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[Thick Thighs Save Lives]

It’s been nearly five years since Valve announced a truly new game — and counting. Valve has still not announced Deadlock, its new hero shooter that takes cues from Overwatch, Dota 2, Team Fortress 2 and more. But that hasn’t stopped nearly 20,000 people from trying the game, including me.

And I’m not under NDA. I have signed no contracts, made no verbal agreements; I haven’t even clicked through a EULA.

This message does pop up when I launch Deadlock, but I didn’t click OK; instead, I hit the Escape key and watched it disappear. Screenshot by Sean Hollister / The Verg

Earlier today, I received a no-strings-attached invite to play Deadlock on Steam. Steam claims the game is made by Valve. It displays Valve’s copyrighted logo when it launches, and its executable is digitally signed by “Valve Corp.” The game’s directories contain Valve legal notices and numerous other text files that reference Valve, and it feels like a Valve game. Though Valve didn’t respond to my requests for comment, I’m completely convinced that it’s legit.

So: what is Deadlock?

It’s a 6-on-6 shooter, like original Overwatch, where your team of heroes attempts to dominate a map by slowly wearing down the opposing team and pushing them back. But you’re also leading an army of NPC grunts down four different lanes to destroy the opposing team’s stationary defenses, a little like Dota 2 or other MOBA games.

There’s no downtime. It’s a constant war between your team’s Troopers (the grunts) and the enemy team’s Troopers, which keep respawning and advancing on enemy positions, wave after wave. But they can’t break through unless the human-powered heroes lend them a hand with powerful weapons, abilities, and upgrades.

Nor can humans easily break through without their NPC army — or at least, that’s what I saw in my first match. To take down the flame-headed, energy spewing Guardians or hulking Walkers that block your passage, it takes at least a somewhat coordinated effort by one human and their little autonomous friends. Each match culminates in an all-hands-on-deck fight against the enemy’s Patron, a gigantic floating orb with arms and death rays.

When I say “coordinated,” I’m not talking about aiming. This isn’t a Valorant or Apex Legends-like game where snappy aim is key. It feels like Overwatch, or maybe even more so Team Fortress 2 in its floaty, wear-down-their-health gameplay. You can tank, heal, and retreat even if a tremendous amount of enemy fire is coming your way.

Each match does get deadlier and deadlier as you unlock your heroes’ abilities and buy skills, many of which give you more damage per second. Others provide life steal, shielding, and more. Every character also has strong and light melee attacks, and you can parry an incoming melee attack to stun your opponent.

It helps that there are a lot of ways to dodge enemy bullets and traverse the map: you can slide, dash, air dash, dash jump, double jump, and mantle up to ledges. Each of the game’s four lanes also has an aerial tramway that lets you hitch free rides into (and out of) the fray.

The ziplines don’t feel overpowered; after an earlier leak, I’d once heard them compared to Titanfall’s attack-from-any-angle traversal gameplay, but Valve keeps them away from the actual firing lines. You have to retreat to territory you own before they’ll work.

They also look like they’ll lead to a fascinating give-and-take mechanic as games progress. To power up, I needed to take my hero back to a shop to buy new perks with the souls I’d accumulated by destroying enemy troopers and heroes, but that left my territory undefended. By the time I returned, the front lines had been pushed back further than I would have liked.

Even in this “early development build,” there are already 20 different heroes, plenty of which look like ones I’d enjoy playing. Yes, some of them are common archetypes like the archer, swordsman, sniper, and shotgun teleport specialist, but it’s not all that simple: have you ever seen an Infernus who literally finger-guns his foes to pieces?

I initially gravitated towards Wraith thanks to her style and the tremendous dakka of her rapid-fire tommygun, then switched to McGinnis when I found out she’s the Team Fortress 2 engineer and heavy weapons specialist in one: turrets, barrier walls, and a giant minigun that fires faster the longer it goes.

