Resident Evil is probably the biggest chapter ever
With RE being the most popular horror game franchise ever since it released and it still beating the crap out of Silent Hill even though SH is the #2 biggest horror game franchise I think this is the biggest chapter ever. Its more beneficial to put A game license into another game than a movie license into a game license since all the.RE fans actually play games so more will join. Unlike Stranger Stuff or something like that when not everyone plays games because... Well its a show.
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I guess so, I'd put Halloween in 3rd place, Silent Hill 2nd and Resident Evil 1st.
Imo, they're probably more likely to get new players through film or television license over a video game license. Say, out of 100 RE players probably 30% or so have played DbD and only 10% of that continues to play DbD. Of Stranger Things fans maybe 5% have played DbD prior to that chapter. Granted that's probably being very generous with those numbers. There's arguably a larger untapped market for BHVR by going with a film or television license because they aren't already gamers.
That all being said they're more likely to keep player retention by adding another game license over adding a movie or tv show like ST because they already play games and have setups for it instead of being relatively new.
Some of the films they've licensed have had far, far, FAR more exposure than Resident Evil. Freddy has been recognized as a pop culture icon by millions of people for going on forty years. Yes, there's lots of crossover between RE fans and DBD fans (myself included in that group) and yes, RE is a huge coup for this game. Any game is likely to benefit more from crossing over with other games as opposed to movies, just by the general nature of the medium. Gamers are more likely to recognize other games than they are to recognize movies. But I wouldn't call RE, or any game for that matter, DBD's biggest license in terms of overall recognition or mass appeal.
In other words, yes, RE is a great fit for this series and one of the better licenses they could have gotten, but characters like Freddy (and Jason, if they were somehow able to get him) are more famous overall.
As much as I love RE, I'd have to disagree. Michael Myers is one of the main faces of horror; you'd have a hard time finding someone who didn't recognize the mask. Same with Freddy or Bubba. Any RE villain? Not so much the case. RE is huge, no doubt, but chapters like Halloween, Nightmare on Elm Street, or TCM held potential to bring a much wider audience to dbd due to their dominance at the top of the world of horror