Deathloop's narrative

gamedeveloper.com:

Deathloop's swinging '70s time loop vibe is bracketed by a story that, for better or worse, sees protagonist Cole battle his way to the center of an unparalleled scientific phenomenon that's locked the island of Blackreef in an endlessly repeating day. In telling a tale about this kind of permanent loop, who knows about the loop—and what they know about it—shapes not only the themes of the story, but how the player will process them.

That's one big takeaway from the talk Arkane Lyon lead narrative designer Pawel Kroenke gave at the 2022 Game Developers Conference. In an hour-long session, Kroenke broke down the different tools Arkane used to ferry players from the beginning of a looping narrative to the end, spelling out the practical motivations of different narrative devices. 

When all of the narrative pieces of your puzzle have to live simultaneously in the same four levels players will repeat over and over, it's important to make sure they make sense. Kroenke broke down how that process looked for Arkane, to better help other developers hoping to build their own sensational, temporally mis-aligned loops. 

A key dramatic element of any time loop story, from Groundhog Day to Palm Springs to Deathloop is the question of who knows they're in a time loop?

In Groundhog Day, only Bill Murray's sarcastic journalist knows he's living the same day over and over again. Hulu dramedy Palm Springs expands the number of time loopers to include Andy Samberg and Cristin Miloti's characters, and Tom Cruise action vehicle Edge of Tomorrow has only one character experiencing the loop, but lets other characters know it's taking place.

The premise of Deathloop is that EVERYONE on Blackreef knows that a time loop is happening, but only a few