Based in Sydney, Australia, Foundry is a blog by Rebecca Thao. Her posts explore modern architecture through photos and quotes by influential architects, engineers, and artists.

Coming Soon to Dead by Daylight: Characters, Cosmetics, Lore, and More Accessibility Options #intothefog

Coming Soon to Dead by Daylight: Characters, Cosmetics, Lore, and More Accessibility Options #intothefog

Robert J Gannon
Games, News

Behaviour Interactive has announced many exciting new things coming soon (TM) to Dead by Daylight.

The most high profile is the earliest they’ve ever announced a new chapter. Chapter XX of the long-running asymmetrical horror game is going to be Resident Evil-themed. This was announced during the Resident Evil event a few weeks ago. More details will come during the fifth anniversary stream on 25 May. All we know for sure is that there will be an Umbrella Corporation charm.

Language used in the announcement suggests we’re going to get two survivors, as the announcement quoted The Darkside Chronicles, "Look, you have two choices here: kill or be killed. It’s your call!” That game was a rail shooter on the Nintendo Wii with two player co-op the whole way through. The quotation itself comes from Claire Redfield.

This is all speculation, but Behaviour has dropped small but direct hints like this before. Survivor Kate could earn a “Free Spirit” t-shirt during the Summer BBQ event, which preceded the release of Chapter IX, the chapter featuring The Spirit as a killer. The Oni’s mask went missing on the Yamaoka Estate map before the release of Chapter XIV, featuring The Oni as a killer. They also put out those devious little teasers a week or so before the PTB reveals a new killer that always make sense afterwards, but are super cryptic before.

While this isn’t an announcement, the new player satisfaction survey had an entire section dedicated to new licensed DLCs. This included drop down menus for media like anime or horror films. I stupidly did not screenshot this when I took the survey, but I distinctly remember Hellraiser, Candyman, Psycho-Pass, Ju-on: The Grudge, Attack on Titan, Tokyo Ghoul, Until Dawn, and even Scooby Doo as options.

This obviously doesn’t guarantee any specific license. Contract negotiation with IP licensing is very hard to predict, and some of these options might not even be available. The survey could be a “look Scooby Doo owners, 60% of our player base said they would spend money to get your characters in our game” negotiating tactic or a source for inspiration. “Oh, people want Attack on Titan? Great, get cracking on an even taller killer than The Plague, only more skeletal.”

For what it’s worth, I once again made it known with a free response section that any Clive Barker property is better than no Clive Barker property in Dead by Daylight.

There are four other announcements to get into.

First, Bill is going to be one of the subjects of the next Tome. This is pretty monumental. Bill comes from the game Left 4 Dead and was one of the early licensed characters in the game. He was free to get on PC, but unavailable on console for years. Getting new lore in the Tome means Behaviour Interactive got permission to include more content with Bill. As someone who reads all the lore in the game, it will be a lot of fun to see how the writers better connect Bill to the DBD universe.

Second, Dead by Daylight is collaborating with Crypt TV to bring original cosmetics to the game. Crypt TV is a horror short film and television producer/distributor focused on original internet programming. The Hag’s skin is inspired by The Birch, a living tree that fights against bullies. The Huntress’ skin is inspired by The Mordeo, a supernatural monster species obsessed with eating people. Finally, The Doctor’s skin is inspired by The Look-See, a monster that murders people if they fail his tests. These skins look terrifying in the concept art and might be enough to get me to abandon my signature blue-armed Hag skin in game.

Third, Dead by Daylight’s next step in updating the graphics and animations in the game is to rework the original four survivors. They teased us with a Twitter poll asking, “If we had sneak peeks for some updated survivor models, which would you want to see first?” Meg won the poll, so they released concept videos and rendered art showing off the changes. The new Meg aligns really well with the style of survivors that have been coming out since the Stranger Things chapter, with more natural looking skin and detailed hair.

The Dwight preview also got added today. It’s the same sort of change. The skin looks more consistent with less extreme contours and the hair has a lot of detail.

Finally, and most importantly, Behaviour revealed their next phase of accessibility changes in the game. Have you ever wondered why I’m a killer main in Dead by Daylight? It is an accessibility issue. Because of my Carpal Tunnel Syndrome and chronic pain issues, I really struggle with the struggle phase mechanic in the game. By the time I'm done hammering away at my spacebar until I die on hook, I’m in a lot of pain and have to stop playing. I’ve tried rebinding struggle to my mouse and it’s only slightly better. I have a better time with struggle on console because of the controller, but I literally have to place my palm on the thumbstick and move my whole arm to not wreck my wrists for the day. I only hurt myself playing killer if I grip the mouse too tight, so I can play a game I enjoy for longer periods of time by ignoring an entire gameplay mode.

The new idea is to use skill checks for the struggle phase. This looks like the skill checks when you get trapped in Pyramidhead’s Cage of Atonement. If you miss a skill check, you’re going to die on hook sooner. If you hit all the skill checks, you’ll be on hook the same amount of time before dying. I eagerly look forward to this option being in game.

Behaviour Interactive still tends to hold their cards close to their chest on any release or update. I get not wanting to announce anything until you can guarantee when it will happen, but communicating plans like they have with these announcements does a whole lot to boost customer’s trust in a brand.

Dead by Daylight is available on PC, PS4/5, Xbox One/Series S/X, and Nintendo Switch.

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