Anyone else feel like dbd's identity is all over the place right now?
I've been playing this game for around 3 years now, just after the Halloween DLC was added, and I strongly feel like identity of the game has been getting weaker over time. Let me explain what I mean by this.
Behold, Dwight. Just by looking at him you can tell his character architype is a nerdy, anti-social dweeb who has spent almost as much time inside lockers in highschool as he has inside the trials of the game. He has great, recognisable characterisation that you can pick up on just by looking at him. Several of his cosmetics also reflect this.
Because of how strong the characterization is in his default outfit, it's completely believable that someone like Dwight would take on a menial job like delivering pizza or being a mall elf. He isn't just wearing a neat looking outfit for the sake of it. His character is being respected and expanded without sacrificing the integrity of the game world. Even though Dwight probably would not wear the latter of the 2 outfits canonically, since it produces a lot of noise, it is believable that he would have worn it at some point in his life.
Which brings me to...Jane.
What can you tell about her character just by looking at her? What is her personality like? Is she social, popular, a loner? There's so little information you can get from her design compared to Dwight's. She has no clear architype, no obvious hints as to who she is as a person. You can assume what she's like based on your own personal experience with people. But that is not nearly as informative as knowing almost everything about her personality just from a glance. Jane suffers from a lack of intuitive character design and a lot her cosmetics are a perfect reflection of this.
The only information you get from any of these is that she likes to wear designer-brand clothing, a personality trait that is almost equally as exciting as inhaling oxygen and exhaling carbon dioxide.
Kate, Adam, Yui, Zarina, Felix and Elodie all suffer from this problem as well. The priority for their character designs was to look "attractive" and not like a carbon copy of another survivor, rather than to look unique and interesting. And just to prove that I'm not holding one group of survivors above another based on personal preference:
Jane actually has one cosmetic set that shows some character. That she's an enthusiastic painter. It's not much, but it shows that there was some squandered potential here. And I really wish it wasn't.
Now some of you might have read the lore of these characters and are wondering how the hell I want a character's entire personality just from their appearance alone. Well, that's because a character's visual design is far better at conveying ideas to a group of people, especially of none of them have played the game that character is in, than a written story. "Show don't tell", as the saying goes. And also because the archives are some of the worst attempts at writing I have ever seen. (Never mind the survivors being tortured for all eternity. This so called "Modern" style of writing needs to be stuck onto a rusty meat hook and beaten with blunt instruments until its windpipe collapses and ribcage is shattered) Apart from all of the unnecessary retcons and glaring plotholes, the archives so heavily distort the whole premise of the game that the entity turns from an incomprehensible eldritch threat that feeds of the hope of the people it tortures, to astral equivalent of a pot junkie throwing away people as if they were joints that is so shallow it even has its own fanclub.
But to stop this post from getting any longer I'm going to finish it off by switching to talking about the licensed killers. Some people have made the comparison that dbd is, "The Smash Bros of Horror Games", and I really can't help but find that insulting to Smash Bros. Every single character added into the SB's over the years and through various generations has been recreated extremely faithfully to how they are in their original game. I mean, just last year that added in Steve from Minecraft of all games and they somehow managed to incorporate the mining and crafting mechanics from Minecraft into his moveset and even tweaked every single map in the game so Steve could function on them.
Now look at every single licensed killer besides Michael Myers and tell me that their implementation into dbd is even close to faithful.
Pig is stuck with 1 trap to use out of the entire Saw franchise and is undone by bad rng, Demogorgon was gone from shrugging off small arms fire to getting stunned by planks of wood, Freddy is so disjointed that his power is just a mis-mash of other killer's powers, and Pyramid Head can be blinded by flashlights.
Pyramid Head. Pyramid. Head. Can be BLINDED. By. FLASHLIGHTS.
Do I even need to explain how stupid this is?
Dbd has gone from a game heavily based around the thrills and scares from classic slasher flics, into a mess of characters, ideas, with not even half as much identity as when it was first launched. Even though the balance issues back then were so much worse than they are now, and they are still really bad currently, dbd still had so much more personality and potential than it does now.
