http://dbd.game/killswitch
Dbd needs to improve its athmosphere
It‘s sad to see the horror part of dbd fading away more and more. It was one of the things I liked the most about it, but many maps have been changed, more settings introduced and even killer powers got their scary factor removed. I know the game loses its horror vibe the longer you play because you get used to it, however this shouldn‘t be an excuse to not expand the horror athmosphere in the game.
That are some things that I would do:
- Add more sounds on maps. Sounds play a very important role in every movie and how they feel. In dbd you could add wind or animal sounds like birds or from crickets to help with that. Additionally you could add crying sounds on maps or classic music playing somewhere.
- Add more moving elements. Most maps are static and nothing is moving besides crows and players. If you made the gras, corn, curtains… move in the wind dbd would feel much more like a horror game.
- Light probably plays the biggest role in this genre. Darkness generally is much scarier than a bright place, where you are able to see everything perfectly. Additionally you could add some lights that flicker a little bit and more shadows.
- Fog is seconds most important part, because seeing everything and the whole map removes a lot of the scary factor.
- Killer powers with a teleport. There are quite a few killers that would be so much more scary to face if you didn’t know where they would come from. It wouldn‘t be me if I didn‘t mention Sadako in this one. So here we go. Before her last rework you didn’t see her TVs through walls, which made her so much more scary and frightening, because you couldn‘t know where she was coming from. You constantly had the feeling of her being near and not being safe (especially on indoor maps in her first version, where she was able to pop up everywhere at all times). There is also unknown, xeno and Springtrap where this applies as well. I know these auras are an important part of their counterplay but we are playing a horror game afterall, so this needs to be mentioned.
- Gameplay wise constantly being in chase and being pressured to rush gens doesn’t allow the feel of horror. The game has become too fast pace to actually lean into the horror and to allow its feeling. You are basically forced to overcome and ignore the fear factor, because you lose 90% of the time if you play into it. Another big factor of horror is when you don’t know what happens next, which is part of this point and the previous one with the killer tp auras.
Thanks for reading and wish you a good day!
What are your thoughts?💭
Comments
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All great suggestions. The only push back I would be adding more sounds. Why thematically it would be awesome it can be a pain as a killer when you are trying to track when you have too much noise going on. Sure some noise but not an overload. The amount of times I think the vultures on Dead Dawg Saloon is a survivor one breaking a totem. Gets me every time.
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Does the gamma settings coming next patch count?
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It will certainly help, but I hope you can‘t make it too bright, so it doesn’t lead to a situation where you have to turn it up to not be at an massive disadvantage. Most people will probably use it to erase the horror aspect of the game to get a competitive advantage, so this feature is a 50/50 against and for the horror aspect of the game.
@PleaseRewind I agree with you. I think behavior if they‘d do something like that would find a way to make it right.
@Valtyk I don‘t think that improving the athmosphere must come with an disadvantage for survivors. Having more fog is an advantage for survivors as well, because they are found less easy and the other things would act similar. Nostromo is a great example for a dark map that has a great athmosphere while not putting any side at an disadvantage. Aside from darkness and fog I don‘t feel like the other things affect gameplay. The only thing that would affect gameplay is my last point, but this will not change anytime soon I believe and it is also more a personal preference. I‘m not a fan of pushing the gen rush vs fast kills mentality any further. I‘d like if matches would last a little longer and would allow both sides to be less competitive.
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One thing to consider is the Fog Bottles, I usually never use them, but I've found it makes the environment super spooky.
They are optional ofc.
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I use them from time to time, but they barely make a difference and often the fog isn’t even high/close. Except on Eyrie of crows there it is huge. I also don‘t understand why fog bottles don’t stack further than the purple one.
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It might be worth it for BHVR to adjust fog bottles on all maps to match Eyries. Idd support that.
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Theyve been trying to keep that horror factor up as much as possible without compromising on gameplay, i know there are a few maps where if you happen to be in a spot something jumps out at you and its scared me quite a few times
I super wouldnt complain about more ambiance if it was pushed to the background when more important noises are happening, and/or if there was an in game slider you can decide for yourself how much of what you want to hear.
