Deadlock Violet is live: Valve added the painter, who fights with living ink, on Friday, October 16, and confirmed that Nurse Harrow, the last of the six City Never Sleeps heroes, arrives on Tuesday, October 20 at 2pm PDT (5pm EDT, 9pm UTC). Violet is the fifth hero in a run that has added two characters a week since October 2, with players voting on the release order.
The six City Never Sleeps heroes, left to right: Nurse Harrow, Deadman Danny, Baba, Solomon, Rat King and Violet. Image: Valve
Table of Contents
Deadlock Nurse Harrow release time
Valve’s “Paint the Town” announcement gives the date and hour: “Next Tuesday October 20th at 2pm PDT.” That lines up with every earlier drop in this update, all of which went live at 2pm Pacific on a Tuesday or Friday. In other time zones, that’s 10pm BST on October 20 and 6am JST on October 21.
Valve hasn’t published Nurse Harrow’s abilities yet; so far it has revealed each hero’s kit on release day. Her reveal poster describes her as “strict, terrifying, savior,” according to GameRiv, and the art shows a nurse holding a glowing syringe. Kit details posted before Tuesday come from dataminers, not Valve, so treat them as unconfirmed.
Deadlock Violet abilities: what she does
Valve’s description of Violet’s four abilities, in order:
- Living Ink: empowers her bullets and “draws mere inspiration into reality.”
- Flow State: her ink weaves toward danger to deal damage, or away from it as an escape.
- Still Life: captures an enemy’s likeness.
- Abstract Landscape: her ultimate, a large piece painted around herself and nearby players.
The post is flavor text and has no numbers, so cooldowns, damage and scaling are only visible in game for now. Patch notes for the first round of Violet balance changes would be the first official stats.
All six City Never Sleeps heroes and release dates
The City Never Sleeps update launched on September 29 with a reworked map, six upcoming heroes, HUD changes and accessibility options. Players vote in game, and the hero leading the vote gets the next slot. Here is how the order played out, from Valve’s Steam announcements:
| Hero | Released | Abilities (Valve’s names) |
|---|---|---|
| Rat King | Fri, Oct 2 | Scrap Grenade, Rat Swarm, Royal Pestments, Rule, Ratannia! |
| Baba | Tue, Oct 6 | Threadsap, Granny Long Legs (her bench), Baba’s Brew, The Birds |
| Solomon | Fri, Oct 9 | Setup Bishop, Kingside Knight, Rook Battery, Develop Queen |
| Deadman Danny | Tue, Oct 13 | Chimera Mk1, Strix Salvo, Jettison Fuel, Close the Deal |
| Violet | Fri, Oct 16 | Living Ink, Flow State, Still Life, Abstract Landscape |
| Nurse Harrow | Tue, Oct 20, 2pm PDT | Not revealed yet |
Deadman Danny arrived on October 13 and got a health and Strix Salvo buff a day later. Image: Valve
Recent heroes haven’t stayed as they launched. Valve’s October 14 minor update nerfed Baba (Baba’s Brew barrier down from 100 to 90, Threadsap cooldown up from 26s to 28s) and buffed Deadman Danny (base health from 680 to 730, Strix Salvo cooldown from 30s to 25s). Expect a similar pass on Violet once players settle on her strengths.
Why it matters: Deadlock’s player count keeps climbing
The two-a-week schedule has been good for player numbers. When Solomon launched on October 9, Deadlock reached 262,145 concurrent players, PC Gamer reported using SteamDB data. That beat Team Fortress 2’s all-time peak of 253,997. Steam’s own most-played chart showed an even higher 24-hour peak of 303,347 in the day around Violet’s release (checked October 17, 09:30 UTC), with Deadlock eighth on Steam and about 118,000 people playing on a Saturday morning.
That’s unusual for a game that isn’t officially out. The Steam store page still lists Deadlock as “coming soon” with no release date, Windows only, and PC Gamer describes the current build as an invite-only test, with invites easy to come by from friends or community Discords. Elsewhere on Steam this week, Valve opened the Steam Achievement Sets beta.
What’s next
Nurse Harrow arrives on October 20 at 2pm PDT and completes City Never Sleeps. Valve calls next week the “culmination” of the update. Deadlock’s first Ranked season, which opened on July 30 with solo and duo queues only (for comparison, see Valve’s Dota 2 reporting and matchmaking system), was already extended and now ends on Thursday, November 5 at 2pm Pacific, with the next season starting right away, according to Valve’s October 6 post. Next week is also busy on PC, with the WoW Forever stress test on October 19. We’ll add Nurse Harrow’s abilities to this post once Valve publishes them.
Sources: Valve (Violet and Nurse Harrow date), Valve (City Never Sleeps), Valve (Deadman Danny), Valve (Oct 14 patch), Valve (Baba, Ranked season), PC Gamer, GameRiv, Steam charts. Checked October 17, 2026.
Live: Follow today’s gaming news as it happens
Featured image: Valve