I really wish the devs could see this. Because they don't. Dbd has no viable competition and probably isn't going to get any for as long as it keeps getting updated. It's problems aren't going to be fixed. Ideas never going to be fully realised. Because there's no incentives for the devs to try anymore. They've gone from a genuinely passionate group of people that wanted to bring a truly unique idea to life, to people that looked at the most recent hallowed blight update, the Twins, the cosmetic store prices, and the upcoming UI and thought, "Yes. People would like this."
I don't. I just want the game to be interesting again.
Comments
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Yeah. DBD is having the same issue as WoW: the developers not decided on WHO to make the game for. Like, right now (interference from covid not withstanding) it feels like every idea is thrown at the wall and no one waits what sticks.
The recent HuD update? A mess. Does it matter WHAT big features they are planning that require it? No, because we neither know what these features will be nor when they'll come. We are given a car without wheels and are told to drive because the wheels they are working on will be great.
The original Killers might looked messy, but there IS a certain rhyme and reason to it. While the licensed ones are... shooting BHVR's own foot with a shotgun. Licenses cost money, and I am not certain they actually attract enough paying customers to justify it. So it results in lots of nonsense pay-to-whatever bits and pieces that the game wouldn't need in this amount if it weren't for the licensed characters.
Then there's the recent changes to the lore with this entity cult etc, which still comes across as failing at 'less is more' and failing at it hard.
The community, which rarely agrees on stuff, agress that we urgently need several health patches AND a break from new killers, survs and perks until the landslide the current perk pool is has been cleaned up.
The devs don't seem to agree.
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I agree wholeheartedly.
Everything about dbd is just wasted potential.
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another good example would be Charms:
Like, a lot of people are almost begging for charms to do SOMETHING like give a statsboost, alter the TR etc, aynthing to make them a tactical element for the game. Instead they are... there, with no rhyme or reason. and usually they come from being filler material on the rift. Like, if the charms would all be on the free rift, fine. But damn.
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Thinking about it now, was there anyone in the community at all that wanted charms? Why were they added? Why not give full hook customisation instead of putting these ugly little trinkets in 3 predetermined places?
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What do u mean? DBD's image of a casually competitive, horror themed children's party game of tag that only has one gamemode has never been any less confusing.
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You're correct, in a way.
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Characters, specifically survivors, aren't supposed to fall into visual stereotypes, especially since there's so many characters and not that many typical stereotypes. They all have their unique identities that aren't shown in their entirety by equipping clothes because the Devs have moved away from 1-dimensional archetypes. In fact, I would say that Dwight is the flawed character, because he has little depth. One look and you know what you are dealing with.
As for the rest... Yes, but also DbD has never really had much of a direct and simple identity to begin with, as someone who has been aware of and watching content around the game since its release but didn't play it til early 2019. It's a problem with being the only successful example of not only a big genre (assymetrical team-based PvP games) but also a niche in that genre (assymetrical horror).
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For a game like dbd, that has almost no character dialogue and has to convey it's overall story completely separate from the gameplay, having characters that you can easily relate to just by looking at them is great design. Dwight isn't very complex by any means. But he's recognisable since the "nerdy" architype is well known by the people who watch horror films and are whom dbd is marketed towards. So he's a well designed character for the game.
Most of the characters that the developers have designed since Dwight somehow have even less of a personality than he does. They do not fall into traditional architypes and instead have bland, poorly written backstories and no characteristics other than their physical appearance. They're empty puppets that the player makes dance around in game that exist solely to have a specific visual aesthetic and nothing more.
Imagine if Jane, felix, or any of the other poorly designed characters like them were put into an actual horror movie. They'd be fodder for the antagonist so the main characters, (that all good slasher films make clearly distinct from the side characters), seem more under threat.
