Valve’s new Hero Shooter leaks and fans are confused

Valve—the company behind Half-life and Steam – working on a new game probably named Dead end. It is probably a third-person team-based hero shooter with MOBA and tower defense elements. And people are playing it right now through a closed, private beta. However, some of these same people have started leaking footage of the yet-to-be-announced game online and the reaction has been… mixed, to say the least.

We know Dead end for years now, based on leaks and datamined information from other Valve games. The project was probably codenamed Citadel and it was at some point known internally as Neon Prime. Its development probably started in 2018 and has undergone many changes according to previous leakseven though it was still an online team shooter with DOTA-similar elements. At one point, this was going to take place in the Half-lifethe universebut that seems to have changed, as recently leaked gameplay shows.

So what is Dead end Today? Well, based on gameplay and screenshots closed alpha testing, Dead end will be a hero-based online third-person shooter, featuring maps with MOBA-style pathways, monsters to kill, and BioShock Infinite-like rails that you can bypass to quickly access areas.

In alpha test footage that leaked online, it appears that the game currently has 19 charactersand all share a similar steampunk-meets-fantasy style, similar to the rest of the game’s vibe.

Kotaku contacted Valve about Dead end.

It should be noted that this construction of Dead end is likely still early and the game will change its look and gameplay as it gets closer to an official launch, the reaction to gameplay leaks and screenshots from Valve’s next big project has been fairly muted, with most fans being more confused than anything else.

The reaction to Valve’s next game hasn’t been great

While I’ve spotted some people excited to see what Valve will work on next, the majority of online discussion around Dead end focuses on the “late” feel of this game. The craze for hero shooters has largely died down, and the demand for one, with MOBA elements no less, seems to be lacking. The game’s generic style and world, with no IP, also confused fans who had long wanted a new game. Half-life Or Portal game from Valve, but instead get something closer to Valorant meets Monitoring.

According to the details of Insider gamespeople who would have played Dead end Let’s say it feels a lot like a MOBA, with creeps roaming the maps. Kill these weaker NPCs (maybe called candles or candlesticks) will reward players with currency that can be used to upgrade their hero during that match. It is also reported that a giant boss appears in the middle of the map and can be killed to get more upgrade currency.

I’m still excited about Valve making another game, but I’m not sure it’s what I (and many others) expected from the company famous for developing Half Life 2 And Left for dead. I’ve seen some people suggest that ultimately it would work. Valve is good at making games. And sure, that’s generally true, but keep in mind that when it comes to original, in-house multiplayer games, Valve’s track record is far from great.

Yes, DOTA 2, CSGO, And TF2 are wonderful, but they are all games that Valve inherited from outside developers and modders and then built and developed. When it comes to entirely original online games, Valve released stuff like Artifact (a now dead card game), Ricochet (a bad HL1-an esports thing from the time), The Lords of DOTA (A Automatic failures clone which fizzled out after a few months), and Half-Life Deathmatch which…ok, that was good.

But yeah, I’m not convinced Valve’s next game will set the world on fire, and the reaction online seems to confirm those concerns. We’ll have to wait and see how Valve reacts to these comments and how it affects (or doesn’t affect) Dead end.

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