Dead by Daylight

This review is for those considering starting Dead by Daylight.
First things first: the game’s concept is excellent for casual players. It’s constantly updated, with new content every few weeks. You can treat it as a quick pick-up-and-play experience, or sink thousands of hours into it - it’s as shallow or as addictive as your preferences allow.
That said, the learning curve is steep. While the core gameplay is simple and there aren't many interactable elements, the depth comes from its variety. As of writing this, there are over 40 killers and 127 killer perks, which means learning dozens of playstyles and counterplay strategies.
On the flip side, there are 46 survivors with around 150 perks. Again, lots of combinations to experiment with or master.
Most perks can be unlocked through play or purchase. But don’t expect a quick grind. Even after 1000 hours, you may not unlock everything. Some perks are also locked behind paid DLCs(not a complaint, just a fact).
Here’s the twist: despite the wide variety, once you climb the matchmaking ranks, you'll notice a pattern. Only a few killers dominate the meta, and only a handful of survivor perks are commonly used.
And the community? It’s the full internet zoo. You’ll meet incredibly kind, wholesome players—but they’re the minority. Most matches involve someone sandbagging, throwing the game, or verbally melting down over a single mistake.
You’ll see people building their real-life identities around this game.
You’ll see how deeply some crave digital victory.
You’ll see content creators whose "amazing" fans may harass you.
You'll see that some players seem to log in purely to annoy others.
And yes, you’ll see both blatant and subtle cheaters—and it might take BHVR a while to act.
But despite all of this… I still play it. Is it worth it? I don't know.

This game is like a toxic ex with a PhD in gaslighting.
It disconnects, it cheats, it ruins your life… but then it hits you with just enough fun to make you say, “Maybe they’ve changed.”
Spoiler: they haven’t. You’re stuck in the same emotional roller coaster, just with worse ping.
You hate it. You love it. You're crying at 4 AM holding snacks you don't remember buying.
Solid 10/10. Would suffer again.

Used to play this game for fun. Now I mainly play it because I hate myself and I deserve the suffering :)

This game has easily the most hilariously pathetic community I’ve ever witnessed. It’s not even close, especially once you play killer, the mask comes off and you see what kind of fragile clowns you're actually dealing with, are you someone with an optimistic points of views towards the world and humanity? Try playing this game, if there's one thing it's amazing at, it's bringing out the worst in us, you might start to hate humanity...
I started with survivor. It seemed fine. Pretty normal matches. Gens, chases, some escapes, some deaths. For a while I thought people might be overreacting about the playerbase.
Then I switched to killer. Yeah. Nevermind.
Suddenly every match was a parade of flashlight clicking, teabagging at every corner, whether it is behind the pallets or at the exit gates, hook dancing like it’s a school talent show, and then the cherry on top: endgame chat filled with angry essays and threats to report me because I committed the ultimate crime of... playing the game.
Apparently, there’s a sacred book of rules that everyone must know. You can’t tunnel, you can’t camp, you can’t slug, you can’t hook the same person twice unless you’ve asked for permission and sent a handwritten apology. Forgive me masters! Who am I to defy you? Next time I hook someone, I’ll be sure to light some candles, recite a survivor approved chant, and gently escort them back to a gen so they don’t feel excluded.
You hooked someone too efficiently? That’s tunneling.
You waited near hook while three of them were circling it like mosquitoes? That’s camping.
You left someone on the ground to chase someone else? Slugging.
You dared to down someone in under 15 seconds? How dare you. Reported.
Winning isn't allowed, or it is allowed but only in spesific conditions, those are? I don't know either, maybe true winning was the friends we made along the way...
You so much as exhale at the wrong moment and it's "wow, toxic killer."
You blink before they do? Reported for harassment.
You play without letting them 99 every gen, unhook their friends, heal under your nose and spam emotes at every pallet? You’ve crossed a moral line, my friend. You’re the problem.
The funny thing is none of these are against the rules, the devs have literally said tunneling, camping, slugging or whatever "strategy" used in order to win, is all valid, yet you can see Reddit debates about whether those are fair or not, when I play as a survivor I don't complain about how the killer decides to play, I expect the same thing from survivors too when I play as a killer, but apparently that's asking too much from crybabies with a toddler like maturity.
I've been accused of tunneling in matches where I barely remembered who I hooked once. But apparently that guy with four meta perks, voice comms, a flashlight, and 3 resets somehow has the moral high ground. Incredible.
And don’t think Reddit is any better. That place is a sandbox for people to roleplay as philosophers. "Here's a 900-word post on why killers shouldn't pressure gens too hard because it makes me anxious." These people are writing ethics dissertations about a horror game while teabagging you at the gate and flashblinding you mid-pickup.
The hypocrisy is astonishing.
They’ll use every dirty trick in the book, abuse every exploit, spam every mechanic, and then cry about "toxic behavior" because you tunneled their friend after he ran into you three times in a row like it was a social experiment.
The only way to survive this game as a killer is to mute chat, never open Reddit, and treat every survivor like they’re one step away from writing a twitlonger about you.
This community is toxic, delusional, and self-righteous.
Amazing game but the worst community I've ever seen.
Everyone playing this game is either a crybaby, a moral crusader, or an amateur philosopher trying to gaslight you into thinking you're evil for using a mechanic they don't like.
And on a good day, you get all three in one post-game chat.

Dead by Daylight feels like deciding to scratch your balls with sandpaper. The first swipe? “Yeah, I can probably handle this, maybe it’s not so bad.” Five minutes later, you realize you’ve accidentally signed up for shame and regret: lifetime subscription with endless hooks, infinite loops, and optional flashlight failures.

Just when you think it can’t possibly get worse, you start questioning why you trusted Steve from matchmaking when he said, “I know what I’m doing, just watch me do a 5-gen chance.” Thirty seconds later, he dies instantly, and somehow makes the killer rage harder than you ever could. Right when you think things can’t escalate further, you get hooked and wonder why your teammate thought sprinting straight into the killer and “saving” you from the hook was a tactical maneuver.
Then the killer shows up, and your sandpaper scratch session upgrades to industrial grade torture. Hooks glare at you like judgmental exes. It's basically a game where 90% of your time is sprinting for your life, and the other 10% is staring at the sky on a hook, contemplating every single choice that brought you here. You’re sacrificed like a dumb animal with zero concept of self preservation, while mentally reviewing your entire existence.
And the community is surprisingly wholesome. They’ll teach you advanced uninstall techniques, and tell me how to just hook yourself in real life beore roasting you and simultaneously explain why you were the reason the killer ranked up.
10/10 would be hooked, stunned, flashlight blinded, and emotionally obliterated again.

great waste of time and efficient way to suffer. my abhorrence for this game is only rivaled by my love for alcohol. 10/10.

This game masquerades as a casual experience when in reality the average player probably hasn't touched grass in months. A sacrifice of the majority of your sanity is required to play. 10/10