Dbd had a much simpler identity earlier on because the idea that the devs realised into a video game was the only goal of theirs at the time. They had no idea the game would take off like it has, so they focused solely on realising their vision. Now, they don't even have to bother anymore. The game is far better designed to make money than give players an interesting experience. The 2 are not synonymous. Just look at the Fifa line of games. Dbd has way more in common with them now than the slasher films it was based off of.
That's why its identity is so scattered. The original idea behind the game as been so morphed and twisted that it's barely recognisable anymore.
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But we still need Five Nights at Freddy's chapter and Sonic the Hedgehog survivor!
Also let's make a ton of explicit fanfics cause this is definitely the setting for that, a sweaty murder world with no showers and everyone has swamp ass. Mmmm!
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I love how you call interesting characters "poorly designed." Do you just really hate nuance?
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I struck a nerve I think.
Explain to me how any of the characters that I mentioned, that have uninspired designs that convey nothing about their personalities, that have backstories that have every phrase ending with a full stop like they were told by an asthmatic after a kilometre run, that have some of the most out-of-place cosmetics in the game that just exist for the sake of existing, are interesting?
You can still like them. I never said that because they aren't well designed that you shouldn't play as them. But don't use the word "nuance" to describe what is literally a collection textures.
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It’s a casual hack and slash horror game on the competitive level of Mario kart. I don’t think the ridiculous skins are too out of place.
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"The community, which rarely agrees on stuff, agress that we urgently need several health patches AND a break from new killers, survs and perks until the landslide the current perk pool is has been cleaned up."
I don't think this part is true, at least not for the silent DBD playerbase-- those away from the forums. I think they believe this game is mostly fine-- not in fantastic shape, but good enough that they're willing to put up with some of the silly stuff as long as they get fresh content and see that the really bad bugs get fixed.
"The devs don't seem to agree."
This is because there is no solid evidence that shows massive amounts of people leaving because of the current state of the game. When people leave, it's mostly because they're burnt out after playing for hundreds if not thousands of hours or want to try something different. And a lot of them usually return with the new content. That's my hunch at least, based on steamcharts.
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The fact that the game isn't competitive doesn't mean it can't have a good atmosphere. Mario Kart is inherently absurd and silly. Dbd is supposed to be a horror game. Having the characters wear outfits that don't connect with their backstory and are just there to look nice take away from the atmosphere for the sake of fan fare.
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I blame esports...
...for all kinds of things, but this problem too.
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I understand where you're coming from about Jane but her default outfit is her work attire. I don't know how they could have designed her differently to put more character in just from visuals alone but aside from that you can tell a little from her body language. She has a certain energy to her that other survivors don't, idk how but when I look at Jane I can tell there's something different about her, yeah maybe I can't tell right away that she's a talk show host / big name TV figure but there's definitely elements that all allude to that and the dots get connected fast once you read their backstory.
The Smash Bros example I can't take seriously at all I'm sorry but they took Bayonetta who has some of the most ridiculous god level powers and reduced her (Literally in size lol) to an ultra lightweight fragile funsy character that honestly? Looking at close details there are so many things that aren't true to her original game like at all.
And that's OK I don't expect her to have ALL of her weapons or be able to OHKO people with torture attacks but she (And all other characters added) all get affected by literally everything that would affect the base characters because it kind of has to work that way for the game as a whole?
The same goes for killers in this game. Let me just go into the pyramidhead example, pyramidhead can already completely bypass ever having to use hooks with his power which if I may add is a MASSIVE boon to him. Imagine for a moment if he could also just never have to worry about flashlights / if he had an innate light born effect? Now you have a killer that ignores all hook related perks and flashlights without even needing to bring lightborn just from the killers base kit alone. That's gross lol so some of these things are obviously for balance. And come on, Freddy is pretty good all things considered. The fact that he has SO many options imo makes it feel like they really tried their hardest to make him fit in as much as they possibly could to the point he literally has too much in his kit.
I agree Pig and Demogorgon feel weak at times but they're still unique in their own ways compared to every other killer.
Idk I'm just not feeling it. I don't defend BHVR on everything but this I have to give them the point on. I don't think there's anything too wrong with every character added thus far and there's always room for improvement and fixing with what's here currently.