I haven’t played enough yet to even begin to tell if the game’s well-balanced, or if there’s any kind of backstory for its heroes, but I’m eager to give it a go with my friends — and it seems like Valve will be just fine with that.

While Valve has yet to announce or even acknowledge this game’s existence publicly, the current build lets anyone with a copy invite as many Steam friends as they like to give it a try, too. That’s why I have an invite, and that’s why my friends now have an invite.

It’s an unusual way to release a game, but this is Valve we’re talking about — it’s an unusual company.

We played Valve’s secret new shooter, Deadlock

Curious what the Half-Life and Dota 2 maker’s been up to?

www.theverge.com

 

[Three]

Now I see why Arthands was defending Concord.

Also funny how people are going after the person who posted the video breaking NDA.

 

[Kupfer]

I did play it as well. For 10 minutes.
It's absolutely not my genre and the choice of heroes has already overwhelmed me, but maybe it was also because I have no interest in immersing myself in this game at all.
When I was ingame, I have to say that it didn't perform well - but again, that's probably due to my ancient computer.
Either massive reduction of the resolution with 60 fps or 1440p with 30-40 fps on a 1070ti. CS2 runs better.
I can't say anything about the fun factor, I switched it off again straight away because, as I said, it's not for me. I was just curious and took a look at it once

 

[RagnarokIV]

looks shit

 

[Complistic]

This is going to be a good thread.

 

[Fabieter]

Oh no another hero shooter. Am I right?

 

[00_Zer0]

This game is getting a lot of shit online. I'm not into many online MP games anymore, but observing this from the outside this looks no more appealing than Overwatch 2 or Concord. This is from the developer of Half Life, Portal, L4D, Counter Strike and TF2, and judging from those standards from the outside, and without playing it, the game looks bland.

 

[Fabieter]

This game is getting a lot of shit online. I'm not into many online MP games anymore, but observing this from the outside this looks no more appealing than Overwatch 2 or Concord. This is from the develop of Half Life, Portal, L4D, Counter Strike and TF2, and judging from those standards from the outside, and without playing it, the game looks bland.

Someone at valve just has a crush on blizzard.

 

[The Cockatrice]

Late to the party Valve. Man these development times jesus fuck only to release in a oversaturated market when everyone is tired of this genre. The few ppl at Valve working on this and not another Half Life game is insanity.

 

[Herbspiceguy]

Looks decent enough.

Anyone that would like to share an invite with me through the mentioned friend method, if that's still possible?

 

[Gen.Grievous]

More trash to milk players with their marketplace.

 

[Guilty_AI]

so its basically a Shooter MOBA? At least i can see now why valve would try that. Looks bland tho.

 

[willothedog]

That's not bad for a game that has not yet been announced.

 

[mrMUR_96]

That TTK looks horrendous

 

[Chuck Berry]

Enough with these fucking hero shooters jesus christ

So much for those HL3 rumors right guys

 

[Eesha]

looks ugly as hell, i will stick to TF2 thanks

 

[Hrk69]

 

[Mister Wolf]

Another Hero Shooter.

 

[LimanimaPT]

What are this companies thinking? Everybody asks for HL3 but instead they work on a game absolutely no one asked for, they waste resources and take at least 5 years to develop this piece of crap.
Yup, game development is not what it used to be anymore... Another industry destroyed by greed.

 

[//DEVIL//]

This looks absolutely amazingly …shit

I couldn’t watch 4 mins and I was already bored .

 

[John Bilbo]

You could have made Team Fortress 3

 

[MayauMiao]

Eh, another hard pass.

 

[Punished Miku]

I'm just glad my passive 30% from all purchases doesn't go towards funding stuff like this.

 

[lh032]

DOA within a year, at most.

 

[SmokedMeat]

Zzzzz like every other modern team based shooter.

Blaze new trails. Don’t follow the beat down worn ones.

 

[Guilty_AI]

ok, unpopular opinion, i think this will do better than people think.

