Valve’s next game, which has not yet been officially announced, had over 16,000 concurrent players over the weekend. At the time of writing, that number is 16,600 via SteamDB. The game is called deadlock and we’ve known for some time that Valve was working on it, but now it seems like we’re in the middle of a soft launch of sorts.
This game hasn’t been officially announced by the company yet either, but there’s definitely something going on. It’s likely that Valve has released the game for test runs to gauge how successful the title could be with a proper PR campaign, as they say. Eurogamer and others. These numbers are certainly impressive when you consider deadlock still needs to be confirmed by the company.
So what is deadlock? It is supposedly a competitive MOBA shooter that is being described as “the next Dota” by veteran Valve reporter Tyler McVicker. It is said to have been in development since 2018 and is a partnership with IceFrog, an unnamed developer who was originally behind the original Defence of the Elders Mod by Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos that’s how it all started Dota Mania.
After all, deadlock is already in an advanced stage of development considering the high number of simultaneous players. McVicker describes it as “like Brave, Watch, Dota2 And TeamFortress2 had a baby.”
Since testers have started sharing screenshots of Deadlock everywhere, here are a few that I can verify, featuring one of the heroes named Grey Talon. pic.twitter.com/KdZSRxObSz
— Gabe Follower (@gabefollower) May 17, 2024
It is reportedly based on a “fantasy setting mixed with steampunk.” Leaked screenshots certainly point to a steampunk aesthetic. There are also allegedly Bioshock Infinite-style skyrails that players can hook onto, which is always great fun.
Although Valve has not yet officially announced, deadlockprobably expecting a surprise of some sort, the company trademarked the name in June. So that’s something. With over 16,000 parallels, it won’t be long before we all know a lot more about this game.
