Dead by Daylight apologises to fans after gifting DLC to TheBurntPeanut and has since 'removed the content that was granted'

Dead by Daylight apologises to fans after gifting DLC to TheBurntPeanut and has since 'removed the content that was granted'

"We can take the heat!" Are you sure about that?

Dead by Daylight's devs have found themselves in hot water and in the middle of quite a mess. In short, over the Halloween weekend a team member saw TheBurntPeanut playing Dead by Daylight, not in a sponsored stream I may add, and gifted him free DLC, items, and currency.

All the Dead by Daylight DLCs combined come to $335/£301: a substantial sum to just give away to a streamer who makes more money than most of us will see in a lifetime. TheBurntPeanut did then offer to give back all the content and said that he was willing to pay for it, but the official response from an official Dead by Daylight account on his stream was, "We can take the heat. They are yours to keep."

This turned out to be untrue, as shortly after the stream Dead by Daylight rescinded this offer. In an official social media post the devs explained: "we have already removed the content that was granted to the creator".

So what went wrong? Well, gifting hundreds of dollars worth of free stuff to a wealthy content creator who isn't undertaking a sponsored stream isn't a fantastic look. But the DBD community were more annoyed about the conflict in values. Something that the Dead by Daylight creator has now acknowledged:

"When collaborating with a new creator, we normally look thoroughly at their past content to determine whether they are representing the values of inclusion our community expects from us. In this case, this was not taken into proper consideration or discussed as a group.

"When we talk about our values in relation to our community, we mean respect, transparency, diversity, and creating a space where people from different backgrounds and experiences feel welcome. Diversity is one of DBD's core principles and everyone is welcome to play it. But when we choose to work with a creator, we're putting our name next to theirs, and we want to partner with creators whose words and actions share and support that principle."

They have also confirmed that there will be updated request and approval methods for this kind of thing going forward to ensure "any Dead by Daylight spokesperson is properly representing our team and our values."

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Elie is a news writer with an unhealthy love of horror games—even though their greatest fear is being chased. When they're not screaming or hiding, there's a good chance you'll find them testing their metal in metroidvanias or just admiring their Pokemon TCG collection. Elie has previously worked at TechRadar Gaming as a staff writer and studied at JOMEC in International Journalism and Documentaries – spending their free time filming short docs about Smash Bros. or any indie game that crossed their path.

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