I thought it was going to be some overwatch clone but seeing gameplay they're clearly leaning more into MOBAs and adding some Team Fortress into the mix. There is definitely an untapped public for this.

 

[Fake]

Just no.

 

[Kokoloko85]

Late to the party Valve. Man these development times jesus fuck only to release in a oversaturated market when everyone is tired of this genre. The few ppl at Valve working on this and not another Half Life game is insanity.

Studios are gonna try there hand at a genre. Just because some are making money from there game, doesnt mean others arent/cant try to make money too from the genre

 

[whyman]

I'm sure it's what the kids today want. But I do miss the games Valve started out making. We have devolved.

 

[hinch7]

A hero shooter built around MOBA.. Why and who asked for this? I love Valve's games, but this ones a no from me.

 

[Herbspiceguy]

ok, unpopular opinion, i think this will do better than people think.

I thought it was going to be some overwatch clone but seeing gameplay they're clearly leaning more into MOBAs and adding some Team Fortress into the mix. There is definitely an untapped public for this.

I feel the same, it definitely looks like a shooter MOBA in the first place, of which I can only recall Paragon (R.I.P.) attempted the concept and to a lesser extent Smite, since it's not that shooter heavy. I honestly think the concept has potential and Valve delivers quality.
I'm interested to know if you can actually pull off MOBA-like gamechanging plays using abilities/ults as a team and if the game allows for carry's.
Trying to get in the test.

 

[CityHunter1981]

Why even bother with this, why not giving fans what they want. I just don’t get it.

 

[Guilty_AI]

i wonder what Men_in_Boxes opinion on this is

 

[Sgt.Asher]

That person playing makes this look really bad.

 

[Gamer_By_Proxy]

and I thought Concord was way too late to the party . . .

 

[LordOfChaos]

Another generic hero shooter, great

Build Half Life 3 you bitches

 

[IFireflyl]

i wonder what Men_in_Boxes opinion on this is

Spoiler:

 

[ljubomir]

I don't hate Valve for daring to make a game that is not for me, but it's just that - a game not for me. I have neither time nor interest to play a hero shooter. Would have preferred literally anything single player. But more power to them, hopefully they find success.

 

[FunkMiller]

Looking forward to the 11th hour cancellation

 

[ultrazilla]

Yuck.

Watched that video. The time to kill? I mean-"What time to kill" all the enemies are giant bullet sponges.

Come on Valve. You make shit like this but Half Life 3 is the game everyone wants.

 

[Ivan]

Seeing Valve becoming a studio making THIS feels kinda surreal... They are still top tier in my brain, but man, this is some seriously bland shit...

I don't care if the game is fun to play and I know new audience will love it, but this is just wrong.

One of the weirdest feelings - when you see a studio that could do no wrong slowly fading away...

 

[tommib]

What’s with all these MP trash shooters? Can we fucking get a high production single player dark/horror shooter campaign with innovative narrative dynamics made for adults? You used to do them, Valve.

 

[Action Jackson]

What I have seen from the roster, the heroes look just as bland and boring as those from Concord.

 

[Guilty_AI]

Spoiler:

not so sure, his GAAS advocate and Pony sides will enter in conflict

 

[Gamer_By_Proxy]

Hearing about a new hero shooter first thing in the day makes me gotta shit quicker than any coffee out there.

 

[asdasdasdbb]

What’s with all these MP trash shooters?

Cheap to develop and makes money?

 

[BbMajor7th]

While it's doing something different in the broadest sense, every individual component seems to have been borrowed from elsewhere. The hero/class format, the MOBA style AI minions, the buffs and abilities, the overall art direction... it's all part of the same live-service buffet we've been staring at for the past decade.

 

[Hudo]

Team Fortress 2 died for this.

 

[clarky]

That person playing makes this look really bad.

The person who made it makes this looks really bad.........

 

[Shake Your Rump]

instead they work on a game absolutely no one asked for

Someone asked for it: the shareholders.