Deadlock gives me the same feeling Dota 2 and Team Fortress 2 did before they consumed my life

Last-hitting is so mind-numbingly boring in most MOBAs. The first fifteen minutes of the match are wasted on this little dance picking off lane creeps right before they die to ensure you get the gold from their death. Games like Heroes of the Storm or Gigantic have done away with last-hitting, or even creeps entirely, but they lose that satisfying sense of progression you get from slowly racking up cash to spend on powerful items. I admit it’s part of why these games work, but frankly, I’ve been sick of it for a long time.

With thousands of matches between League of Legends, Dota 2, Heroes of the Storm, and Smite, I was sure I was over this whole MOBA thing. If I have to kill one more lane creep, I thought, I might just lose my mind. When I saw Deadlock’s multicolored lanes and waves of creeps, I was worried it’d be banal—late to a party Valve itself helped start some 15 years ago. But I quickly realized Deadlock is not Dota, nor is it Overwatch or Valorant; it’s something completely novel which flips the MOBA on its head, not by stripping anything away, but by expanding on it and implementing a full decade of lessons learned.