Dead by Daylight launched in 2016 with a cast of original killers and survivors inspired by the horror archetypes of the 80s golden age of slasher cinema. As the game quickly grew in popularity, developer Behaviour kick-started an ambitious plan to see if they could bring together horror’s most iconic villains under its umbrella, almost like what Fortnite did for pop culture, but specifically for horror.
We spoke to the creative minds behind Dead by Daylight to understand the challenges and journey it took for some of the most iconic crossovers in the game, from Ghost Face to Alien’s Xenomorph, check below to see how some of your favorite horror icons made it into Dead by Daylight.
In the Beginning
Behaviour didn’t begin Dead by Daylight with a cast of recognizable faces. Before Freddy Krueger and Michael Myers, the studio launched the multiplayer survival horror game with four original killers and five survivors that were created in-house but designed to evoke the style of the iconic 80s horror golden age. “The first originals, these guys up there, were really inspired by obviously the classics of the horror world, the slasher movies of the '70s and the '80s. So for us it was always part of the DNA of what we were building,” says Behaviour’s head of partnerships Matthieu Cote.
The meticulous designs of Dead by Daylight’s original characters spoke to the admiration the developers had for the evil movie creatures of that era. Importantly, they were a hit with those playing the game, and the developers were flooded with fan art and fan fiction all based on these original characters, created by loyal fans hooked on the lore created by Behaviour. But as Dead by Daylight’s popularity began to grow, Behaviour was finally in a position to take a stab at a very special collaboration it had been eyeing for a long time. Or as Cote says, “We were able to leverage some of the longstanding relationships we have with a lot of licensers out there and secure the rights to Halloween, the very original Michael Myers and Laurie Strode, and that was the first foray into that licensing world that we did in DBD.”
Getting Michael Myers was a huge coup. Both Behaviour and the fans loved the collaboration and crucially it opened the door for even more crossovers.
How Do You Follow Freddy Krueger and Leatherface?
While it began with Michael Meyers, Behaviour wasn’t content to stop there. The studio branched out quickly, scooping all of the big 80s horror franchises like Texas Chainsaw Massacre and The Nightmare on Elm Street. But with the pantheon of classics complete, Behaviour looked towards the modern hits next.
One of the earliest collaborations was between Behaviour Interactive and Lionsgate for the film series Saw, though maybe not the character you might expect. Instead of adding Jigsaw aka John Kramer, Behaviour chose Amanda Young, John Kramer’s apprentice from the Saw films, or ‘The Pig’ as she’s known in Dead by Daylight. “I think the obvious answer for most people was Jigsaw, right? And he should have been the killer. And we didn't think so,” says Behaviour’s senior creative director Dave Richard.
The reasoning was that Jigsaw wants to “test people” which is too noble a goal for a Dead by Daylight killer. However as Cote says, “Amanda cheats. Amanda wants people to suffer and wants people to die and doesn't play the game fair, which made her a great prospect, a great candidate to be a killer, because she's bad, she's a really bad person.”
“Plus, it was a nice little way to surprise people by bringing an interesting character that is very core to the Saw, but that fit better within our universe.”
Behaviour didn’t want to just add a famous character for the sake of it, but wanted to incorporate a horror franchise in a way that made sense for both Dead by Daylight and Saw. Amanda was the more natural fit as her film counterpart was a true sadist compared to John Kramer’s more philosophical teacher. Plus, choosing Amanda meant that as part of Amanda’s kit, she’s able to put survivors in the trap that she herself survived— the Reverse Bear Trap.
“Yeah, it's the most iconic trap, I think, people will think about when thinking about Saw,” says Richard. “There's a lot of great other traps, but they're not as practical as the Reverse Bear Trap too. Being able to move around with this on your head, and having the pressure to go play that game and to get out was a perfect fit for our rules as well in the game.”
Scream If You Want to Die Faster
The Saw collaboration proved that Behaviour was capable of rewriting the horror canon to its will, subverting expectations by focusing on Amanda Young rather than John Kramer and taking the reins of a franchise with the blessings of the license holder. However, integrating other characters wasn’t always that simple. The rights to some horror franchises are tied up in all kinds of limbo.
Take Scream, for example. Ghost Face’s iconic look is actually owned by the original toy company that created the mask, Fun World, rather than the movie studio behind the films. And so, to get the iconic visage, Behaviour reached out directly to Fun World and got the rights to Ghost Face from them. But because they didn’t have rights to any of the movies, Behaviour had the fun task of creating an original killer to hide behind the mask. This actually worked in the developer’s favor because Ghost Face’s identity changes each time in the films. As such, Behaviour was able to give its own spin on creating a new killer, a freelance journalist named Danny Johnson. “It was a perfect fit for us. The costume is more important than the person underneath. So it was a great opportunity for us to create that original character.,” says Richard.
What Behaviour did try to convey from th emovies is the sense of humor which in the game appears in the descriptions for his ability add-ons, whether it’s his camera ‘Philly,’ or an add-on called ‘Cheap Cologne’ that makes his presence known to survivors, while at the same time ‘marking’ them. Furthermore, Ghost Face is able to ‘lean’ around corners, which makes any encounters with him terrifying, if a little ridiculous.
From The Silver Screen to Silent Hill
While Behaviour featured guest characters from another video game in 2017, when Left 4 Dead’s Bill made it into Dead by Daylight, 2020’s Silent Hill chapter was a full-blown collaboration that brought the killer Pyramid Head and survivor Cheryl Mason to the game. But Silent Hill being what it is, the collaboration wouldn’t have been complete without incorporating the iconic location of the title, which Behaviour incorporated into the DLC as a special map. “It was non-negotiable,” says Cote on adding a Silent Hill map as part of the DLC. “We would not have done Silent Hill without Silent Hill, right?”
“it's Silent Hill. It's a place, the place is very important,” adds Richard. “So having the map in there was, like you say… non-negotiable.”
Over the years, Silent Hill has had many different incarnations. In the earliest games, Silent Hill’s otherworld was something that just happened – you’d be in a normal version of the town one moment, step through a door, and come out the other side into the nightmare realm. In later games, Silent Hill changed in real-time, an effect that was borrowed for the live-action film adaptations. Behaviour’s take involved a Silent Hill that was both normal and nightmarish at the same time.
“I think that in the early days of the level design of this map, we wanted to go through a narrative so that the level would actually change, and so that there's some actions that you'd be able to do that would change the level to the dark world and maybe back,” Richard explains. “That sadly was just out of scope, something that we couldn't do at a time. So the best other thing that we could do is to make these two worlds live side-by-side. We've also implemented that secret gameplay that you can discover, make the clock bell ring and discover the secret. And that was also another way to show a bit of transformation or to wink at the original transformation that we see Silent Hill.”
For Silent Hill, the location was just as important as the characters Behaviour set to incorporate into Dead by Daylight. But for the studio’s other video game collaboration, the challenge was focused entirely on the character itself.
Face Your Nemesis
Nemesis is just one of the deadly foes players encounter in Resident Evil. Rather than just pick-and-choose, Behaviour decided to arm Nemesis with all of the dangers present in Capcom’s survival horror series, giving him the ability to summon zombies or infect players with the G-Virus. The ultimate goal was to get all the details right, with Behaviour conferring with Capcom to get even the tiniest attribute correct.