Deadlock - An FPS MOBA by Valve.

That happened with Dota 2 as well.
I have been wanting a game like this for years but I have my reservations about this leaning more into the Dota elements than shooter elements (a game I liked did that for its sequel and it was less fun compared to the original)
Hoping to have some free time (and peace) to try it out soon.
From personal experience, i can tell you that DotA was unimaginably popular for a Warcraft 3 mod well before dota 2 came out. Practically 8/10 games on the custom games list for warcraft 3 was dota, and about ten times as many was played in private garena lobbies with their ranking systems. My middle school self was so fucking excited for dota 2 that i spent 30 hard earned dollars on an invite that was given for free to some users in the 2011 steam winter sale event. At the time, the only two alternatives were HoN (which was a pretty shit clone tbh) and LoL, which even back than was considered a watered down version for babbies.
DotA's growth was not because of any kind of crazy viral marketing, it was simply because it was a one to one copy of the original, spearheaded by the same person who managed the original mod for so many years before. Add to that a general disdain for Pendragon, (due to suddenly shutting down the biggest DotA fansite and replacing it with a message practically saying "party's over idiots, come play LoL instead") and the only choice left was DotA 2.
I think the biggest evidence i have of this is the fact that the game peaked in 2015 to 2016, which is when the last patches for the original warcraft 3 mod was released, essentially forcing the last few stragglers to make their eventual choice of ASSFAGGOTS.

The inherent problem with DotA is that you need to put so fucking many hours into the game to even grasp the basics, and even in unranked baby matches people will shittalk you for not knowing how to pull creeps or know how to refill bottles when teleporting. Generally not a great time investment for anyone looking to get into a new game, and it shows. Ever since its peak in 2016, the game has been on a very slow, but noticable decline. The people who play are diehard fans who will stay to the bitter end, but the people getting in are fewer and fewer.
I really really wish that the game would be able to see some kind of renaissance, but I don't see it happening. Half the community wants new patches constantly, and the other half wants nothing to change, and nobody dares to look in because you need a postdoc to even get into a game.
 
I get the feeling that Deadlock is only do as well as it is because it was made by Valve. If this was made by any other company and was still the same game, it would likely have flopped as hard as Concord or Dustborn.
It's doing well because it's good.
People will give good developers, like Valve, the benefit of the doubt, but if the game sucks they'll simply stop playing. This is what happened to Artifact and Dota Underlords.

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Games that peaked on release and then quickly died.
Dealock is still young, but I see no sign of dying, in fact every weekend the peak grows.
 
bebop needs to be nerfed. his hook bomb combo can be unlocked 2 minutes into the game and takes off half your health bar instantly, there is no way to avoid it as it comes out immediately and is only on a 20 second cool down. i just quit a match because i died 6 times in 5 minutes and there is no counter play besides him missing it.
Skill issue. Stay away from him as much as possible, his hook is slow.
 
Just got an invite and played for a couple hours, it's much better than I expected (even though it's in Alpha). Never played League or Dota so I'm not attuned to how the lanes gameplay works but it's been fun so far.

Looking forward to how the game develops.
 
The biggest problem I have with the game is performance. I cannot play M1 builds, because my fps drops to as low as 10 over time. I think Kelvin's ult gives me biggest drops, it goes from 50s to 10s-20s inside of it. I understand they want to give a good first impression, but the fact that there's no way to turn down shadows and particles is just stupid.
 
I'm a little surprised Underlords fosters a four-digit playerbase in general. I figured it was gonna totally tank after they added the hero units and started bogging the mechanics down.
At its heart its still autochess and that's honestly good enough casual fun.
 
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Nigga what the fuck are on about, do you even read the posts before you respond?

Edit: I think the gane is doing so well because of the invite System. It’s literally a viral spread plus the feeling of exclusivity is a huge factor.
I think the game itself is fun but the invite system is the biggest innovation, free to play while still requiring effort to enter. If what I've read about people getting banned or at least banned from inviting after people they invited get banned is true, it'll be the first truly effective way to limit cheaters outside of just not being F2P.
Valve's lootboxes were copied poorly in a way that made it impossible for people to just buy what they wanted and everyone is going to poorly copy this idea for their next round of multiplayer games too. Not down to the "also developed under NDA until people think the game is so fun they break the NDA to share it" part but that'll just be the regular "midwit middle management and retarded MBAs cannot comprehend the idea of an 'X-factor' or secret sauce" situation that plagues industry in general.
 
