Deathloop will see players try and break out of a constantly resetting time loop in a bid to escape a mysterious island. The game comes from Dishonored developer Arkane Studios, and appears to roughly inherit that series' art-style and combat system.
Though the Deathloop trailers released so far have focused on the premise, they also rage a huge question that the plot will need to answer if the story is going to make any sense.
The Loop Is Knowledge
Deathloop takes place on the island of Blackreef, where all the inhabitants are stuck in a time loop. From the perspective of the protagonist Colt, the loop either resets at the end of the day, or when he dies. Colt's aim is to take out the eight self-declared "Visionaries" who took over the island and appear to have control over the time loop.
The Visionaries are spaced out over the island such that simply finding them and assassinating them one at a time proves impossible before the loop resets. The Deathloop "Two Birds One Stone" trailer shows how Colt can gain the upper hand, however. Each time the loop resets, he is able to use his knowledge of past loops to manipulate events in order to get some of the Visionaries in the same places at the same time.
In the example given in the trailer, Colt knows that one of the Visionaries - scientist Egor Serling - will make the same breakthrough every day. Without Colt's intervention, this breakthrough will cause him pass up an invitation to a party being run by another Visionary, Aleksis "the Wolf" Dorsey. However, by preventing Egor from making his breakthrough Colt can make sure both are present at the party that evening, allowing him to assassinate them both without losing valuable time. As the Deathloop trailer puts it, "the loop is knowledge. Knowledge is power. Power is freedom."
Knowledge Is Power
The premise of the game relies on the idea that Deathloop's player character Colt is able to retain knowledge across his loops, but it also seems to suggest that his targets don't have that ability. If they did, Egor wouldn't need to make the same breakthrough every day, and though Aleksis might theoretically have the same party for eternity at the very least his invitations would be unnecessary.
However, it doesn't seem like all of the Visionaries' memories reset with each loop. Juliana "Jules" Blake is one of the eight Visionaries and the other potential player character in Deathloop. She appears at the end of the "Two Birds One Stone" trailer, saying "you keep forgetting, Colt. I'm not like those other idiots. Only got one name on my list, yours." This implies that Juliana is also somehow able to retain knowledge between loops as well. Why Juliana Blake is able to do this but the other Visionaries are not is one of the biggest mysteries Deathloop will need to explain. It could also raise some interesting themes for the game to deal with.
Are the Visionaries who are living their lives in blissful ignorance of each reset closer to the "immortality" they set out to achieve, able to live forever without ever feeling bored or facing the existential implications of eternity? If so, why is Juliana happy to spent her every waking moment hunting down Colt if the loop means she's doomed to do that forever? For now, these remain mysteries. Whatever the reason is that Colt and Juliana can retain their memories, however, could be a key plot-point and a strange link between the two characters.
Deathloop is set to release on May 21 for PC and PS5.
