Deadlock is the kind of game that makes you think, wow, that’s exactly what I’ve been looking for all my life. Once again, Valve came out in full force, and even though Deadlock is still in the early stages of development, it has already gained a huge following from players.
I’d be lying if I said Deadlock was easy to rank. It is located on the border of everything possible. It is third-person shooter, MOBA, hero-shooterand combines everything in a great never-before-seen action. After almost a hundred hours played, I would call Deadlock a MOBA shooter rather than a hero-shooter, and there are several reasons for this.
How can you play Deadlock?
Although it is still not available to the general public, it is played by tens of thousands of people every day. How is that possible? Valve has made it possible for any tester to send Deadlock invites to anyone else. The approaches are thus still expanding day by day. In order to be able to try out the new product from Valve, all you have to do is find someone who already plays Deadlock and ask for an invitation. Already at this stage it is part of it official Czech translationmaking this unusual combination of genres more understandable even for beginners.
The very principle of the game is noticeably inspired by the MOBA genre. You have four lines where there are towers and your task is to destroy each of them and get to the main core, which here is called the Patron. Basically this whole aspect of the game would he gave a direct comparison to League of Legends or Dota. It’s the same, just with a different name. So players of these games have a significant advantage right from the start against those who have never played a MOBA game, as they understand the whole concept and objective better.
The second aspect is the shooting one. Like third person shooterwhere individual characters have certain abilities, Deadlock is in a certain way in the genre of hero-shooters, with the only difference that it is not from a first-person perspective, which is also the rule for games of that genre.
As I probably can tell from my lengthy description, Deadlock is fundamentally played very similarly to LoLko or Dota. In combination with the event, it creates a unique experience. I have never played a game like this in my life (although there have been similar attempts in the past, e.g. Paragon). I constantly felt that while playing it is similar to something, but at the same time nothing quite equals it. Deadlock does a great job of combining all the elements into a complete and unique experience that is honestly very addictive and will absorb just about any competitive gamer.
It is available to you now a variety of characters that vary in both appearance and abilities. Then they all combine weapons together, each character has one in their equipment. However, the abilities are already very different, for example someone throws ice grenades and the other sets enemies on fire. We also find those that fly through the air or burrow underground. The variety of characters is, I’d say, enough for how early the game is.
Also inherent in any MOBA game are the items you buy during matches to make your character stronger. You earn money for these items by killing minions that drop a soul upon death and you have to blast it to get the full price. The enemy can be faster and blast the soul from his own dead minion thereby depriving you of money. It’s basically the same as in Dota.
Coming to the mentioned items, Deadlock doesn’t offer much yet, but it’s enough. They are divided according to strength and price. The cheapest ones cost 500, then 1250, 1500, 3000, 6000. So in practice this means that each item tier provides purchase options for a different part of the game. In the beginning you can only afford the cheapest ones, but in the late stage of the match you have to invest heavily.
Their differentiation using colors is also connected with this. Each color represents a different area of what the subject is focusing on. Orange boosts your weapon, green health and purple mystical power or spells. Many items hit two colors at once, so itemizing is worth more thought.
“Complete movement mastery is perhaps the most challenging thing in the game.”
Other a large part of the gameplay is movement, making Deadlock fundamentally different from similar games. If you’ve played Apex Legends, the movement system will feel right to you, it just works with stamina consumption. So you can double jump, slide, wall bounce and dash. In all honesty, completely mastering movement is perhaps the most challenging thing in the game.
Now that we have a more or less complete picture of the whole game, we can talk about what it brings and why I am convinced of its success. As I’ve mentioned several times before, it’s a unique experience that’s similar to a lot of things, but it doesn’t directly compete with any. It’s hard to describe the experience of a game so complex and elaborate that it makes sense to someone who hasn’t played it before. Anyway, I don’t see a single reason why Deadlock shouldn’t succeed in the future.
After all, just look at the player numbers already. Around 100,000 players play Deadlock daily worldwide, and I haven’t mentioned yet that this is a closed beta that you can only get into if you’re invited via Steam. It should be mentioned that the game was already played by a lot of people before it was officially announced, but that doesn’t change the fact that it became a hit and for good reason. Many gamers disaffected with other popular games turned to Deadlock because it combines elements of what they like with what they missed.
Probably the biggest current problem of the game is balance. Some characters or items are stronger than others and in many cases this leads to a very boring or annoying meta. But what is nice to see is the effort of developers who regularly release updates and try to improve the game. There isn’t a single reason why Deadlock shouldn’t take the world and the esports scene by storm when it’s fully released. So if you like basically any genre of competitive multiplayer game, Deadlock is definitely worth at least a try.