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I actually agree with the first statement. Most people who play the game think that not "much" is wrong and are willing to put up with most of the game's problems.
And for the second statement, this is the main reason why the devs of now are so un-spirited and lazy compared to when they first started making the game, excluding the extra people now helping them. Unless a massive chunk of the player base leaves and they are at financial risk, they are not going to fix the game's massive underlying problems. They have no reason to because they no longer care about the quality of the game unless it impacts their ability to keep making money off it.
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I'm not gonna lie, it really does seem like you hate nuance. You want characters to be one-dimensional, you dislike the variety in their outfits and you criticise the syntax of their backstories. Sorry you can't tell everything about a character from their appearance, but I guess that's what happens when developers want a little realism in their game.
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Its just a game. You need to hear this.
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I kinda feel this. One of my major gripes with Dead By Daylight is that it feels like it's trying to be something that it's not.
A big comparison that accurately reflects what one would typically expect from a game like this is Rainbow Six: Siege. Why? It's got similar elements, the big difference is that it's a tactical shooter game but the fundamentals are practically the same.
DBD likes to create this world which is great but the world they generate isn't something that necessarily pertains to what is going on inside the realms, just beyond it. I don't mind lore but it feels like they are pushing stories too much and are using a once convenient expository device to now go absolutely ham. It's their game they can do what they want but it feels like the lore outweighs the game by a wide margin. At one point the entity was this pan dimensional (literally speaking) entity that wasn't just in the shadows, it was the shadows. At the start Benedict Baker went on this odyssey to discover just what did happen at the MacMillan Estate and why was the town of Weeks so mysterious and blah. Now there's the Cult of Skaro in the depths of like Paris or something makin up ryhmes to summon a creature that apparently can be summoned or whatever. It was nice having scraps of lore where Benedict Baker and the alchemist filled in some of the gaps but now everything is being explained in great detail and if you missed the lore in Book #119 you'll not understand anything in Book #10,050.
I can understand some things like with Pyramid Head being blindable. Every other killer can be and it would be a waste if you brought a purple flashlight, didn't get to use it and lost it all in one roll. It's a balancing thing so I can understand. I always went with the idea that the helmet was just full of tiny little holes, but like a hundred [BAD WORD] little holes.
I do tend to think some of the cosmetics drift away from the original idea but I'm not super out of it. R6 does the same thing and like I said, it's a pretty solid comparison.
In the end I think Character lore and scraps from Benedict and the Alchemist would have sufficed but now we have Shakespeare's 150 part epic.
I think the game drifted too far away from itself and forgot exactly what it was. Like Kate Denson.
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"I don't know how they could have made her any differently to put more character in just from visuals alone..."
Because she has so little character to begin with. The fact that she's a popular TV host makes her unrelatable, and her backstory, that tries to show her as an actual human with has to hide her emotions to do her job, fails spectacularly because of the modern writing style and makes Jane come off as an angsty drama queen. As you said, her idle animations show off a tiny bit of character. But seeing a small part of character through an animation that you don't even see while playing as her is nothing compared to just looking at someone and understanding exactly what their is personality.
"The Smash Bros example I can't take seriously at all..."
Do you play Smash Bros at all? Did you know that when Bayonetta first released she was one of the most powerful characters in that game and had to be nerfed later on? Be ignoring that, her appearance in Smash Bros is faaaaar more accurate to her original medium that any of the dbd licensed killers, excluding Michael. Bayonetta can still use witch time, her heel guns, fly, perform astounding acrobatics, and beat the hell out of people by transforming her outfit into a giant monster. Her overall powerlevel has been pushed down so the game is still fair for everyone, but that's the point of Smash Bros; to have a whole bunch of characters from different franchises beat the snot out of each other in interesting ways.
Now let's look at every single dbd licensed killer.
- Michael Myers - Is a very strong guy that stabs people with a knife and is known to stalk his victims before attacking. He stalks people in the game until he is able to insta-down them and has several add-ons that allow him to kill people on the spot, like how he does in his films. He's depicted fairly accurately.