The game is boring as dirt and matches go on way too long, felt nothing when winning too. The world is honestly pretty cool though
 
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The game characters have enough soul for this not to be a concord or a hyenas and the game world, despite being pretty much just scream fortress elaborated into an entire world is ok.
Gameplay itself is fun but the balance is a bit patchy at the moment IMO
Haze is a death sentence for most people 1v1 but is very squishy as a balance but wraith on the other hand can harass entire teams at any range and is awful to lane against.
skill issue his hook has the longest range of any ability in the game
Again his hook is quite slow and it also doesn't stun so you cant use it on seven's ult.
Bepop bomb is powerful but it also falls off against heroes who arent exclusively haze and vindicta with no spirit resist.
 
wraith on the other hand can harass entire teams at any range and is awful to lane against.
I had a streak of 3 games in a row against a Wraith in lane. She's an absolute nightmare. She can unload her entire magazine in one nanosecond from anywhere and do a ton of damage with her dumb cards. Once she gets her ult she can press it for free kills.
Then after the laning phase, she split pushes and escapes any and all consequence with her teleport, or she can turn around and just kill you for funsies.
Everyone's whining about Seven this, Vindicta that, and they're completely ignoring Wraith.
 
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I had a streak of 3 games in a row against a Wraith in lane. She's an absolute nightmare. She can unload her entire magazine in one nanosecond from anywhere and do a ton of damage with her dumb cards. Once she gets her ult she can press it for free kills.
Then after the laning phase, she split pushes and escapes any and all consequence with her teleport, or she can turn around and just kill you for funsies.
Everyone's whining about Seven this, Vindicta that, and they're completely ignoring Wraith.
git gud
 
I had a streak of 3 games in a row against a Wraith in lane. She's an absolute nightmare. She can unload her entire magazine in one nanosecond from anywhere and do a ton of damage with her dumb cards. Once she gets her ult she can press it for free kills.
Then after the laning phase, she split pushes and escapes any and all consequence with her teleport, or she can turn around and just kill you for funsies.
Everyone's whining about Seven this, Vindicta that, and they're completely ignoring Wraith.
She's a cunt in every MMR bracket. Your one option is to grab an item with Spirit shield early so she can't burst you down with cards during lane, and get Restorative Shot for the sustain and the bullet resist. Just stay a healthy enough distance away so she melts you in 10 seconds as opposed to 5.
 
Tried the game finally, initially seemed alright, I thought if I got in early there wouldn't be so many characters to learn like Dota, but there seems to be dozens already. I think I would have played more if the game didn't have the item system. There are too many items. The fact that the game is right there holding your hand telling you what to buy is meh, why not get rid of them, and that way you don't need 3 "build" guides on the item page. That's one nice thing about TF2 I can just drop in and play, I don't need to read "bigboss420s build guide on max DPS Kelvin" or risk feeling like I'm underpowered. I wish the game had more TF2 influence and less Dota influence.
 
Tried the game finally, initially seemed alright, I thought if I got in early there wouldn't be so many characters to learn like Dota, but there seems to be dozens already. I think I would have played more if the game didn't have the item system. There are too many items. The fact that the game is right there holding your hand telling you what to buy is meh, why not get rid of them, and that way you don't need 3 "build" guides on the item page. That's one nice thing about TF2 I can just drop in and play, I don't need to read "bigboss420s build guide on max DPS Kelvin" or risk feeling like I'm underpowered. I wish the game had more TF2 influence and less Dota influence.
It's unavoidable with a MOBA, the items are core to the genre.
 
I was looking at the latest patch notes on the forum and I'm confused:
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Why was the Viscous (green slime) nerfed so hard? Similar to Shiv who was actually op dominating every game. I have only seen him picked like twice since I started playing and never felt like he was op.
 
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