The Best Time-Loop Story Out There Is on the PS5

On paper, Deathloop sounds like another entry in the seemingly endless parade of games, movies, and TV shows about time loops--a period of time that repeats again and again and again, until our hero can figure out how to reset the flow of time and move forward once again. Much has been written about the ubiquity of these stories: There's Russian Doll, Happy Death Day, Palm Springs, and The Map of Tiny Perfect Things, to name only a few recent, well-known examples. A glut of time loop games from over the last half decade include titles as diverse asThe Sexy Brutale, Outer Wilds, Minit, Elsinore, and Gnosia, among those most acclaimed. This year in particular is stacked with games in which players must return to the same time and place ad infinitum, from Returnal to 12 Minutes and The Forgotten City. Time loops stories are clearly in vogue right now, but they aren't new.