Verge: We played Valve’s secret new shooter: Deadlock

Kokoloko

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Oh ffs the rejects from the destiny studio and bungie itself are not in the same league as the people at valve and icefrog is a dude who cut his teeth in the war3 frozen throne custom scene for years before he landed his job making dota 2.

Sure, for a PC fans yes, but I prefer my shooters from Bungie and similar feel. Im sure Im not the only one
 
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TrishaCat

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I bet nobody will ask them to port to Xbox and PS Day 1 for a "bigger reach" or even other storefronts. The rules never apply to Steam 🙄
They should port the game to XSex, PS5, and Switch once it's out

And you're being silly
If you want it on PS5, let Valve know! Send messages, get like minded people in on it! Instead of whining about other people not asking for it, ask for it if you wanna play it. The more demand there is for something the more likely it is to happen.
 

Kokoloko

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They should port the game to XSex, PS5, and Switch once it's out

And you're being silly
If you want it on PS5, let Valve know! Send messages, get like minded people in on it! Instead of whining about other people not asking for it, ask for it if you wanna play it. The more demand there is for something the more likely it is to happen.

Valve knows PS fans wanted the likes of Portal, HL2, L4d, HL-Aylx, orange box on PS4 etc etc.

Why does every other 3rd party seem to be ok with porting to PS but Valve has to be given messages from fans and be serenaded?
 

TrishaCat

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Valve knows PS fans wanted the likes of Portal, HL2, L4d, HL-Aylx, orange box on PS4 etc etc.

Why does every other 3rd party seem to be ok with porting to PS but Valve has to be given messages from fans and be serenaded?
Why did it take lotsa effort to get 3rd parties to start porting to PC in the early 2010s?
Let it be known the amount of port begging and fan collaboration was quite large. Japanese games on PC especially used to be a rarity prior to the mid 2010s, but fan outcry changed that.

I can't tell you why Valve doesnt; it's not as if they haven't put games on PS4 and Switch before. Bridge Constructor Portal is on PS4 and Switch and both Portal games are on Switch. Perhaps they're hesitant to because they want people on Steam. In which case the best that can be done is to show that there's a sizable enough audience for it on PS that wants to buy it there. That's what PC peeps did in the 2010s
 

TrishaCat

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I also want to add to the above that that's not unique for PC people either; there's a rather large amount of people that were port begging for Switch in the Switch's early days. "x should be on switch" was an extremely common post. And what do you know, nowadays most games get Switch releases except for really high end AAA titles and and some first party stuff on the Microsoft/Sony side. This is not a unique phenomena. You just need to do what Switch and PC people did.
 

Dick Jones

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😂

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Like I need a reason to mock those 🤡🤡🤡🤡 at the Verge
 
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The characters have the same design "inspirations" you trashed Concord 🤷‍♂️
I really can't understand you guys lol

Nah. Deadlock's character designs are on average MUCH better than Concord's. Better silhouettes, better realization of concepts, and better overall variety. It has a lot of female characters, but for me a large group of female or diverse characters has NEVER been an issue and not what inherently hurts Concord's designs.

What hurts Concord (IMO) is that a lot of the designs just feel half-finished and don't seem like they're completely fleshed out. The fact many of the weaker designs are among the more diverse ones is incidental, but that doesn't help the push for more welcomed diversity in games. Take Daw for example; they could've still made him "big" but in a way where he's more a Strongman build, with a much more inspired outfit, and that design would be magnitudes better while still also being diverse.

A lot of Concord's characters are a symptom where, design-wise, the team just feels making them non-white or non-male is good enough to make up for weak aesthetics. Instead that just exacerbates the weak aesthetics and makes them even more noticeable.

I'm not seeing any of that with the Deadlock characters, at least not so far (and the same can be said for games with even more diversity in character designs like Overwatch and VALORANT).
 
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Kokoloko

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Nah. Deadlock's character designs are on average MUCH better than Concord's. Better silhouettes, better realization of concepts, and better overall variety. It has a lot of female characters, but for me a large group of female or diverse characters has NEVER been an issue and not what inherently hurts Concord's designs.

What hurts Concord (IMO) is that a lot of the designs just feel half-finished and don't seem like they're completely fleshed out. The fact many of the weaker designs are among the more diverse ones is incidental, but that doesn't help the push for more welcomed diversity in games. Take Daw for example; they could've still made him "big" but in a way where he's more a Strongman build, with a much more inspired outfit, and that design would be magnitudes better while still also being diverse.

A lot of Concord's characters are a symptom where, design-wise, the team just feels making them non-white or non-male is good enough to make up for weak aesthetics. Instead that just exacerbates the weak aesthetics and makes them even more noticeable.

