Licensed characters appearing in games is kind of a huge deal right now. It seems like every other week there’s a new familiar face arriving in Fortnite and more and more we’re seeing other games follow suit and using pre-existing properties to pull in players. One such game is the popular multiplayer horror title Dead By Daylight, which has added nearly a dozen major horror movie monsters since revealing its Halloween/Michael Meyers collaboration back in 2016. However, the big problem with these games using licensed characters? Well, they’re not technically theirs.
Such is the problem Dead By Daylight is facing right now following what is presumably the expiration of their deal with Netflix’s Stranger Things. According to a post shared on the official Dead By Daylight blog earlier today, all Stranger Things-related content is being removed from the game’s store on November 17, 2021. This announcement comes merely two years after the Stranger Things Chapter was added to the game back in September 2019, and perhaps more importantly, raises some concerns as to what other licenses are set to expire and what that means for these big, license-heavy games. While we might not have any answers to those looming problems yet, we do have a few more details on just what’s going on with the Stranger Things DLC for those who have already purchased it or were planning to.
According to Dead By Daylight developers Behavior Interactive, all players who purchase the Stranger Things Chapter or any of its individual contents prior to November 17 will still have access to all three playable characters (the Demogorgon, Steve Harrington, and Nancy Wheeler) following the chapter’s removal. The only part of the Stranger Things collection being officially removed from the game is the Hawkins National Laboratory map, which is scheduled to be retired the same day the DLC is taken down from the store.
Despite the characters remaining, however, it does seem very likely that their names will be changed following November 17. In a tweet made by the Dead By Daylight official Twitter, the developers stated some of the Stranger Things-related perks will soon be getting new, generic names in order for players to still use them. Based on this news, it seems likely that could extend to our heroes as well.
Generic versions of the perks will appear in the shrine. They’ll be functionally identical to the originals.
— Dead by Daylight (@DeadByBHVR) August 16, 2021
As of right now, all of Dead By Daylight’s Stranger Things DLC is on sale for between 50-60% off with the character sale scheduled to last until November 17 and the costume sale running until September 8. While there’s no telling what all this news means for Dead By Daylight‘s other licensed properties in the future, if you’re still interested in this one it sure looks like now is your final chance to grab it.
