Is Dead By Daylight the greatest horror game of all time?

At the time of writing the nights are drawing in and the days are getting colder, as autumn merges into winter it all makes for a haunting vibe. As Halloween draws closer I inevitably find myself having an appetite for all things horror.

I am a huge fan of the genere, some of my favourite movie experiences are from the horror genre. Whether that be Halloween, Scream, The Evil Dead, They Live, The Thing, Friday 13th, Nightmare on Elm Street. As a child of the 1980's, I can assure you that the era of the video nasty was tryly awesome. Unlike today there were countless VHS tresures to work through that provided amazing monsters to fuel your nightmares and worst fears. 

So when someone told me there is a new multiplayer horror game that you can play as a team of survivors or the killer monster i thought it would be worth checking out. This game has been out for a couple of years already and I must confess it has passed me by.

I am lucky enough to have a decent internet connection and subscription to Google Stadia, for anyone that has the option I am huge fan of cloud gaming. Each month as part of Stadia Pro you get complimentary games each month and was delighted to see that Dead By Daylight was included recently. 

The game is available on most platforms and it is cross-play. Can we just also take a moment to consider how awesome cross-play is, I hope some of the other game studios follow this approach. It is amazing to be able to play with your friends acorss any platform no matter what their preference is. 

This is my favourite mode to play in, as a survior you join the game with four online team mates. Your job is by stealth, collaboration and distraction to fix broken generators that are laid out across the map. Fixing the generator is the only way to power the exit gate and leave the arena, doing this is almost impossible alone and you have to work as a team to outwit and outsmart the murderous killer this is after you. The Killer is selected from a range of iconic monsters and villains, each has varying abilites. So in this game you and your freinds are hiding, runing and fighting from anyone from Ghost Face from Scream and Mike Myers from Halloween. The sense of tension, suspence, terror and foreboding are palpable. It's so much fun being the victim of a horror nightmare and being able to share in the terror with your friends.

As the Killer, you are on your own and you can only see in first person view. Your role is to hunt down and eliminate the four survivors. The way to do this is capture them and impale them on rusty hooks that populate the map, this is a nice homage to Leatherface from the Texas Chainsaw Massacre who famousley dispatched one of his victims this way. Once a Survivor is impaled, they have a limited amount of time for their friends to come and rescure them. If not then are consumed by an ominous force called 'The Entity' that the killer is sacfificing its victims to. As the Killer you have awesome power, although you must rely on your killer instinct and senses to catch and outsmart the survivors. 

What is truly awesome about Dead By Daylight is the sheet amount of DLC and additional content available. For fans of the horror genre there is literally everthing a fan could ask for... For example you can play as Mike Myers from Halloween or the Demagorgan from Stranger Things across inspired maps that take design cues from classic horrow settings. 

Gameplay wise, Dead By Daylight has been coined as an asymentrical horror game. This means it offers a totally different gameplay experience depending on what team you are on. In this case you can play ast the killer or a team of four survivors. Playing as either is equally enjoyble, lets take a closer look at what it is like to be hunter vs the hunted!

Find out more at the official Dead By Daylight page