I'm not seeing any of that with the Deadlock characters, at least not so far (and the same can be said for games with even more diversity in character designs like Overwatch and VALORANT).

Id say a handful of Concord characters look good/deent while the rest look like ass lol.
Graphically Id say Concord looks good though outside of characters and some of the character colour palette. Maps included

Id try this anyway, Ive really really never been into Dota style stuff though, even less so than PVP Hero shooters
 

Zzero

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Nah. Deadlock's character designs are on average MUCH better than Concord's. Better silhouettes, better realization of concepts, and better overall variety. It has a lot of female characters, but for me a large group of female or diverse characters has NEVER been an issue and not what inherently hurts Concord's designs.

What hurts Concord (IMO) is that a lot of the designs just feel half-finished and don't seem like they're completely fleshed out. The fact many of the weaker designs are among the more diverse ones is incidental, but that doesn't help the push for more welcomed diversity in games. Take Daw for example; they could've still made him "big" but in a way where he's more a Strongman build, with a much more inspired outfit, and that design would be magnitudes better while still also being diverse.

A lot of Concord's characters are a symptom where, design-wise, the team just feels making them non-white or non-male is good enough to make up for weak aesthetics. Instead that just exacerbates the weak aesthetics and makes them even more noticeable.

I'm not seeing any of that with the Deadlock characters, at least not so far (and the same can be said for games with even more diversity in character designs like Overwatch and VALORANT).
I really feel like the Concord characters fail the siluette test whereas Valve's always pass despite being just humans.
 

Kokoloko

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Why did it take lotsa effort to get 3rd parties to start porting to PC in the early 2010s?
Let it be known the amount of port begging and fan collaboration was quite large. Japanese games on PC especially used to be a rarity prior to the mid 2010s, but fan outcry changed that.
They were mostly console game developers and got with the times eventually. Whats stopping Valve during the PS4/PS5 generation?
 
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ethomaz

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Nah. Deadlock's character designs are on average MUCH better than Concord's. Better silhouettes, better realization of concepts, and better overall variety. It has a lot of female characters, but for me a large group of female or diverse characters has NEVER been an issue and not what inherently hurts Concord's designs.

What hurts Concord (IMO) is that a lot of the designs just feel half-finished and don't seem like they're completely fleshed out. The fact many of the weaker designs are among the more diverse ones is incidental, but that doesn't help the push for more welcomed diversity in games. Take Daw for example; they could've still made him "big" but in a way where he's more a Strongman build, with a much more inspired outfit, and that design would be magnitudes better while still also being diverse.

A lot of Concord's characters are a symptom where, design-wise, the team just feels making them non-white or non-male is good enough to make up for weak aesthetics. Instead that just exacerbates the weak aesthetics and makes them even more noticeable.

I'm not seeing any of that with the Deadlock characters, at least not so far (and the same can be said for games with even more diversity in character designs like Overwatch and VALORANT).
So there is a narrative change now?

I mean at first my impression was that the hate of Concord characters were because the woke, trans, etc design that basically is all over the place in Deadlock.
In fact if we go back to posts you will see the focus of complain weighted a lot in the "shit woke design".

I don't find neither bad to be fair.

But to see people here now being ok with the characters but trashing Concord make me more convinced of my early points... that the Concord's hate was fabricated preconceptions due being a Sony's game.

Overwatch got a free pass... now Deadlock is getting a free pass.
But Concord not.

Even so (I did not play Deadlock yet) Concord's gameplay is superior to Overwatch's gameplay.
 
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Why did it take lotsa effort to get 3rd parties to start porting to PC in the early 2010s?
Let it be known the amount of port begging and fan collaboration was quite large. Japanese games on PC especially used to be a rarity prior to the mid 2010s, but fan outcry changed that.

Coincidentally, that just proves something I've been saying for a long time: PC (Steam in particular) has mostly grown due to once-console gamers in the PS3/360/Wii era either leaving console and going to PC, or going back to PC after leaving that to go to console in the late OG Xbox/Xbox 360 phase.

I mean it's no coincidence they were begging for more Japanese games on PC; how would they have known of or played those Japanese games before if they weren't either console-exclusive or console-primary gamers earlier on? The advent of the PS4 Pro and Xbox One X in the following gen leads further support of this theory, i.e those systems were in part made to keep console enthusiasts from leaving console and going to PC.

Which makes Microsoft's lack of a mid-gen Pro system this gen make sense: besides the sales collapse of Xbox hardware, MS are already fully on PC so they don't "care" as much about losing players to a platform that's still mostly theirs anyway when it comes to gaming (thanks to Windows and DX12U), and where their games are at Day 1. But Sony? Well, considering they've been increasingly adamant about PC support, more PC support has a direct correlation to weakening driving factors for justifying the PS5 Pro.

