Valve’s unannounced hero shooter is already one of Steam’s most-played games

Despite being unannounced, Valve’s latest game is currently one of Steam’s most popular titles.

The game in question is a hero shooter called Deadlock, which leaked in May when videos and details were shared online following the launch of a private playtest.

Valve has significantly ramped up playtesting for the game in August, to the extent that Deadlock is currently among the top 100 played games on Steam.

According to figures from SteamDB, Deadlock had an all-time peak of 18,254 concurrent players on August 12.

Before this month, Deadlock’s peak concurrent player count was just shy of 2,700. The recent player count spike may suggest an official reveal for Deadlock isn’t far off.

IGN reports that Valve is using an invite system for the game’s current early access period, where certain Steam players are receiving invites and can then suggest other users to also receive invites.

Here’s deadlock gameplay loop explained what the game is actually about #deadlock #leak pic.twitter.com/wu0NY2BNoj

— Doodle (@DoodleLTG) May 23, 2024

According to well informed Valve enthusiast Tyler McVicker, Deadlock has been in development since 2018, features tower defence mechanics and has a fantasy setting mixed with steampunk.

“This is meant to be Valve’s next major competitive game, the next Counter-Strike, the next Dota,” he said in May. “It’s hero-based, it’s class-based, it’s very personality-driven.

“This is Valve attempting to bring together all of their community under one umbrella.”

Valve’s most recent release was last year’s multiplayer tactical FPS Counter-Strike 2.