I got my Xbox Series X this week, and I’ve been neck-deep in Game Pass offerings since. The moment my set-up was done, I installed Deathloop. I’d heard about the game when it was first released, but I’d only had a PS4 then, and no PC, so I didn’t get to play it. I’d always found the idea of time loౠops fascinating, and this game seemed right up my alley – immersive story, dynamic combat, space for many play styles, and plenty of secrets to discover. If you missed it too, now is the time to get into it – it’s been on Game Pass since September, and it rules.
Deathloop is incredibly fun. You wake up as a man on the beach in a place c🦹alled Blackreef, with no idea what your name is or what you’re doing there. You find out, as you move through the game’s tutorial, that every time you die, you come back lying on that same beach, pockets empty and sand on your face. The core gameplay loop has you exploring different districts of the map, collecting information, chasing down leads, and collecting gear. If you get killed thrice, you start the loop all over again, with no gear. If you get to the end of the day, it’s the same ﷺthing – same day, no gear.
Your goal is to kill all eight “Visionaries”, who are prominent people in charge of running the loop programme. You want to destroy the loop, and the only way to do this is by killing every Visionary within a single loop. The day is split into four times and four locatio🍸ns, and different Visionaries will be at different locations at different times. Investigating locations, collectin꧒g information and even eavesdropping on conversations will unlock new secrets and methods for your assassinations – it’s like being a spy, except you have as many chances as you need to get the full picture of what’s happening on Blackreef, and when.
The game really gets going when you learn the Visionaries’ routines well enough to begin executing a perfect series of assassinations. Once you understand how to get in and out of locations without raising alarms and the best paths to take towards your targets, the joy of the game lies in doing it all without monuꦉmentally screwing up. You can easily fall into a sweet, sweet rhythm of doing the same thing over and over again, trying to do it better each time. You add layers on layers of planning, till the plan feels seamless in your head – you just have to do it without being seen by an NPC, or missing a headshot that you need to get in order to silently assassinate the right person.
Mess it up? It’s fine, you’ll൲ just have to try again. And again. Every time you die, you wake up with new information, a new NPC to watch out for, a new patrol to keep your eye on. Play it enough, and you perfect your plan – perfect your plan, and you can perfect your execution. Nothing is more compelling to somebody like me who loves to plan every second of their day. Practice enough, learn enough, and you’ll pull it off. There hasn’t been a gameplay loop so compelling to me in years. If you’re looking for a new project to pick at, Deathloop is it. It’s perfectable, and👍 that’s kind of the point.