- Pig - In the films she is shown to be a cunning and devoted disciple of Jigsaw who eventually bastardised his teachings in favour of murdering people she thought were beyond redemption, instead of always giving people a chance to escape the unique traps they were ensnared in. In the game, she uses 1 trap out of the entire arsenal used in the films, which survivors can still escape from by searching the boxes with keys in them. Ignoring how highly out-of-character this is for Amanda, she's still an agile and determined women who wants to murder the survivors, and yet she vaults windows at the same speed as the bigger and less agile killers and instead of just vaulting over a pallet like survivors do she breaks them with her foot. The way she acts in game and how her traps function are not very accurate to her appearance in the films.
- Freddy - A psychopath that manifests in the dreams of his victims and enjoys scaring and torturing in various creative ways before finally killing them. But he is powerless when in the real world. The Freddy we have now can attack people regardless if they are asleep or not. The only powers he can use when people are asleep is a bloody puddle that slows them down a bit and prevents fast vaults on windows, and fake pallets that explode into blood when used. He can also teleport to gens. Compared to all the stuff he can do in the movies, his appearance in dbd is severally lack-lustre.
- Demogorgon - A trans-dimensional horror that is extremely resistant to guns and fire. It hunts by sensing blood and pulling victims into the "upside down" where it either devours them or traps them in a web-like substance until they die. In the game, the portals that Demo uses do not allow it to travel into the upside down but instead to another point on the map. Survivors cannot be dragged into upside down either. Demo is also easily stunned by a pallet, a survivor jumping out of a locker, or a small piece of glass. They are a very far cry from their appearance in the show.
- Leather face - A big, strong guy with a chainsaw and a mental deficiency. The game is accurate for the most part. Except with LF hits an object or holds his chainsaw for too long, causing him to thrash about for a little while rather than continue after the survivors he's psychologically conditioned to chase. He is depicted fairly accurately.
- Pyramid Head - A manifestation of guilt. PH exists to punish people and does so with a massive iron machete. He is very slow and clumsy, and vulnerable to bullets, but also, unrelenting and will not stop hunting someone until they accept themselves and what they have done. PH in the game moves fairly quickly, doesn't use the full length of his machete for attacks except to finish someone off, and has a bizarrely out of place ranged wave-attack that goes through walls. Survivors who get "tormented" by walking through the trail he leaves suffer no debuffs except the terrible png image stuck on their screen, or the PH uses certain add-ons. His depiction in the game is very far from how he is in the Silent Hill series.
You've completely missed the point I made about Pyramid Head. Not only would giving him immunity to blindness make perfect sense, and be not nearly as overpowered as you're making it out to be, but it also be a step into making him much more true to his character. How he is now, how most of the other DLC characters are now, is completely laughable compared to the level of detail that characters get in Smash Bros.
The devs have done this intentionally as they know that making these characters as they should be would take effort, time and money. Which is why they deserve criticism and for their soulless plans for the game need to be changed so it might actually improve.
But it won't.
Post edited by SirCracken on3 -
You think that the developers of Dead by Daylight, a game based on the dramatic and horrific nature of slasher films, are adding in flowery designer outfits for their objectively 1-dimensional characters to wear, so their game can be more realistic?
My only guess as to why you would make a claim that ludicrous is because you are greatly attached to one of the characters I mentioned and feel an unnatural need to defend them.
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I agree with almost everything you said except PH getting blinded. You mentioned how it would be a waste for the survivor if they brought a flashlight and couldn't use it because the killer would be immune. Well...https://deadbydaylight.fandom.com/wiki/Lightborn
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I voted for customizable hooks but not... this.
Imagine being able to modify hooks to look like in the underground complex.
But instead we got charms...
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I would very much to be able to choose how my hooks look.
Even something as simple as choosing the design from the selection already in the game, it's way better than the charms.
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In the last questionnaire they asked if we would like customizable lobbies.
