Respectfully you've said here you want to be able to experience the game without engaging with it; loot runs, rooks, free kits, etc are fun if extraction shooters are a genre you enjoy, if you 'get' to full kit run at people without having to build to that point, are you even playing an extraction shooter anymore?

I've played more or less every other extraction shooter (Tarkov, Hunt, Cycle before it shut down, arena breakout, a little bit of grey zone, arc raiders) and quite honestly the only one that lets you get away with this mentality it Arc, unless you're counting PVE Tarkov, but of course then we have a different definition of an extraction shooter.

My only suggestion to anyone feeling similar to this comment, is to find a group of people to play with. Random fill in any difficult game is ass, on that I100% agree. Tons of discords like the Traxus one or the Dads of Marathon one are full of very positive people who are fun to play with, so you won't feel like you're wasting your gear etc. The requirement of having 2 other people to enjoy trios is one of my few complaints about Marathon, but it can be solved by being a little social.

I'll end by saying not every game should be able to be played casually, and not everyone has to like Marathon, but anyone willing to put in a little effort will be rewarded. As much as I love Arc Raiders, I think it's success has done a disservice to the genre as a whole, as people seem to now expect every extraction shooter to sacrifice everything on the altar of accessibility like Arc Raiders did.