everything in it. There are certain games that I always want to reach for and play but that's bc they're just easy to pick up and play, and I do tend to play them for a long time, but they're too long/complicated to marathon (for me). Basically any of the Diablo games (except the cell phone one). I'm sure if I tried I could marathon any of them, but that would be eight hours at best (for me; I know it's possible to speedrun them in less time) and I just don't have that kind of time or desire.