At least, IMO.
 

TrishaCat

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Coincidentally, that just proves something I've been saying for a long time: PC (Steam in particular) has mostly grown due to once-console gamers in the PS3/360/Wii era either leaving console and going to PC, or going back to PC after leaving that to go to console in the late OG Xbox/Xbox 360 phase.
Fwiw, I was primarily a console gamer until very early in the PS4/Xbone life. What actually got me building a PC was Final Fantasy Type-0 HD and Hyperdimension Neptunia Re;birth 1 being ported.
 
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So there is a narrative change now?

I mean at first my impression was that the hate of Concord characters were because the woke, trans, etc design that basically is all over the place in Deadlock.
In fact if we go back to posts you will see the focus of complain weighted a lot in the "shit woke design".

I don't find neither bad to be fair.

But to see people here now being ok with the characters but trashing Concord make me more convinced of my early points... that the Concord's hate was fabricated preconceptions due being a Sony's game.

Overwatch got a free pass... now Deadlock is getting a free pass.
But Concord not.

Even so (I did not play Deadlock yet) Concord's gameplay is superior to Overwatch's gameplay.

Well maybe there were other people saying that stuff about Concord's designs, with all the usual stupid buzzwords and stuff. In fact, I know they were. I just also know I wasn't one of them. When I pointed out weak designs, it was a lot to do with them being unfinished-looking, or too generic, or looking like bad takes on Zoomer aesthetics (and a lot of Zoomer aesthetics are already bad). Though I might've picked on a couple designs here and there, mainly Daw because of how utterly ridiculous they look if you take even a second to think about it.

But with the Deadlock designs, again I'm not seeing the vast majority of those problems. Concepts look visually fleshed out and well-realized, and while it's not a bright/poppy colored hero shooter, it doesn't have too strong a mix of almost garish tertiaries like Concord's color palette does in a few places. The UI also looks better and more informative right from the jump.

In fact going back to Concord, if you asked me who were among the Top 5 designs some of my own choices were some of the more 'diverse' ones like Haymar and Jabali, but not because they "checked a box". It's because they're genuinely among the most fleshed-out and interesting designs among the cast. So for me it definitely has nothing to do with gender, sexuality or skin color. Which again, is why the people who resort to those buzzwords are so boring & annoying, and unfortunately some of them even here really showed their ass (in the bad way) with AssCreed Shadows.

Fwiw, I was primarily a console gamer until very early in the PS4/Xbone life. What actually got me building a PC was Final Fantasy Type-0 HD and Hyperdimension Neptunia Re;birth 1 being ported.

There are definitely a lot of people just like you in that case. Which, relating to things today, is why I'm baffled to Sony's PC strategy in particular. They're just enabling an (indirect) competitor platform to encroach on their hardware gaming market. A lot of PC gamers today have way more crossover in gaming tastes with console gamers than back in the '00s or '90s, or even the early 2010s.

So how they don't see PC as some form of competition is just dumb to me. What they could at least be doing is adding features to PlayStation to make it more competitive with PC gaming storefronts, even if they are also flirting with bringing more games to PC with shorter intervals if not Day 1 becoming more prevalent. The reviews added recently to the PS Store is a good baby step, but they need to add a lot more when it comes to features/QOL.

It's the least they can provide for console owners of the hardware, if again, they are planning on having less genuine exclusives for the console going forward.
 
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ethomaz

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Then, at some point, Valve invited players to a closed beta for Deadlock, using a key system that allowed players to invite their friends. The invites proliferated so far that according to SteamDB, the game's hit a peak of 18,000 concurrent players.

Such invites for unreleased games normally come with varying NDAs, but as The Verge's Sean Hollister discovered, Valve's only attempt to discourage sharing anything about the game was a menu screen saying "don't share info" when you opened the client, with a prompt for the user to say "ok."
Hollister's banning tripped a red flag for me. Not just because retaliating against journalists pushes against a free press (I don't want to make too big a deal of this, it's just getting banned from a game's matchmaking), but because this series of events indicates Valve's market power might be getting out of hand.

Is it a monopoly? I don't know, but because Valve owns and operates Steam, the platform it distributes Deadlock on, it's been able to market its game in a way no another developer or publisher can.
 
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ethomaz

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A notice asking to please not share stuff and proceeds to share stuff. Gaming media where's are so embarrassing. Valve aren't throwing their weight around. They are asking the beta testers to not be cunts spoiling the game.
That is for what NDA exists.

When games have the notice "This game can cause headaches etc" , don't you play it?

Human nature… I receive a notice asking to not go in a party tonight… well I weren’t going before but after the notice let’s go to that party 🤷‍♂️

But hey this was probably all planned by Valve.
 
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