Deadlock crashes when a player spams chat (exploit)
Everyone else's game closes at once when one player floods text chat with repeated Unicode characters. Players who crashed mid-match reported getting a leaver penalty.
Also appears as: deadlock chat crash, deadlock crash exploit through chat, deadlock unicode chat crash, deadlock crashed by chat, deadlock everyone crashed chat spam, deadlock chat spam crash leaver penalty
This is a crash someone else sets off, not a problem on your PC. In an r/DeadlockTheGame post from early September 2026 (420 upvotes, 56 comments), a player flooded text chat with repeated Unicode characters and "everyone else's game immediately crashed", while that player stayed connected and won.
A second post, with 74 upvotes, described being crashed by chat, reconnecting twice and still getting low-priority games and then a week-long ban. Valve's changelog threads for August and September 2026 and its Steam announcements don't mention a chat or Unicode fix, so as far as we can find this is still open.
What to try
- 01Reported
No confirmed fix yet
We checked Valve's changelog threads (08-22, 09-16 and 09-29-2026) and its Steam announcements through October 6 and found no mention of a chat or Unicode crash fix. Nothing on your side prevents another player from triggering it.
- 02Unconfirmed
Players suggested turning off text chat (unconfirmed)
A commenter on the second Reddit post suggested turning off text chat until this is fixed. Nobody confirmed that it prevents the crash, and we couldn't source a chat-disable setting, so look for muting or disabling text chat in the in-game settings yourself.
- 03Unconfirmed
Wait for the match to close to avoid the abandon penalty (unconfirmed)
One commenter wrote that if you wait until the match closes you don't get the abandon penalty. It is a single comment and nobody else confirmed it.
- 04Reported
Report the player in-game
The subreddit's AutoModerator reply tells players to report cheating, griefing and similar offenses in-game, and notes that Deadlock's anti-cheat is still in development.
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What people are saying
Notes from players who've hit this one — no time limit, an answer from months ago is still an answer.
- Nothing reported here yet.
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