Valve Releases Massive Update for Hero Shooter Deadlock Amid All-Time Peak Player Count

Valve deployed a massive update for its lane-based multiplayer hero shooter, Deadlock, on Tuesday, propelling the still-unannounced title to a record-breaking concurrent player count. Dubbed “City Never Sleeps,” the latest patch injects a fresh map, six prospective characters, and an assortment of brand-new neutral monsters now officially designated as Haunts.

Shortly after the patch went live, player numbers soared past 228,000 concurrent users—marking an all-time high for the game, according to SteamDB.

Alongside the rollout of City Never Sleeps, Valve shared additional insights regarding the title’s trajectory, clarifying that a final launch is still a ways off. Following January’s “Old Gods New Blood” update, the developers noted that substantial foundational work remained before transitioning into intensive refinement phases, such as updating legacy hero designs.

The development team explained that they are currently tackling multiple features simultaneously, some of which have already debuted in the City Never Sleeps expansion.

“Some others are things we’ve been working on in the last few months alongside this update,” the studio stated. “This even includes things like progression and hero/hideout customizations, as we feel those are features we want to be able to adjust and significantly change based on feedback before the game is fully released. There are also other things we’ve been working on recently that are more speculative (as in we aren’t 100% sure if they will be released or not based on how playtesting goes, though results so far have been promising) like large item redesigns/additions and alternate game modes that expand the scope of the game.”

Ultimately, the creators expressed considerable satisfaction with how Deadlock has evolved over recent years, aided immensely by continuous community feedback.

What’s in Deadlock’s City Never Sleeps update

There is an immense amount of content to unpack, anchored primarily by a striking New York City map that channels a heavily stylized, eerie atmosphere reminiscent of the early-to-mid 20th century metropolis.

In Deadlock‘s version of New York, traditional neutral creeps have been swapped out for a wildly imaginative roster of entities known as Haunts. This new lineup includes:

• Specimen – a disembodied hand trapped inside a glass jar
• Past Dues – spectral entities inspired by library archives
• Gutter Ghouls – cyclopean, ambulatory garbage bags
• Barrel Mimics – limbed barrels wielding tire irons (potentially with explosive capabilities)
• Stage Hands – eerie marionettes animated by ghostly appendages
• Crabbage Pots – a cryptid reminiscent of urban folklore, drawing clear inspiration from Little Shop of Horrors
• Festival Spirit – ethereal souls dwelling within traditional Chinese lanterns
• Shrooms – laid-back fungal wizards
• Underhands – gargoyles suspected of working as pickpockets

Furthermore, Valve is introducing six prospective heroes, many of whom embody distinct New York flavors: Nurse Harrow, Rat King, Solomon, Deadman Danny, Baba, and Violet. While the Rat King (accompanied by a loyal pizza rat) and Solomon (an intense competitive chess player) are immediate standouts, Baba—a pigeon-obsessed elderly woman—brings delightful grandmotherly representation to the hero shooter genre. Participants can cast in-game votes to determine which of these six newcomers will be officially integrated first.

Comprehensive patch notes for the City Never Sleeps update can be reviewed on the official Deadlock portal.

You need to be playing Deadlock right now

A hero shooter unafraid to blaze its own path

Source: Polygon