The future of movie licensing for DBD. What is left and diminishing returns.
Hello everyone. With the 10th anniversary stream done and the
roadmap for year 11 made public I figured I would give my personal
rundown of some of the remaining licenses left for DBD. I would like to
say this is a list of movie only licenses that are often discussed here,
so no games, anime etc. Also this is all just my opinion and I am sorry
if your favorite licens is not here. This post will be a long one.
In some ways there are still plenty of licenses left to add, but in other
ways with the addition of Jason and Art they will be starting to scrape
the barrel for major movie licenses. Also diminishing returns might
start to play a factor in if a license is worth it for them to add due
to cost of said license vs. income gained from it.
First of all Behaviour has in my opinion three major white whales
left to add to the game. 1. Pennywise/It. 2. Predator. 3. Candyman.
Pennywise is the biggest one left, if they ever get the license he
is in, but rumors have it Stephen King is hard to play ball with. Still
with a new season of Welcome to Derry coming the chance is there.
Predator. This is more a sooner rather than later case and would
not surprise me if next year's anniversary chapter is Predator.
Behaviour seems to have a great working relationship with Disney/Fox
with alien after all.
Candyman. Probably the least likely at this point with the passing
of Tony Todd. Not impossible if they sample lines from the movie for
voices or get someone that can sound like Tony Todd or have him be
silent. Worse case they go the 2021 movie route and make it a “new”
Candyman killer aka a Freddy 2.0 scenario.
Licenses with a big chance of making it. These licenses are popular and would rake in good money etc.
- Jurassic Park/World: Plenty of survivors and skins to pick from. Raptor or Indoraptor as killer. Great map potential.
- The Conjuring: They have a working relationship with
Blumhouse/Atomic monsters. The Nun as a killer and Warrens as survivors.
- Star Wars: As much as I would hate seeing Vader (THE iconic
movie villain) being tea-bagged and pallet stunned, it is a possible
license.
- Terminator: The first movie is straight up a slasher and it
would fit perfectly. They used to have the license for the cancelled
Deathgarden game.
- Jaws: Survivor only chapter. Hooper and Quint would be perfect
survivors. So would Sheriff Brody but the Scheider estate is hard to
play ball with.
- X-Files. Survivor only chapter. Just give us Scully and Mulder already.
Honorable mentions that are highly popular, but unlikely to make
it due to licensing issues or difficulty to fit into the game imo, but
still might be possible, The Shining, The Thing, Silence of the Lamb.
American Psycho and the Exorcist.
Licenses with a chance to make it but diminishing returns might
start to kick in for Behaviour due to lack of popularity etc.
- Phantasm: I would love to see the Tall man as a killer in DBD so
much. His spheres are a perfect power with minions to boot. Reggie is a
perfect survivor. The license owner Don Coscarelli has shown interest
before. Unfortunately the license is kinda niche and Reggie Bannister is
in hospice care and Angus Scrimm passed in 2016.
- M3gan: The first movie was a major hit, the second one not so
much. Might still have a good chance of making it due to the
relationship with Blumhouse/Atomic Monsters.
- Thanksgiving: John Carver would fit well, maybe with the second movie coming.
- My bloody Valentine: Canada’s famous slasher movie and with an
iconic killer look in the miner/ Harry Warden, probably still too niche
to make sense and a kinda dead IP.
- Leprechaun: Again niche, but dang it would be a hoot to play as
the Leprechaun collecting your gold from the pesky survivors and cursing
them along the way.
- The Grudge: Kinda a dead IP atm at least in the west.
- Hatchet: Victor Crowley would fit right into the game, but the
IP is kinda dormant atm and Victor's thunder kinda passed in the early
10’s.
Comments
Thats not really scraping the bottom of the barrel though, you just made a very long yet still incomplete list. Yeah, the very huge names may be done but that doesnt really matter, and we could still see second chapters of existing chapters just like Resident Evil already showed.
Also they started to branch of from strictly Horror to horror-adjacent to Nicolas Cage so everything goes.
I can see what you mean, I was strictly referring to major movie licenses where we have most of the most requested stuff, the possibilities are still endless.
Oh damn I had no idea Reggie Bannister was in hospice care. That makes me very sad, not just for the license in DBD but for him. I am a huge phan of the Phantasm franchise so that makes me genuinely sad.
Reality: Resident Evil chapter 3, Silent Hill chapter 2, Bendy and the ink machine CHAPTER
Frankenstein's Monster is still missing too and you don't even need license for that one to bring him in the game as he is in public domain. I hope he gets added some point as he is one of the classical monsters we are still missing. Werewolf would be another one that would be a good adition at some point too. He could spawn in as the human form and then transform to the Werewolf when the trial starts. Creature of the Black Lagoon we already have as skin for Hag so not really needing that as new killer and its not the most well known anyway. Invisible Man would not be the most interesting but could work. Dracula we already have even if its the Castlevania version.
Another franchise that can be now a possibility is the Brendan Frasier Mummy franchise as they are making a new movie and who would not want him as survivor and Imhotep as the killer. You could litterally make his model so that every time he hooks a survivors he becomes more flesh and blood like in the movie. That franchise has a quite huge loyal following and everybody loves Brendan Frasier now it would be foolish not to get that license if you can. They could make a cool new map in the Forsaken Boneyard realm like the city of the dead.
I wonder if Independence day would fit. Along with Shaun of the dead, Stormship troopers, and The Mummy. All 4 of which were quite popular when they came out and are now distant memories. (Aside from mummy making a new movie with the old cast)
Frank Stone can be viewed as their original take on Frankensteins monster: the naming, him being resurrected and kind of also being made up of his victims
Also completely sidestepping stuff like Pearl and Maxine from the X trilogy, Horror is alive and well.
I know most would say the movie sucked but i think I Know What You Did Last Summer chapter would be cool.
Phantasm is a must for me. It's been my most wanted chapter for years now and the roster just won't feel complete without Reggie & The Tall Man.
A shame about what's happening to Reggie Bannister with his hospice situation. Already donated to his GoFundMe page a while back.
There are tons of possible licenses that you haven't even talked about that are movies, but we also given the ghoul existing have the ability to pull from anime, and there are many horror anime that would fix very nicely into DBD.
For anime you could pull from some classic horror/monster ones like:
For movies we could easily have:
Then there are games like:
Not to mention there's shows and books things like:
I would argue most of these are not "scraping the bottom" and are all quite famous popular IPs in their own right and could easily be a chapter, or a skin line released at any point in the future.
How about this for a deepcut license that would never happen but might be fun: Tourist Trap.
Would also really love a full Evil Dead chapter, there is a lot they could do with that!
Thats an impressive list, too long for me but:
Babadook never killed anyone.
I think Sam and Dean Wincester from Supernatural are an honorable mention! I see them requested alot and they are very fitting for dbd