We find ourselves in an alternate reality in which the supernatural has always existed, even if for most of human history it has remained confined to the world of legends and beliefs. What changed everything was an event that took place towards the end of the nineteenth century, during an eclipse. That event, known as Maelstrom, caused the opening of mysterious portals called Astral Gates, which appeared in different parts of the world. For the first time, humanity was faced with a reality that was impossible to ignore: magic and supernatural forces were not mere myths!
Fifty years later, the story of Deadlock takes us to Cursed Apple, an alternate and supernatural version of New York, where the boundary between the earthly and otherworldly worlds is now much thinner.
But let's take a step back...
In the beginning, Valve's latest invention had a completely different name: Neon Prime. The game was in fact born as an ambitious project with a strong sci-fi character, an evolution of an even earlier idea known internally as Citadel. During development, however, the developers progressively changed direction, abandoning the sci-fi aesthetic to build something completely different.
So in May 2024 Deadlock was born. A project that, while maintaining some of the foundations of the original idea, would change the setting, art style and identity, until it became the competitive shooter we know today.
Deadlock is a team-based competitive multiplayer shooter that combines the mechanics of a hero shooter with those of a MOBA. Two teams face each other within a large map divided into "lanes", with the aim of advancing towards the opponent's base and destroying its defenses. Each player controls a hero characterized by a weapon, specific skills and a unique style of play. Killing opponents is just the tip of the iceberg. During the game you have to eliminate minions, collect Souls, buy items, build your build and decide how to spend the accumulated resources .
And so far it might seem like a familiar description, right?
A shooter with the soul of a MOBA
The first game can feel like you're in front of a regular hero shooter. There are weapons, abilities, cooldowns, fast-paced combat, and very different characters. But the more you play, the more noticeable the MOBA component becomes.
Every choice has consequences.
Farming correctly means getting more resources. Having more resources means being able to buy better items. A properly built build can completely change a hero's behavior and allow you to face situations that, with a different configuration, would be almost impossible. You have to learn to read the game, understand when to push a lane, when to retreat, when to help a teammate and above all when to avoid a fight. It is an approach that can initially displace those who come from traditional FPS, but which certainly represents one of the most important strengths of the game.
Despite the strong MOBA component, Deadlock never forgets that it is a shooter. Weapons play a central role, and the ability to aim remains crucial, especially in ranged engagements. The difference from the competition, however, is that accuracy must continually coexist with skill, movement, and resource management. This creates unique situations. A player may have excellent aim, but find themselves struggling against an opponent with a build that is more suited to the situation. Similarly, a good skill used at the wrong time can turn an advantage into a disadvantage.
NEVER STOP!
If there's one thing that immediately sets Deadlock apart from most of its competitors, it's movement. The game offers several ways to move quickly around the map and combine movement and skills. Dash, jumps, ziplines , and verticality turn combat into highly dynamic combat. It's not enough to simply stand behind cover and wait for your opponent to come out into the open. You have to constantly move. A fight can start on a street, continue on a rooftop, and end a few seconds later inside a building. Moving around the map becomes an integral part of combat and not just a way to move around the map.
An ever-expanding roster
One of the most striking aspects of Deadlock is certainly the design of its characters. Valve has managed to create an extremely varied and recognizable cast, in which each hero has their own well-defined visual identity. From costumes to animations, passing through weapons and abilities, each element contributes to telling something about the character and the world in which he lives. The result is a roster that manages to be original without losing consistency: each character immediately stands out from the others and, above all, seems to have their own story to tell. But variety is not just about aesthetics or skills, in fact the objects allow you to further modify the behavior of your character.
The question becomes: how do we want to build it?
This system increases strategic depth tremendously, but it also brings with it one of the main problems of MOBAs: the learning curve.
Among the most recent novelties we find six new characters: Silver, Graves, Celeste, Venator, Rem and Apollo. Their introduction was accompanied by a voting system through which the community could decide the order of release. At the end of the event there were over 60 million votes.
It's an interesting example of how Valve is using this phase of development to engage its community and, at the same time, gather feedback.
An alternative New York
From an artistic point of view, Valve has chosen a rather particular path. The world of Deadlock is a supernatural reinterpretation of New York in the 30s, where urban elements, magic, technology and occultism coexist within the same universe. We are therefore not in front of the classic medieval fantasy or even in a futuristic city. The setting has a strong identity and manages to stand out thanks to the cohesion of elements apparently very distant from each other.
The map is not a simple arena, but a living city where anything can happen.
Hard to master
Between Souls, items, skills, stats, lanes and map management, the amount of information to be assimilated can be quite high. Those who come from an FPS may initially focus only on eliminations, soon discovering that this approach does not necessarily lead to victory, on the contrary... Similarly, those who come from MOBAs may have some difficulty with the shooter component and with a much more elaborate movement system. The game therefore requires you to learn two languages at the same time. Precisely for this reason, the first few hours can be frustrating; and when I say frustrating, I mean really frustrating.
BUT once this barrier is overcome, the game becomes much more readable and, above all, much more fun.
So don't be intimidated! We all started from the bottom.
LORE
Two powerful entities known as the Patrons, the Hidden King and the Archmother, are trying to reach Earth. To do so, they need a particular ritual to be completed, and to get what they want, they are willing to make a very simple promise: to grant the greatest wish of those who will help them. The ritual then pits two teams against each other in the streets of the Big Apple.
On the one hand there are those who try to summon the entity, on the other those who try to prevent this from happening. The lore of Deadlock is told within the game: in the stories of the individual heroes, in their jokes during matches, in the setting and in the numerous details present in the map. Behind what seems like a simple competitive game there is therefore a much larger supernatural conflict, still to be discovered.
And now?
Valve continues to consider Deadlock a project in development and access remains tied to an invite-only playtest phase. Even in 2026, the game continues to receive substantial changes and patches that make a major impact on its mechanics. A system that seems definitive could be completely reworked, or a character could receive such major changes that their role changes completely. Valve is using this phase to experiment and understand what works and what needs to be changed.
The downside is that the player must be willing to accept a certain instability. Bugs, balances, modified mechanics and systems that are still evolving are part of the experience. The game can count on an average of about 80,000 players, reaching peaks of 170,000. Impressive numbers for any title, but even more so if we consider that it is a game that is still in Early Access.
But then... When will Deadlock be ready? It's hard to say. What Valve has built so far is already something hard to ignore. Each update adds new pieces to a game that still seems to have a lot to express. A big update is expected at the end of September 2026 and could represent another important step in development. For now, however, one thing is certain: Deadlock has already shown that it has its own identity and enormous potential.
And if this is just the beginning, the real question is only one: How far will it go?
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