Deathloop Is Set In “One Of The Futures Of The Dishonored World”

The fan theories were right. Arkane Studios’ latest time-looping action shooter that’s sort of still an immersive sim, Deathloop, really is set in the same universe as the Dishonored series.

There were many fan theories that speculated about this, given the many hints and clues (including a big spoiler-y one) that can be scoured around Deathloop’s setting, the island of Blackreef.

Since the game’s launch last year, speculation of the two games sharing a universe has been in discussion among fans, like in Arkane’s own Discord channel.

But now, one year later, we finally got the word of god that this is indeed true. Dinga Bakaba, creative director of Deathloop, has revealed this on the latest episode of the Xbox podcast.

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“We envisioned Deathloop to be happening in the future, after Death Of The Outsider,” Bakaba said, referencing the latest Dishonored expandalone game.

“We didn’t want to make something too big about it because [Deathloop] would be its own story, its own character, its own time period that we wanted to flesh out, its fashion and its music, et cetera.

“But at the same time, there were a lot of things that we wanted to say, hey, so after Death Of The Outsider… we always wondered about what would happen after that. As we were making Deathloop, we said, hey, that could be one of the things that could happen after that. So we have a certain timeline to link that.”

Throughout Deathloop, there are little morsels of clues that you can pick up and notice vague references to the Dishonored universe.

In the podcast, Bakaba mentioned that the Heritage Gun, the unique shotgun-rifle weapon, actually has the logo of Dunwall Tower, referencing Dishonored 1’s setting, etched on it all this time. It’s something more players will notice now that the game has idle hand animations added in a post-launch update.

Another example Bakaba brought up is how characters made mention of certain locales but not using their proper name, “the motherland” is referencing Tyvia.

If you play Deathloop, and played any of the Dishonored games before, you too should have spotted some of the hints. Even the slabs, which mechanically function just like the powers in Dishonored, have more ties than from a gameplay perspective.

Bakaba referred that Deathloop is “one of the futures of the Dishonored world,” which leaves the table open for Arkane to offer other interpretations, and not making Deathloop hard-canon to the universe’s timeline.

At the end of the day, Deathloop’s world still can stand on its own. Having the developers confirm the fan theories and speculation that these Dishonored references aren’t just Easter Eggs but imply something bigger is also a really nice pat on the back for the sleuths that pieced it all together.

Deathloop is out now on PS5, PC (Steam, Epic Games Store, Microsoft Store) and Xbox Series X|S. The game is also available on Xbox Game Pass and PC Game Pass.