I expected being able to choose the background and music from earlier releases and events. But now that I think about it, we'll probably just get charms in the sides.
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I see no reason to dispute this.
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I can see that, but Lightborn consumes a perk slot forcing you to give up something potentially better. PH would just have it so he might as well be running around with 5 perks.
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I appreciate what you are trying to call attention to here, but unfortunately I think part of your argument depends on willful ignorance to nuanced character design. Cosmetics are minutiae that should seldom be used when designing characters--particularly in a game with customization. While they can be used to further reveal information about a character (i.e. Jane's passion for painting), the silhouette and mannerisms are true indicators of a character's personality.
Dwight, Claudette, Jake, Nea, Bill, David, Ace, Feng, Tapp, Jane, Nancy, Steve, Yui, Cheryl and Elodie all have silhouettes (and idle animations) that reveal a bit of their personality. Every survivor has their own set of poses and idle animations BECAUSE they are unique individuals, and BHVR is attempting to convey that through the design.
At the end of the day, design is subjective, and even good design is hated by some. You're welcome to hate some of their design choices, but it would be wrong to claim that most of the cast lacks personality.
Take Yui as an example...
Her elbows hug close to her waist, making her appear smaller--an indication that she is uncomfortable or nervous. However, her shoulders are pushed back and slightly raised, which paired with her clenched fists, implies she isn't scared. In fact, she is ready to fight for herself if she needs to. It is important to note that compared to Bill or David's stances--which are blatantly confrontational--Yui's silhouette does not read as agressive. This pose is strictly defensive. Looking at her hair, it is distinctly directional--all her hair flows back to a narrow point--implying a sense of direction and/or speed.
Her bio unsurpisingly reflects my analysis of her pose. She was raised in a traditional family, but was known as a rebel interested in racing against the local boys. She is a minority; a female racer among all boys, thus explaining the uncomfortable/nervous stance. She's headstrong tho, and determined to win, which explains the clenched fists--she is not afraid of being a woman in a man's sport. And, most obvious of her design choices, the hair is designed to reflect a sense of speed because she is a racer.
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As the saying goes: To each their own.
I love mystery within a character’s design. That, and there are some people in the world who are gonna stick out like a sore thumb, though that shouldn’t call for excluding more relatable characters.
Other that, I agree with the other points stated in this post.
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Let me start by saying I appreciate you actually taking the time to write a good counter-argument. These forums are filled with childish people who don't seem to understand the difference between objectivity and subjectivity. So having someone at least try to explain their viewpoint rather than presumptuously telling me how wrong I am is refreshing. Now onto addressing your statements.
"Cosmetics are minutiae that should seldom be used when designing characters--particularly in a game with customisation"
You disproved your first point in the same sentence that you stated it. The characters of dbd have almost no dialogue. The most we've gotten is Plague's occasional quotes and Ash saying something in the waiting lobby. For all intents and purposes, the personality of the survivors is how they look. They can express themselves in no other way besides screaming in terror. The only other interaction that we, as players, have over these characters besides helping them survive is choosing their outfit. So how those outfits are designed is a very important part about expressing that particular character's personality. Silhouette and mannerisms are important as well. But not nearly as important as how a character looks to begin with. (When I have the time I'm going to contrast every character silhouette in the game to see how they look. I'll get back to you when I'm done)
"At the end of the day, design is subjective, and even good design is hated by some"
Not entirely true. In every single design in every single field, objectivity can be measured. A stick as an objectively worse weapon compared to a gun. A pile of leaves is an objectively worse shelter than a house. When it comes to creative fields such video games it certainly becomes harder to measure objectivity, but is by no means impossible. It simply requires a more thorough examination than the previous examples.
You are entirely correct in saying that good design is hated, however. I hope that my analysis of dbd has come across as sincere and not disgruntled as I try to analyse things as objectively as possible.
The last thing I'll address is your analysis of Yui's pose. All of which is completely correct and I agree with.
