Valve's rumored Overwatch rival has 19 playable heroes, Bioshock Infinite-esque rails, and Dota-style lanes in allegedly leaked footage

A Team Fortress 2 player uses a machine gun against foes
(Image credit: Valve)

Rumors of a new Valve game are always swirling around the internet, but alleged leaked footage has now bolstered whispers about an 'Overwatch meets Team Fortress 2' shooter that could be on the way.

Deadlock is the supposed name of Valve's upcoming third-person hero shooter, previously known as Neon Prime in a trademark filed two years ago. Several Valve content creators and leakers began to dish information about the project, calling it a 6v6 "combination of Dota 2, Team Fortress 2, Overwatch, Valorant, Smite, Orcs Must Die" with tower defense sprinkles and suspended metal rails used for traversal à la Bioshock Infinite. 

A series of images purportedly leaked online following the Deadlock whispers, and now, a new one-minute clip seemingly shows the game in action. The video shows a character ziplining across the map using the suspended railways before experimenting with their pistol and perusing the menus, which reveal 19 playable characters.

Among the maybe-playable heroes are a magical archer called Grey Talon, a sneaky character called Haze who reminds me of Overwatch's Sombra, a pyromaniac aptly named Infernus, a health-stealing Lady Geist, and a winged goblin I'm particularly fond of already. The footage is said to be from an ongoing closed beta where these 19 characters are all playable. 

Deadlock's announcement could be imminent, according to the abovementioned leakers like Tyler McVicker, who claimed that the shooter was currently in the playtesting phase of development, not only from Valve's own developers but also from content creators. Returning to the hero shooter genre with a new series as opposed to just counting to three with Team Fortress is probably the most Valve move available, but we'll need to wait for an official announcement before anything is set in stone. 

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Freelance contributor

Kaan freelances for various websites including Rock Paper Shotgun, Eurogamer, and this one, Gamesradar. He particularly enjoys writing about spooky indies, throwback RPGs, and anything that's vaguely silly. Also has an English Literature and Film Studies degree that he'll soon forget.