TL;DR: This game is horrible.
If you wanna know why, well, here's the full version:


Power gaps between killers

As you were probably able to gather by now, Dead by Daylight is split into two roles: Survivor and Killer. Survivors all function exactly the same, and are basically just glorified skins. The same, however, can’t be said for Killers, bringing me to my first point.

One of the biggest problems with Dead by Daylight is the sheer difference in power between the different Killers. There are Killers who are widely considered to be very strong or at times even somewhat overpowered, while others are so weak that even skilled players will struggle to win with them.
Now to balance this, the devs would have to look at each killer individually, and while that does happen occasionally, the results are usually a very mixed bag.
The main problem, however, lies with general changes, ones that apply to every killer. So while a survivor- or survivor perk nerf may make weaker killers stronger, that also goes for the already strong killers. On the other hand, a survivor perk buff to counteract the stronger killers means that the weaker killers suffer even more than they already do. From a balance standpoint, it’s easy to see why this might be a problem. The strongest killers have sat at the top of the list for years, and the same goes for the weaker ones at the bottom. Sadly, this a problem the devs do little to nothing about. Meaningful buffs to the weakest killers and nerfs to the strongest killers rarely ever happen, even if the entire community collectively agrees that they are needed. The changes that do happen and the killers affected often feel super random, and are usually justified by a bunch of questionable statistics that omit a ton of very important factors and thus don’t reflect the actual gameplay experience in the slightest. Yet the devs remain stubborn, insisting that they know better, even when it’s painfully obvious to even the most inexperienced of players that they do not.


Solo Queue vs "Survive with Friends"

The balance problems don't end here though. There's also the difference between Solo Queue (SQ, playing alone with randoms) and "Survive With Friends" (SWF, playing in a team with people you know).
SWF is widely considered to be much stronger than SQ because it is possible to properly communicate with and coordinate between one another via Discord or alternatives, in addition to being able to pick players that you know are good at the game. With Solo Queue, neither of this is possible. For better or for worse, you are at the mercy of your teammates, and the matchmaking that brought you together. The devs implemented a whole whopping two emotes to deal with the communication problem, and MMR for the matchmaking that’ll regularly match some of the best players in the game with people that’d have trouble pouring water out of their boots if the instructions were printed on the bottom.
As you can guess, this can make for very frustrating matches and is the reason why SQ is usually considered the weakest role in the game. And similar to killers, every survivor nerf that makes SWF weaker also affects SQ, and vice versa. The community has made a plethora of suggestions to bring the two roles closer together, but the devs once again continue to ignore them. This an ongoing trend as you'll soon come to realize.


Horrible Map Design

There's also the problem of the map design. What I mean by that they look pretty from an aesthetic viewpoint, but are horribly designed from a balance standpoint. Certain randomly generated map tiles (usually referred to as "loops") are much stronger than others. Some are so good that even a strong killer will have a hard time catching a good survivor there, others are so weak that even the best survivor WILL go down if the killer is somewhat competent.
The problem lies in the fact that the maps are randomly generated, and very often you'll find multiple very strong tiles chained together on one part of the map, making it nearly impossible to catch someone there, while other parts are either completely devoid of anything, or only feature aforementioned horrible tiles.
As you can probably guess, this regularly makes for very frustrating moments as you're essentially at RNGesus's mercy. As a killer you're often forced to leave survivors in one part of the map because you quite literally have no chance of catching them without throwing the game, while as a survivor you'll often find yourself in so called “deadzones”. Because of this, either side can end up in situations where they’ll feel completely powerless, all because of something they have zero control over. There are also maps with an objectively horrible layout from a gameplay standpoint, are confusing to traverse for new players, or offer massive advantages to one side. Your performance on either side is often linked directly to the map you get, and the way it was generated. In other words, RNG.
Fun, right? But don't worry; the devs ignore this problem, too.


Scummy Tactics

Then there's the scummy tactics. There's a whole onslaught of scummy or overpowered tactics players of both sides can use to turn a match into living hell for their opponent(s), some of which can completely suck any joy out of a match for one side entirely. Most of these tactics are known to the devs and some of them have been around since the launch of the game back in 2016. Yet the vast majority of them still lack any effective base-game counters. This resulted in said tactics becoming EXTREMELY popular, and as such can be encountered almost every second match if you’re unlucky. The only way to have a reliable chance against them is by using certain perks... bringing me to my next point.


