A potent gumbo of Things You’ll Recognize From the Silent Hill Series™ are coming to Twitch dot com’s favorite slasher movie multiplayer game, Dead by Daylight. As can be seen in the below reveal trailer, which looks about 400 times better than actual Dead by Daylight gameplay footage, the asymmetrical PvP game’s latest crossover chapter introduces beloved Silent Hill 2 monster Pyramid Head as a new DLC killer, Silent Hill 3 protagonist Heather/Cheryl Mason as a new DLC survivor, and the original Silent Hill‘s Midwich Elementary School as a new map, which will be available to everyone for free. All three are live on Dead by Daylight‘s public test server.
Pyramid Head is here because Silent Hill fans love him, despite the fact that he has nothing to do with Heather and Harry Mason’s tragic story, or Midwich Elementary, for that matter. His special Dead by Daylight killer abilities allow him to shoot out a big gross line of Silent Hill gunk in front of himself, tainting any survivor hit by it with a special “Tormented” debuff. Tormented players are teleported directly onto the game’s trademark meat hooks when captured by Pyramid head, though it’s worth clarifying that gunk manifestation and victim teleportation are not abilities that Pyramid Head is traditionally known for. In his original form, Pyramid Head’s abilities mostly revolved around standing ominously in hallways, walking very, very slowly, and getting bored after being shot with a gun 46 times.
Heather will be the first Dead by Daylight survivor to receive a new “Legendary Outfit,” which changes the character’s entire model, rather than just their clothes. Heather’s Legendary Outfit transforms her into Lisa Garland, a prominent side character from the original Silent Hill, though neither Konami nor developer Behavior Interactive have shown what this looks like in practice.
As can be seen in this 10 minute montage of footage from IGN, the new Midwich Elementary School map is an expansive multi-story series of corridors and chain link bathrooms (with occasional outdoor sections), heavily inspired by the aesthetic of the Otherworld featured in the two Silent Hill feature films, which also conscripted Pyramid Head into scenarios that had nothing to do with him. Behavior Interactive has said that while the layout of Dead by Daylight‘s Midwich Elementary is not one-to-one with the original, it has gone to lengths to recreate many of the location’s most iconic features, in addition to puzzles and Easter eggs aimed squarely at longtime Silent Hill fans’ nostalgia glands.
Lastly, Silent Hill series composer and groundbreaking audio designer Akira Yamaoka collaborated with resident Dead by Daylight composer Michel April to create a new version of the Dead by Daylight theme, though the full extent of Yamaoka’s involvement is unclear. What is clear is that Konami is only willing to remember that Silent Hill exists whenever it means making money without taking on any significant amount of risk, despite perpetual and continually debunked rumors that a series reboot is just around the corner. Maybe the real Silent Hill was the licensing agreements we made along the way?
