Deadlock is an upcoming game by Valve that blends the elements of a hero shooter and a MOBA rolled into one. As of the time of this writing, the game is still in its early development stages. However, some players such as ourselves already have access to the game. To add to that train of thought, the only way of playing the game is via invite codes from playtesters.
In this article, I've clocked up to 16.7 hours of play on Deadlock. Given the time I've invested so far, we feel it's enough to express our thoughts on Valve's brewing experiment. With that said, here are our first impressions of the game.
Deadlock – A Perfect Blend of Hero Shooter and MOBA Elements
As mentioned earlier, Deadlock is still in early development. Meaning to say, we can't give an official review of the game yet. This article will focus more on what we think the current build of the game has to offer.
For those who own a copy of the game but haven't necessarily begun playing yet, Deadlock is both a hero shooter and a MOBA that features 6v6 combat. However, based on our experience, the gameplay mainly focuses on MOBA mechanics. The game works exactly like every other MOBA like Dota 2 or League of Legends.
Objectives
Players will be assigned to either of the four lanes: blue, orange, purple, or yellow. Two of those lanes will have two players each, while the remaining lanes will have one each. In each lane, players need to take down four towers before infiltrating the enemy base. Upon reaching the base, players need to destroy a couple of non-hostile shrines, which will allow them to take out the Patron. Once players destroy their enemies' Patron, they win the game.
While our brief explanation of the objectives sounds simple enough, achieving victory is easier said than done. Depending on which lane a player is assigned to, they will have to face either one or two other opponents in their lane. Given the MOBA elements of the game, players also need to kill creeps or minions to gain more EXP and Souls (in-game currency to buy items).
How is it a Hero Shooter?
Looking at the objectives of the game, Deadlock seems to be more of a MOBA than a hero shooter. But the twist Valve added was that they made it into a third-person shooter game. Deadlock slightly shares some elements similar to Overwatch but they aren't necessarily the same. For instance, both games have players select heroes with four unique abilities. Then both games also have players take out their enemies by gunning them down while utilizing their special skills.
But why isn't it a hardcore hero shooter, one might ask. In hero shooters, players are typically more fixated on taking their opponents down. While players should have the same mentality in Deadlock, the game is more complex than simply running and gunning. Due to the blend of MOBA elements, there are a lot of things to factor in: killing minions, destroying towers, killing enemies (especially in one's assigned lane), map awareness, purchasing items to buff one's hero, properly leveling up the hero's abilities, and so much more.
Given these factors, we'd like to give players with no MOBA background but a lot of hero shooter experience a gentle warning that they'll need to learn the basics of playing a MOBA to fully enjoy the game. While the game is still fun to dive into despite not having a background in playing MOBAs, it's worth noting that simply killing enemies doesn't necessarily result in triumph. MOBAs are notorious for having a team turning the tables at any given moment despite the other team seemingly dominating the match.
Gameplay
After a little over 16 hours of gameplay, it's safe to say that Deadlock has the potential to become one of the biggest esports games in the near future. Despite the game being in its early stages, Deadlock already feels smooth and polished. While the graphics may still need some enhancing, the performance of the game itself is impressive as we rarely felt any technical errors.
Technical Performance
As I'm writing the first impressions on Deadlock, it's worth noting that I played the game on a gaming laptop hooked up with a Ryzen 7 5800H CPU and an RTX 3070 GPU.
So far the game ran smoothly on 144fps on medium settings and rarely had my frame rates dropping. The only time they did drop was either when the game goes on beyond 40 minutes or when there are too many animations triggering during a team clash.
Graphics
As mentioned earlier, the graphics could still use some tweaking but we have a feeling that the overall aesthetic of Deadlock isn't supposed to be a realistic-looking game. We could compare the graphics to games like Team Fortress 2 or Valorant.
The only improvements we feel Valve should make to the game is in the environment. The surroundings of the map feel a bit bland in terms of color scheme. Adding a bit more colorful elements would certainly brighten up the feel of the game. But we're not saying they should make the game colorful.
Sound Design
If you listen to Deadlock's audio without any visual aid, off the bat you could tell that it's a Valve game. The sound effects of the game slightly resemble Dota 2. From the announcer to the deaths of heroes, everything about the sound design screams Valve.
What we found interesting was how the developers included warning voice lines similar to how Wraith from Apex Legends warns players if there are enemies nearby. Whenever we found ourselves roaming around the map alone, either our hero or the announcer would warn us that it wasn't safe. The warning feature is really helpful as it gives us the option to either fall back or prepare for a fight.
Another helpful audio queue is when the announcer tells your team which player is carrying the opposing team. In MOBAs, having at least one of the players fed is enough for a team to dominate a match. In Deadlock, the announcer will tell players who they should be taking down to either even the playing field or completely turn things around.
As for the overall audio, it's everything you'd expect from a Valve game. The background music makes the game feel more intense, the sounds from each hero's unique abilities are appropriate, and the overall environment from the destruction of towers to the killing of enemies is properly executed.
Balance
One of the most important aspects when it comes to new games is balance. As of the early development build, Deadlock feels slightly imbalanced. Emphasis on slightly though. It's natural for a game that's still under development to have some imbalances. But we can say that Valve did a good job making each match feel like a fair fight, given that the lobby is filled with players who are already well-versed in the game.
The only genuine imbalances we feel from Deadlock so far are from the heroes. Some heroes feel stronger than others, but that doesn't mean they are invincible. Like every other game out there, the developers simply need to either nerf or buff heroes who need some tweaking.
Thankfully, the developers have a Discord channel for playtesters to drop their feedback on what changes they could make. Looking back at the time I secured my copy of the game up to the time of this writing, it's safe to say that Valve listens to the community as they launch a plethora of updates to patch some balance issues or overall gameplay bugs.
Overall Thoughts
For a game that's in early development, Deadlock is already fun and addicting. Having that said, what more when the final version of the game launches? We feel like Deadlock has what it takes to become one of the biggest PvP MOBA hero shooters out there when it globally releases.
If by any chance you have a friend who is already a playtester of Deadlock, you might want to ask for an invite code to experience this unique game Valve is brewing up.
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