My best friend in Marathon is a knife. When nobody has me in a shootout – not my empty Bully SMG, not my ludicrously over-scoped sniper – I know the knife has my back. I've won many fights against players who underestimate melee, who desperately try to reload even as I bear down on them, and many a would-be ambusher has chased me blindly into the Assassin's smoke cloud and never left.
This reflects less on the knife (though it remains deeply underrated) and more on my own playstyle, which has evolved specifically to survive solo runs. I initially disabled autofill out of necessity, to squeeze in more time with Marathon while my friends were unavailable, but I've grown increasingly fond of playing alone – and if you're yet to visit Tau Ceti IV on your lonesome, you're missing out.
