In Dead by Daylight, working as a team is the best way to play survivor. Whether you are trying to escape and play seriously or mess around and have fun, playing in a group is the best way to do both of those things.
Being able to communicate with your friends and tell them valuable information makes all the difference in the world. In the Dead by Daylight community, playing in a group is known as “SWF” meaning “survive with friends”. When playing solo queue as a survivor, your chances of escaping are significantly lower. You have no idea what your teammates want to do throughout the game or how skilled each player is. One player might be trying to take chase all game and not touch a single generator, and another player might decide to hide in a corner all game long.
When playing in a group, you can do so many things to have fun. If you want to bring four toolboxes and make hooking impossible for the killer, you can do that. If you want to bring a troll build and have four players run the perk Head On, you can do that.
The game as a survivor is drastically enhanced with friends, no matter what your objective is. If you want to have fun messing around or play seriously with the goal of escaping every game, playing in a group is the way to go.
9. High Skill Ceiling
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In Dead by Daylight, there is so much to learn. The difference between a player with over 1000 hours and a player with even 100 hours is night and day. Regardless of which role you prefer to take on, the game has a tremendous skill ceiling.
There are many killers in the game who are very easy to play with little room for growth outside of universal game sense and fundamentals. Killers such as The Wraith and The Legion are very simple and have rather low skill ceilings. Then you have the killers, who are harder to play but are significantly stronger if learned. Killers such as The Nurse and The Blight are harder to play, but when mastered, they are unmatched in strength. There are also killers who are strong, easy to pick up, but still hard to master. Killers such as The Huntress, The Mastermind, and The Artist all fit that niche category.
Survivors, on the other hand, do not have a unique power to learn. Survivors have to have tons of game knowledge and understand fundamentals. Most importantly, survivors need to understand the concept of “looping”. Looping is the act of running select parts of the map in order to prolong the time of a chase. The skill ceiling for looping is pretty high since there are various techniques that take time to learn and get used to. The difference between an experienced survivor who can loop well and a player with a bit of time is incomparable.
Both roles require thousands of hours to truly master. It is important to understand how perks help you and what builds are good to use.
8. Great Perk Selection
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Dead by Daylight has a wide variety of perks that fit many different playstyles. The game features unique 246 perks (and counting). However you want to play the game, these perks can help enable your preferred playstyle. You have so many options in both roles of the game.
As a survivor, if you want to play stealthy, you can bring perks such as Iron Will and Lightweight. If you want to focus on generators, you can bring something like Prove Yourself along with a toolbox. If you want to be better in chases, you can bring perks like Lithe and Windows of Opportunity. There are even perks that can allow for plenty of meme-worthy moments. Perks such as Diversion are perfect for those games with friends where you just want to mess around.
As a killer, you have tons of options that fit each killer's niche. As a Huntress, you may want aura-reading perks such as Barbecue & Chili or Bitter Murmur. Whereas other killers may prefer slowdown perks like Scourge Hook: Pain Resonance or Jolt. Many killers have a unique power that might play better off of specific perks.
Regardless of what role you play, there are tons of perks that can aid you or even just spice up your game. New perks come out very frequently as well, so there is always going to be more added.
7. Gameplay Feels Rewarding
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In Dead by Daylight, playing well feels extremely rewarding. Whether it’s looping the killer and allowing your team to get generators done or hitting an awesome shot across the map as The Huntress, there is no shortage of satisfaction.
As a killer, making great use of your power is such a satisfying and rewarding feeling. Getting multiple downs in a row with The Trickster’s Knives or landing a crazy curve as The Hillbilly are some of the most satisfying things in all of Dead by Daylight.
When playing as a survivor, outplaying the killer at a loop and extending a chase for longer is such an awesome feeling. Landing a tech or a 360 on a killer is one of the more advanced things a survivor can do, but when pulled off, you truly feel like a god.
Dead by Daylight may not be an eSports kind of game, but performing well feels just as rewarding as any competitive game.
6. Huge Selection of Iconic Characters
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Dead by Daylight has essentially become the Super Smash Bros. of horror. BHVR consistently releases licensed characters from tons of different sub-genres of horror.
