Dead By Daylight Dev believes its competitors are failing because one license is "restrictive."

Whenever a studio announces a new horror game based on a beloved IP, there's a lot of fear involved. Because usually the game turns out to be another asymmetrical title. Of course, Texas Chain Saw Massacre and Killer Klowns from Outer Space are among the best games. But these kinds of games always enter the genre already on the third hook. You can't compete with Dead by Daylight, and Behavior Interactive knows it.

“They’re not doing enough,” joked Head of Partnerships Mathieu Cote in an interview with GamesRadar+ at this year’s Game Developers Conference. And even if that's true (it's not, post-release issues aside, Texas Chain Saw was great), the problem goes much deeper. One IP is too limited to make creative director Dave Richard say, “We were there first.”

Licensed IP is “very limited,” says Dead By Daylight partnerships head.

Survivors aiming guns at Killer Klown tank

Like all hero shooters and battle royales that try to compete with Overwatch and Fortnite, the asymmetrical horror genre is incredibly difficult to break into because it needs to attract people. away All of Dead by Daylight's time and money has been poured into Behavior Interactive's horror sandbox. One IP can never handle it. Because there are only so many decorations and updates you can sell before the well runs dry.

“There’s no vanity in saying we have it all figured out. There are some choices we’ve made that, looking back, we know were the right ones,” Cote said. Other games are “tied to a specific license, which is great because it allows us to delve much deeper into the worlds people know and love, but it's also very limiting,” he said.

Admittedly, Dead by Daylight has some very limiting elements. For example, there are crossover killers (such as the Xenomorph) and hooks that don't always go well together. But being able to leverage a wide range of horror IP while also creating entirely new characters has given Behavior more wiggle room than any other studio. This includes the ill-fated Friday the 13th. Although the film was a word-of-mouth success, it fell on its own in 2018 due to legal disputes over the franchise. That's another risk that comes with building an entire game based on an infamous horror IP.

“We figured out some good ways to do certain things so people can do it better next time,” Cote said. “Just… not yet.”