Marathon Players Urge Bungie to Take Stronger Action Against Cheaters
Some of Marathon’s most dedicated players are raising alarms about a significant cheating issue. While many gamers may not notice anything unusual, those engaged in ranked matches or exploring the end-game Cryo Archive map are losing their hard-earned gear to unfair matchups against players using paid cheat tools for an edge. In response, Bungie has promised to take further action.
“I tried to play some ranked Marathon tonight, played 7 games and logged off after being blatantly cheated in 3 of them,” popular streamer AlbralelieVT shared on X. “As much as I enjoy the game, I’m not willing to deal with cheaters ruining the experience again, so I might stop creating content for it and shift back to Apex.”
He accused some players of using cheats to pre-fire through walls, landing impossible shots across foggy maps, and noted that some of these cheaters were players he had previously encountered, implying they weren’t banned after their first offenses. “Most of the time they’ll streamsnipe you while hurling slurs (mostly the N-word) and literally admit they’re cheating (Makima and two others said, ‘We’re 6-manning cheating, f*** you and Bungie’) because Bungie won’t do anything about it,” AlbralelieVT stated.
The best part about showing clips that clearly display cheating is the players with the game IQ of bricks trying to argue that the obvious cheaters aren’t actually cheating.
— Diffizzle (@TooDiffizzle) April 7, 2026
Streamers often find themselves targeted by cheaters, meaning that top players may experience the impact of cheating more acutely than the average Marathon player. Following the second weekend of ranked play, discussions about the cheating problem intensified.
“Apparently, high-ranked lobbies are just filled with blatant cheaters,” wrote streamer GJake on X. “It’s almost guaranteed you’ll run into them. How is Bungie so quick with nerfs and changes, yet they silently allow these cheaters to run rampant week after week?”
“Marathon DESPERATELY needs a gear refund system for encounters with cheaters and a more intuitive reporting system,” added another player, Kruzer. “I shouldn’t have to go back to the main menu, find the cheater in recent players, and report them. There should be a report option as soon as you die. These accounts are level 150+ just cheating all day.”
.@MarathonDevTeam hire me to watch streams and ban blatant cheaters, please. I’ll make ranked playable ????
— avihra (@avihraa) April 7, 2026
Bungie has responded to the outcry with plans to enhance its cheat monitoring efforts. The studio previously announced a zero-tolerance policy for cheating before Marathon’s launch, and now they’re looking to “expand our telemetry and detection methods to better catch these cheaters.”
The development team mentioned they are working on streamlining the reporting process to make it easier to flag suspected cheaters and toxic chat behavior. In the long run, Bungie aims to invest in improved voice chat moderation and explore in-game protections against stream sniping, including options for name privacy.
The studio stated, “Some of this work is already live, and more improvements will roll out in the coming weeks. Anti-cheat is a continuous cycle of monitoring, improving, and responding. This is an area we will continue to invest in to protect the integrity of your runs.”
While these measures may not drastically reduce cheating in the immediate future, they do show Marathon’s most passionate players that Bungie is aware of the problem and is working on solutions. Meanwhile, some fans are already drawing comparisons to The Cycle: Frontier, a 2022 extraction shooter that suffered from rampant cheating, ultimately leading to its downfall.
Marathon faces even bigger challenges regarding player retention and maintaining a healthy community, but an unchecked cheating issue in the endgame will certainly complicate matters further.
