DBD Halloween Event Thoughts through the Years

Heh… I have to respectfully disagree. As I see, the Hallowed Blight was the worst event in the history of DbD.

The IDEA of the event seemed cool, but the execution and gameplay was a complete mess. There was a very limited number of cankers each trial and they didn't respawn. They also didn't give any in-game benefit to survivors, didn't help them completing the objective at all… but they were needed for the CURRENCY to obtain skins, so survivors kept just fighting among each other for it. The results: survivors not doing gens to search for cankers, letting others wait on hook while they did the cankers on their face (freeing them would mean less serum for you), and the worst part: If they didn't get enough serum to fill a vial, they would give up on hook or just DC on the spot so they could "go next", and there were no bots back then, a disconected survivor was a dead survivor.

And because the grind for the skins was pretty long, these lased through the whole event. Playing survivor was UNNWINNABLE most of the time because your team was against you and gave up on the spot, but you NEEDED to escape to get your serum for the skins. And as killer you just automatically won almost every match because survivors sabotaged each other and gave up all the time. To make things worse, because the experience was so one-sided, killer queues were insanely long too. You had to wait a ridiculous amount of time just to get one bad, very easy match.

And I wasn't the only one thinking this, just look at forum posts from that time (I´m cutting some of them to avoid making this comment gigantic):

As you can see…

…let's just say there's a reason why the cankers later came back only as an easy tome challenge that only one survivor could interact with per game. The event was such a mess that the whole concept was changed for future versions. The lore of the Alchemist (who would later become The Blight) and its cinematics were cool, the skins were cool, but the gameplay was absolutely terrible.

I personally think this iteration of their Halloween event has been my absolute favorite! Yes, I even like the orange filter and realize a lot of people are going to disagree on that point, but feel it gives a spooky feel, without being overly dark like lights out.

I can't speak for any of the events prior to Haunted by Daylight as I started playing late 2023, but can say I have very much disliked the events prior to this one. The void was especially disadvantageous for the survivor role, but honestly neither role benefited enough with spending the time to go into the void and thus lose all progress/pressure in the game. Changing things this time around to being able to gather what you needed while remaining in the trial realm has been a big win and I see both roles interacting with the event items much more equally. Only thing I might understand being a complaint from others is the prevalence of the haunts that cause a pretty big hinder effect, but it hasn't been a huge issue for me personally.

Glad as well they went with a focus on a more stereotypical Halloween theme for the cosmetics. Freaking Singularity with a lil alien mask?? Cute, love that. Billy's lil puppy fit I've been screaming to people from the rooftops is one of his first fits I've been excited about in a while. 90% of the time they like giving my boy the most diabolical fits. I even prefer the shirts this time around for the survs.

Point being for me at least, love it! I'd been taking a couple weeks break from DBD to grind other games and this event re-ignited my passion to play.

Oh, but I can assure you all the other Halloween events after that one were much better. Like, I don't remember many gameplay details of the second one, "The Withered Blight" from 2019… because it wasn't nearly as infuriating to be marked so hard in my memory, lmao. But I remember it had a cool as hell lore just like the first one, but without the awful gameplay, just minor gameplay additions instead. "The Eternal Blight" in 2020 barely had any gameplay changes, just special gens and hooks, but at least the tome had some brand new challenges that made it look like more of an event, including the cankers, and that was the event that introduced the special add-ons for killers and med-kits that we have today! The Blight Serum was released with the Blight, and that's why his power is the only one that interacts diferently with it (it gives him 1 more charge of his power).

Then, in 2021, they moved away from the "Blight" theme because the story was already complete (and also because they always change the theme of an event after 3 or 4 years to avoid making the events repetitive. The anniversary event had multiple themes now already) and introduced "Midnight Grove", which was… pretty much just a "Trick or Treat" theme. A normal Halloween Event about celebrating Halloween. Cool, fun, but a bit of a downgrade from how unique to DbD the blight theme was. But I believe it was the first that added pumpkins! And they had random effects back then, which I find way more fun then always a haste effect that barely compensates for the time wasting kicking it.

Haunted by Daylight started in 2022 and I found its first iteration one of the most Halloween events ever. It added small rifts (just like the ones that turn into portals in the current event) you could spend points on to get haste, so knowing that, you could combine it with fast killers and haste builds to catch survivors by surprise. The 2023 version made so rifts turned into portals to the Void… but I HATED that event, worst one after 2018. Seriously, there was no reason to go to the void as killer because there were no gens to protect there, and killer powers didn't work there! If you played Hag or Huntress, you became a slow killer with no power. But I would also find survivors less often because a lot of people just kept using the portals to hide in the void all the time, which lead to some really boring matches. As survivor, that meant your teammates either ignored the void or ignored the gens, which was awful.

The 2024 Haunted by Daylight had more incentive for you to go into the void as killer, as you could pick up better rewards there, but you couldn't stay for long due to having to protect gens. Still, despite flaws I think that was the most fun among the Halloween events I played, it had improved A LOT from the previous version.

I didn't play the 2025 one, unfortunately. It was the only Halloween event I lost in the history of the game. But I've been liking the current event so far. I just must admit I still don't like the portals. The way they are opaque and don't allow you to see through windows and doorways some times, the way survivors often enter them before you even get close and makes it take longer to start a chase… it's annoying, but less annoying than it was in 2022.

Don't expect much from BHVR there, they've proven for years they're not to be adventurous, especially in the last 5 years. If they making modding actually powerful then it will be the modders who do the adventurous things and then BHVR will incorporate the good stuff into the game. But I am cautious about modding being powerful, after all how will that sell DLC?