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[Cthulhu]

Is this real life?  Have my eyes deceived me?  Did somebody actually pull off multiplayer survival horror?

Dead by Daylight just came out and is on sale for about 18 bucks on Steam right now; deluxe edition had closed beta access but that's gone now so no point unless you like digital artbooks and shit.

It's, like I said, multiplayer survival horror pitting four survivors against a superhuman murderer in service to the Entity, some arachnid devil from a between-space called the Bloodweb. 

As a survivor, you're trapped in a dark, mazelike environment (Apparently twelve maps with three themes and limited procedural generation to keep it fresh) and have to activate a number of generators to power the door to safety.  You have no way of harming the Killer but you do have some limited means to delay and annoy him.  You can pull debris over to slow him down and stun him momentarily if he's too close when it falls, there's a flashlight that can temporarily blind him, and if the Trapper is dumb enough to walk over his own beartraps he'll be briefly immobilized.

There's also closets of course.  If you've ever wondered how effective hiding in a closet would actually be against a determined hunter, you're probably right.  I actually think closets could use a "buff." Right now even if you're healthy your breathing is pretty clearly audible on headphones.  I headed into a cabin basement on a lark and heard a guy hiding in a closet when I'd had no idea he was there at all.  I'm guessing it's so you can't just hide in a closet somewhere all day, but it makes them completely useless instead of situational.

The Killer is pretty sweet and right now there's a decent wait time for games if you want to be Killer, presumably due to all the people also wanting to be the killer.  You're basically Jason or Michael Meyers, and the feeling of power is pretty intoxicating.  You're slow, brutal, relentless.  You don't sprint, you don't jump, but no matter how fast they run somehow you're always a few steps behind them, just like in the movies.

It's also got a fun twist on the bog-standard "help your teammate up" mechanic.  Since you're here to sacrifice them to the Entity, you don't actually kill the survivors with your attacks.  One hit wounds them, causing blood trails and loud moans you can follow.  The second hit knocks them down and if friends aren't there to run interference and help them up you can pick them up and carry them off to the meat hooks scattered across the map.  Then there's a delay while the Entity forms around them and if they're not rescued they're impaled on black limbs and carried away to parts thankfully unknown.

I've only played a couple rounds so far so I dunno how balance is.  It seems like one of those games that'd be best with a group of friends or where everyone's not super experienced.  It's best when it's chaotic and visceral and I can see a lot of the magic being lost if people are figuring out the best strats and how to cheese the killer and shit.

Has anybody else played it yet?  It'd be neat to get some bay12 games going, it kind of looks like there's no multiqueue matchmaking right now which means you need five friends to play it properly.

Spoiler: An infographic with some stats (click to show/hide)

The Killers are a hillbilly with a chainsaw (dunno what it actually does), a trapper with beartraps, and a wraith with a bell that turns him into mist.

There also doesn't appear to be any way to chat, which gives it a nice feel of isolation.  I would like to see emotes, especially for the Killer.  I want a survivor to think he's hidden, then that grinning nightmare waves at him

[Neonivek]

The Killers are weird combinations of slasher villains. Mostly a "Ok, you look like this villain but ACTUALLY you are this one"

For example the Trapper is clearly Jason but has the skillset of the Inbred (Wrong Turn)

[Cthulhu]

Trapper is Jason enough.  The traps have some limitations that I haven't found a way to work around enough to rely entirely on them.  YOu still spend most of your time chasing and chopping people.

I forgot to mention there's also a progression system.  I'm not sure how big a deal it is, it's mostly small things, and there don't seem to be microtransactions.  I got enough to deck my Trapper out pretty well after one good round.  Gloves for faster trapping, a wreath for faster points gain for more fun things, and serrated blade traps that cause big bleeding when trapped.

[Neonivek]

It isn't a criticism I kind of prefer it that way.

[Cthulhu]

Got a better understanding of the progression system.  There's four things:  Items, add-ons, offerings, and perks.  Items are stuff like flashlights, medkits, and the Killers' special powers.  Addons improve items.  Offerings affect the entire match with stuff like bonus points for certain actions and altering generation.  Perks are personal boosts.  Only perks and Killer items are permanent.  Survivor items are lost if you die or use them up, but if you survive you keep your item (Or anything you found in-game)

The main way to get stuff is the Bloodweb, where is both the realm of the Entity and a web of perks you buy.  Bloodwebs are randomly generated and once you buy everything in one (usually five or six items) you get a new one. 

It puts some interesting spins on what exactly is going on in the game, since survivors can gain boons from the Entity as well.  I think the game takes place in the Bloodweb or otherwise outside the sane world and the Entity demands the competition itself, not necessarily the sacrifice.  Maybe it's entertaining. If you escape you just find yourself in a new hunting ground, and if you die it just brings you back for another round.  The tagline is "Death is no escape" after all.

It's a genuinely scary game as the survivor.  Running away sets off some very primal triggers even in a video game.  It's always very tempting to make things scarier as the Killer, toying with people especially if they think you don't see them.  I've heard from some people that the closets are actually good, just because nobody ever hides there and nobody ever thinks to look.  I'd try to find somewhere with background noise though.