Something i think would improve this a lot is making the chase music more terrifying, after a while it kinda seems goofy in most cases, if it was more basey and chaotic, just enough to be distracting to get that sense of panic while still being mostly nonintrusive chase music
Maybe having all that extra ambiance of birds and wind and leaves rustling exclusively while not in the terror radius would be nice, maybe it would just be super jank and distracting coming in and out idk2 -
To play devil's advocate, one point to consider is darkness and atmosphere don't just affect the Survivor, they also affected the killer.
I have noticed a number of times that darker maps like Borgo, Red Forest, Greenville and MacMillan are all a little harder to keep tabs on survivors in the dark compared to the likes of Glendale, Ormond, Coldwind, etc.
This is probably fine due to the prevelance and relatively decent strength of aura perks nowadays, but I can imagine a reason for brighter map pallets and removal of the fog is to focus more on the chase side of DBD than the stealth side.
So while I'd absolutely love more atmosphere are darkness in DBD, in game where the relative FOVs are a big factor between the 2 sides, it might be worth bearing this in mind.
That said... of course darkness and limited view range is better for stealth killers, and the upper tiers tend to do very well with clear lines of sight... maybe this is the secret buff lower tier killers need vs. the higher tiers xD
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It‘s kinda weird to me that you didn‘t mention nostromo as dark map, which for me is one of the darkest and it is one of the best maps in terms of athmosphere in my opinion.
I would as darker maps affect both sides equally. Survivors have it harder to see the killer approaching and killers can‘t spot survivors over the whole map.
Besides that, I find maps where you can see everything and all borders very ugly.
That said... of course darkness and limited view range is better for stealth killers, and the upper tiers tend to do very well with clear lines of sight... maybe this is the secret buff lower tier killers need vs. the higher tiers xD
The secret buff we‘ve all been waiting for
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Well to be fair, Nostoromo, while dark, has a lot of bright surfaces that you can clearly see silhouettes relatively easily against... whereas these other ones, it's all dark dingy surfaces that it's easy to miss someone at a quick glance.
Terror radius is the key difference, as a survivor can slip into a dark mark unnoticed far better than the lighter ones...
Personally I hope they go through with the survey feedback option to have day/night/twilight map options. Maybe not all maps, but some maps could really use some night modes...
And Borgo needs some sconses and burning bodies or something... that map is stupid dark...
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Some weather effects would be nice. Imagine some heavy rain and thunder sounds with wind blowing props like the cowtree
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That would be really cool.
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For a few weeks Ormond and Lery's had storm effects, many years ago. They were removed due to game performance issues, same reasons why the fog and grass etc. were greatly reduced.
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I thought something had changed about them but I could never put my finger on it. Now that most people run on better hardware and consoles I wonder if it would still be as much of an issue especially considering there has been graphical overhauls since.
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How much can they do with their, ummmm iffy coding,... while still supporting the Switch and PS4 and Xbox1?
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This is the hurdle. I know I'm probably going to get flack for saying this but at some point in the near future, old systems should and will stop being supported
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The issue isn't the capabilities of those platforms, but how they attempt to digest DBD's coding. They all can run much more demanding games well enough, even the Switch, however it is just how this game was built that they struggle with. Even those on very powerful PC's feel this, as DBD is an unusually voracious gobbler of resources.
Since this is a Live Service game, they have to continue to support those platforms until Sony and Nintendo and Microsoft stop their individual support for them, or they can no longer physically run the game.
Most of the players are on the consoles (more than 70% or so globally) and around half are still on these prior gen machines. That's a lot of players.
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I'm not denying that the way the game is built is an issue but it's the balance of whether or not that older hardware is worth supporting if it's holding back the games potential.
If your stats are correct then it won't be for some time (if DBD maintains the fanbase instead of fizzling out) but eventually those stats will change to a proportion which might not be financially viable to keep due to players naturally upgrading their hardware.
I mean I currently play on PS5 and occasionally on Series X and they aren't exactly new anymore.
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I imagine with the Switch 2 rolling out Nintendo will ease out the Switch 1 support, and that'll domino the PS4 and Xbox1 machines. I bet it'll happen next year, and they'll be phased out.
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