(Except I'm surprised you didn't mention the ridiculous wrappings around her feet that made her look like a Sonic Boom character.)But what I will criticise is her characterisation and story and how it poorly ties to the game's narrative.(What's left of it)- Dwight is an anti-social nerd who's spent most of his time alone or avoiding others that would ridicule him. It makes sense that the entity would take him because less people would look for him.
- Claudette is an anti-social nerd who's main interactions with people are online. It would make sense for the entity to take her as well.
- Yui a renowned racer who now holds record for youngest ever woman to win the "All-Japan Moto Championship" and has thousands, if not millions, of sponsorship money backing her. Why the hell would the entity ever consider taking her?!?
I'm fully aware that other survivors have this problem also, and that the entity has been reduced to an imitation of a bad eldritch joke at this point, but that doesn't excuse how contrived her inclusion in the game is.
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4 perks + 1 mediocre perk that doesn't do anything if the survivors don't have flashlights.
I still think he should be immune to blindness just because of basic logic. He has a giant ######### metal pyramid on his head. How is the light getting into his eyes!?!
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Your OP definitely comes across as sincere, rather than disgruntled, which is why I took the time to respond in the way I did.
My statement regarding the use of cosmetics in character design is a broad character design principle. Every online art school I've ever enrolled in, and every vis dev video, podcast, or blog i've ever seen underscore the importance of a great character silhouette. It is common practice for character designers to begin with a silhouette (which may have implied cosmetic detail), and expand from there.
To be honest, I'm not familiar with the lore of the entity, so I cannot speak towards it or its relation to the characters added to the game.
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You think game design is based on attractiveness? That is a weird take coming from outfits like the Christmas Hoodie Feng.
Designing characters like that would get BHVR attacked by feminist groups. It's why there isn't a single large breasted woman in this game despite the horror trope of the "big breasted blonde" that was made fun of in the Scream franchise.
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We're going on 5 years in and there's still no clear direction on whether they're balancing for the casual aspect or the esports crowd. I'm not sure the devs themselves agree on it. There's no clear direction with the balance. Perks get buffed, but never equal gen speed buffs/slowdowns, second chances, or instadowns. You end up with zero playstyle diversity at higher skill levels because of that. Like good luck with your "fun" build vs a skilled player with a meta build. I'm sure it'll be a blast.
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The Entity doesn't take people because they are loners and nobody would notice (it's an interdimentional being and I doubt it gives a #########), it takes people who have a very strong will and survival instinct, people who wouldn't give up.
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I think it makes sense that the entity started taking stronger people over time, it's probably just indicating that the entity has grown in power since it first took Dwight. It started out taking loners or quiet people with less influence up until Kate, who took multiple tries to take.
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Let me add something I also noticed recently to this conversation. When the game launched, it had a specific way of texturing objects. You can see it, for example, on original Dwight shirt, screen from OP's post. What I mean are these quite small but noticible stains, like a drops of paint from brush or something along those lines. It's obviously stylized and I quite enjoyed it, it was consistent - the maps were like this, the game object were like this and characters and their clothing also looked like this.
The problem is, over the past year or even more, this style has been disappearing more and more, to the point that reworked gens, assets on new and reworked maps and most recent cosmetics aim for much more realism. So now, when you equip original character with vanilla cosmetics and you run around these maps, something is off. I can recommend you to try this on Coldwind Farm before it gets reworked and compare it to current MacMillan Estate.
It's this attention to detail and consistancy that should be expected from a developer with a strong vision of the game's artstyle.
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You're ignoring a massive problem with the entity taking people who are renowned or famous.
Let's say that I am the entity. I need humans, hope, to survive. When I take someone to my torture dimension I want to make sure that as few people as possible come looking for them. Because not only are lonely people most likely easier to kidnap, but if people start to notice others mysteriously disappear in a deep fog my food source is now at risk. The devs have stated in the past that escape from the trials is possible if the right ritual is performed. So having people look into what might be taking their peers is very bad for me.