[Azurestrike]

I played the beta and am loving playing the Wraith, it would be fun to play some private games with people since we can all use our items/offerings/addons without losing them, even though we won't get points for it. It would still be fun practice with people and we can test out just how effective certain things are.

Also, the perk system can get really, REALLY strong, like stuff that lets people sabotage hooks without needing a toolbox, or if the killer stands still for 6/4/3 seconds their terror aura/heartbeats go away.

[Cthulhu]

I've got the stealth perk for the trapper but I didn't see how useful standing still could be with four guys aggressively pursuing generators.  Aside from camping one, or hook-camping.  Would be funny to use as the wraith and surprise a fucker.

I've played all three now.  I hate the Wraith.  The forum cries 24/7 about how he's OP but my thing is this:  His power lets him get right on a survivor, which is nice, but it's not like the other guys can't get on you too.  And once you're on a guy, the Wraith is the only one whose power doesn't help him chase.  Traps are brutal, especially if you put them under windows and obstacle-drops, the chainsaw makes only hardcore juking safe since he can close the gap in an instant, what can the wraith do?

Nothing.  Any half-decent player can keep the Wraith tied up pretty much indefinitely.

Speaking of which, here's a meta-tip.  At this point in the game's life cycle most players have no idea what the shit they're doing.  In a given game there'll probably be one or two seriously dangerous players and the rest are fodder.  Check their levels before the game starts, look for the higher level ones.  If you find them in the game single them out and kill them ASAP.  It's common for me to lose two or three generators, hook the one good player, and then have a relaxing game.

The difference in skill is really obvious.  A lot of decent players never fail a generator check so you only know what's happening when it goes up.  Usually if I lose it's within like five minutes because they grab all the generators right away and there's not really anything I can do being one dude.

[Azurestrike]

I've played all three now.  I hate the Wraith.  The forum cries 24/7 about how he's OP but my thing is this:  His power lets him get right on a survivor, which is nice, but it's not like the other guys can't get on you too.  And once you're on a guy, the Wraith is the only one whose power doesn't help him chase.  Traps are brutal, especially if you put them under windows and obstacle-drops, the chainsaw makes only hardcore juking safe since he can close the gap in an instant, what can the wraith do?

Nothing.  Any half-decent player can keep the Wraith tied up pretty much indefinitely.

Yeah, this is precisely why I'm enjoying him while I can for the first few days of release. Once people start getting better, I'm gonna switch over to Trapper. To be fair though, Wraith has some addons that can really mess with people, specifically the one that puts you in stealth if you decloak without moving, meaning no heartbeats, so he's pretty heavy on going SURPRISE!

[Cthulhu]

Oh man, I'm so happy.  I'm starting to get the hang of window-cheese, it's pretty manageable outside the autowreckers (God help you if one of the survivors uses the license plate offering, he knows exactly what he's doing)

Also, I bit the bullet and burned my Cypress Memento Mori, which lets you kill the last survivor yourself.  I won, thank God, and got to see what happens.  When the last survivor is down you hold down M1 and it plays an okay animation where you pin him down with your foot and chop the shit out of him, at least that's the trapper animation, dunno if the others have them.

Could be better, but it must've been an experience for the guy on the other end.  I had him down when there was still like thirty seconds on the third guy's hook timer so I let him crawl around, following him and waiting for the other guy to die. 

When the game is at its best it really does capture that slasher movie feel. 

[Tnx]

Very fun.  Matchmaking is sorta screwy sometimes though.  Sometimes you get killers who have 3x rare perks and sometimes you get a newbie who has no idea what they're doing.  Also the wraith is plain un-fun to play agaisnt.  There's not much strategy going up agaisnt him besides lots of juking and abusing windows to win.

[Cthulhu]

Just had my first disconnecters, two in the same game.  One was hooked and bugged the hook so now I'm sitting here alt-tabbed waiting for the guy on it to leave so I can get my one kill's worth of XP.

There are so many scumbags playing this game it's ridiculous.  If they're not quitting to derank you, they're cherrypicking games and hacking.

I wrote a Trapper guide, most of it's common sense but there's some stuff I haven't seen other people saying, plus some scummy tips to deal with scumbags.

Protip:  If you see people under rank 17, just leave.  With the way the ranking system works right now, nobody gets that low without being a total fucking scumbag.

[Cthulhu]

Very fun.  Matchmaking is sorta screwy sometimes though.  Sometimes you get killers who have 3x rare perks and sometimes you get a newbie who has no idea what they're doing.  Also the wraith is plain un-fun to play agaisnt.  There's not much strategy going up agaisnt him besides lots of juking and abusing windows to win.

The Wraith has Predator invisibility, as in he's still pretty easy to see if you're paying attention.  He also snarls a lot when he's close by and the heartbeat starts up as soon as he's close.  I actually think he's the worst killer in the game right now.  Invisibility helps you get on them but everybody can get on them, it's chasing them that's the problem and the wraith has nothing to help him chase.