They have accumulated the licenses for Halloween, A Nightmare on Elm Street, Alien, Resident Evil, Ash vs Evil Dead, Left 4 Dead, Leatherface, Saw, Ghost Face, Stranger Things, Silent Hill, Hellraiser, Ringu, Nicolas Cage, and most recently, Chucky.
BHVR also managed to create amazing collaborations for cosmetic items with PUBG, Attack on Titan, Crypt TV, and Naughty Bear. Soon we'll be seeing Slipknot and Iron Maiden cosmetics enter the game, as well as a collaboration with Rainbow Six Siege.
BHVR seems to be willing to add non-horror cosmetics to the game, given the fact that PUBG made it into the game as a skin for Dwight and that Rainbow Six Siege will soon have cosmetics in the game.
This amount of licensed content is fantastic for the game’s longevity and gives something to people from all different fandoms.
5. Active Updates
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BHVR’s flagship title is Dead by Daylight. They actively release fixes for bugs and game issues whenever they arise. We also get huge updates for balance changes, both nerfing and buffing perks, items, and killers.
Many games out there have a complete lack of developer support. Despite what people say about BHVR, they at the very least fix bugs and try to balance the game.
Dead by Daylight gets roughly four chapters per year so the game is actively getting updates, changes, and new content. If you are looking for a game to play that gets consistent support, Dead by Daylight is a great choice.
4. Amazing Original Characters
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Dead by Daylight has an abundance of well-written, interesting characters. The game has surprisingly great lore, and almost every character has an interesting backstory. Both the killers and the survivors have lore that gets you invested in the universe of Dead by Daylight.
Survivors such as Yui Kimura, Mikaela Reid, and Yun-Jin Lee are all interesting characters with tons of personality. Killers such as The Huntress, The Trickster, and The Artist all have interesting lore that is surely worth a read.
Dead by Daylight also managed to mix their creativity with licenses. The Ghost Face in Dead by Daylight is BHVR's creation. The character and the costume are completely different from any version of Ghost Face we have ever seen. Yoichi Asakawa was made an adult by BHVR and is essentially an entirely new character as well. In Ringu, he was around seven years old.
I am excited to see how the Dead by Daylight movie turns out. It is being created by Blumhouse and Atomic Monster, and as an avid fan of the lore, I cannot wait to see it hit the big screen.
3. Healthy Player Count
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Many players have this assumption that Dead by Daylight is “dying” or losing players for whatever reason. That is so far from the truth, and the longevity of the game is remarkable.
Due to the tremendous amount of licensed content, players from all different fandoms actively have an interest in the game. The game being cross-play is also a tremendous reason for the game being so popular. Dead by Daylight has been going strong for years now and has shown no signs of slowing down in 2023.
There are roughly 30–40k players on the game daily on Steam alone. This does not include all the console players, the Xbox Game Pass players, or the Epic Games launcher. The player count is very healthy, and Dead by Daylight is here to stay for a long time.
2. Good for Content Creators
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Dead by Daylight is a great game to play and grow as a content creator. Due to the popularity of the game, you can attract many viewers to either a stream or a YouTube channel. The community is very active on both of those platforms.
The nature of a game like Dead by Daylight is also just entertaining content for a lot of people. People enjoy watching survival horror, and Dead by Daylight is a giant in that niche. Dead by Daylight even has a program called “Fog Whisperers”, where they collaborate and communicate with select content creators who play their game.
For both large content creators and small content creators, Dead by Daylight is a great game to grow and entertain an audience.
1. One of a Kind
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At the end of the day, there is no game like Dead by Daylight. The game is almost essentially a standalone in the niche genre of asymmetrical horror. Other games in the genre have existed and done well before, but none of them are Dead by Daylight.
No game has the characters, the licenses, and the replayable, addictive gameplay that Dead by Daylight has to offer. It is essentially what League of Legends is to MOBAs or what Fortnite is to Battle Royale games.
Dead by Daylight is truly one of a kind, and it is hard to imagine any game ever coming close to what it has managed to achieve over the years. In no other game will you be able to play as Ash Williams and slam a pallet on Freddy Krueger’s head.