Like, say, talking an individual that's worth millions in sponsorships and will have no doubt have investigators trying to find out what happened to her. It's an extremely stupid decision to take someone like that given that I want to remain unseen. And even apart from that, if anyone actually managed to break out of the trials, they would be a massive security risk. Because if all the people I took were nobody's or loners or just people that weren't well known, the person who escaped who be hard pressed to find anyone who believes what happened to them.
Unless of course they have valuable information pertaning to all of the celebrities I've apparently been kidnapping.
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What? No! How did you reach that conclusion? I never even mentioned Feng's outfits.
In case it didn't come across, good Character Design in dbd tells the player about the personality of the character and their vested interests through just sight alone. Since most of the characters never speak, having their personality expressed through how they dress is the only form of characterisation they get besides their perks.
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I actually had a look at the older cosmetics and I see exactly what you mean.
They're clearly dated but more stylised. Now, with the reworked maps and modern characters, everything is now a shade of bland realism. Even if the textures well made, they're designed very blandly.
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Are you 100% sure about that
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Please tell me you don't seriously think those are big.
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I'm pretty sure they are bigger then Clown's, they use to have more jiggle then he does, but you said you wanted the stereotype and there it is, beggars can't be choosers mate.
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That is soooo not the stereotype.
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Yeah nothing about this says "Blond Bimbo"/s. You're funny dude.
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This has nothing to do with most of your comment but on the point of Yui's hair, I absolutely hate it. Not because of your reasoning. I think it's rather smart for the developers to style the hair in way that shows a sense of speed. But I absolutely hate playing Yui with that hair because my OCD absolutely hates how the hair isn't symmetrical.
It has a permanent curve to the side and that makes sense when racing but not when you're just walking/running, or working on a gen. Like Yui, please put away the hairspray, something is wrong with your hair. I just had to rant about that because I've always hated it and someone actually mentioned it. Lol.
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hahaha personally i'm a fan (in part for the deliberate design choice), but I can understand your disapproval!
It feels like she just took off her helmet, and her hair is stuck in mid fluff as she is doing a hair whip
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to play devil's advocate...
this assumption about the entity presumes that it acts only in a manner of self-preservation, and that avoiding detecting is its single greatest concern.
the entity might not be like that at all. it might feed off fear and chaos--it might even strive to instill those things in society. Taking nobodies and outcasts in the beginning may be a way of growing/building strength. Taking somebodies and celebrities is the moment the entity begins terrorize the real world.
If people are investigating what the entity is, then more people are going to be placing themselves in vulnerable positions to be taken.
A powerful being like the entity might not concern itself with the behavior of mortal beings. The earth is its classroom, and the entity is the class bully. It is all-powerful, all-knowing, and nothing can bring it down.
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The version of the entity that you described, which is also the one I sadly admit that the devs are leaning towards, is a massive leap in quality from the entity described at the game's launch.
Now it acts like a Power Rangers villain, its evil cackling almost audible as it lords over the petty mortals because of how great and powerful it is. It even has it's own fanclub for christ's sake! The equally ham-fisted "Entity Cult" that was totally there the whole time and definitely isn't a shallow replacement for Benedict Baker because the devs thought it would be cooler to have an an entire organisation know about this supposedly lurking threat. (RIP Benedict. B, Died along with this game's immersive narrative)
The entity at its inception was actually menacing. We didn't know much about aside from BB's brief descriptions. It followed the traditional eldritch god linage of being beyond humans, something that you only begin to comprehend at the corners of your mind. It sought out those who were deranged, or wounded, or alone, and tortured them into submission whilst feeding on their faint hope of escape. Its existence heavily drew upon the universal fear of loneliness and isolation, the fear that if you were taken by this thing that no one would ever come looking for you. And as you were sacrificed on the hook over and over again, and your hope dimmed even further, the desire to turn on your fellow survivors just to ease your pain would start to grow. Until you the hope dies within you and is replaced by a dogged obedience for your arachnoid master, eagerly feeding the souls of your former friends into it's abyssal maw so that your eternal pain might be eased for the moment.
There has never been such a drop in quality compared to the old entity and current entity, since PvZ 2.
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