The never-ending Band-Aid Fixes

Ah yes, The Band-Aid Fixes. What I mean by this is that BHVR’s design philosophy goes as follows: Don’t fix the problem itself, release perks that kinda help with it. They also do this with the aforementioned tactics. The thing is, there's only four perks slots, but countless situations that require specific perks, the lack or presence of which can often change the outcome of a match.
Let me visualize this for you.
Imagine you've got a hole in the wall of your apartment and the developers are your landlord. Naturally, you tell them about the problem. Now what the developers of this game do is instead of stuffing the hole, they hand you a painting and tell you to hang it over the hole. You can already tell that there’s no possible way this could go wrong, but hey, better than nothing, right? Well, except you have 20 holes in your apartment and it looks like ♥♥♥♥, but the landlord only gives you 4 paintings and tells you to deal with it, maybe tells you to screw yourself while you're at it. Replace paintings with perks, you've got yourself Dead by Daylight. But hey, it gets even better. Those perks I talked about? You know, the ones that are that are the only way to make those situations bearable? Yeah, they’re usually locked behind paywalls. And not just in-game currency. Real, cold, hard, cash. Even the only reliable counters to the scummy tactics I mentioned earlier. You know, the ones you encounter nearly every match?
You may be able to guess why this is a problem, and the devs have been continually ignoring said problem since the launch of the game 8 years ago. And why wouldn't they? It makes them money, after all.
So you better have your wallet ready if you want to have a chance in those situations, because it’s gonna cost you.


Conclusion

I could go on like this for a while, you know. I still haven't talked about the hackers, the bugs (so, so many bugs), or the horrible grind, but these are the worst offenders and I'm running out of characters, so I'll keep it brief:
Dead by Daylight is a horribly unbalanced, unfun mess that I wouldn't recommend anyone getting into.

Do NOT buy this game.

TL;DR: This game is horrible. If you wanna know why, well, here's the full version: [u] Power gaps between killers [/u] As you were probably able to gather by now, Dead by Daylight is split into two roles: Survivor and Killer. Survivors all function exactly the same, and are basically just glorified skins. The same, however, can’t be said for Killers, bringing me to my first point. One of the biggest problems with Dead by Daylight is the sheer difference in power between the different Killers. There are Killers who are widely considered to be very strong or at times even somewhat overpowered, while others are so weak that even skilled players will struggle to win with them. Now to balance this, the devs would have to look at each killer individually, and while that does happen occasionally, the results are usually a very mixed bag. The main problem, however, lies with general changes, ones that apply to every killer. So while a survivor- or survivor perk nerf may make weaker killers stronger, that also goes for the already strong killers. On the other hand, a survivor perk buff to counteract the stronger killers means that the weaker killers suffer even more than they already do. From a balance standpoint, it’s easy to see why this might be a problem. The strongest killers have sat at the top of the list for years, and the same goes for the weaker ones at the bottom. Sadly, this a problem the devs do little to nothing about. Meaningful buffs to the weakest killers and nerfs to the strongest killers rarely ever happen, even if the entire community collectively agrees that they are needed. The changes that do happen and the killers affected often feel super random, and are usually justified by a bunch of questionable statistics that omit a ton of very important factors and thus don’t reflect the actual gameplay experience in the slightest. Yet the devs remain stubborn, insisting that they know better, even when it’s painfully obvious to even the most inexperienced of players that they do not. [u] Solo Queue vs "Survive with Friends" [/u] The balance problems don't end here though. There's also the difference between Solo Queue (SQ, playing alone with randoms) and "Survive With Friends" (SWF, playing in a team with people you know). SWF is widely considered to be much stronger than SQ because it is possible to properly communicate with and coordinate between one another via Discord or alternatives, in addition to being able to pick players that you know are good at the game. With Solo Queue, neither of this is possible. For better or for worse, you are at the mercy of your teammates, and the matchmaking that brought you together. The devs implemented a whole whopping two emotes to deal with the communication problem, and MMR for the matchmaking that’ll regularly match some of the best players in the game with people that’d have trouble pouring water out of their boots if the instructions were printed on the bottom. As you can guess, this can make for very frustrating matches and is the reason why SQ is usually considered the weakest role in the game. And similar to killers, every survivor nerf that makes SWF weaker also affects SQ, and vice versa. The community has made a plethora of suggestions to bring the two roles closer together, but the devs once again continue to ignore them. This an ongoing trend as you'll soon come to realize. [u] Horrible Map Design [/u] There's also the problem of the map design. What I mean by that they look pretty from an aesthetic viewpoint, but are horribly designed from a balance standpoint. Certain randomly generated map tiles (usually referred to as "loops") are much stronger than others. Some are so good that even a strong killer will have a hard time catching a good survivor there, others are so weak that even the best survivor WILL go down if the killer is somewhat competent. The problem lies in the fact that the maps are randomly generated, and very often you'll find multiple very strong tiles chained together on one part of the map, making it nearly impossible to catch someone there, while other parts are either completely devoid of anything, or only feature aforementioned horrible tiles. As you can probably guess, this regularly makes for very frustrating moments as you're essentially at RNGesus's mercy. As a killer you're often forced to leave survivors in one part of the map because you quite literally have no chance of catching them without throwing the game, while as a survivor you'll often find yourself in so called “deadzones”. Because of this, either side can end up in situations where they’ll feel completely powerless, all because of something they have zero control over. There are also maps with an objectively horrible layout from a gameplay standpoint, are confusing to traverse for new players, or offer massive advantages to one side. Your performance on either side is often linked directly to the map you get, and the way it was generated. In other words, RNG. Fun, right? But don't worry; the devs ignore this problem, too. [u] Scummy Tactics [/u] Then there's the scummy tactics. There's a whole onslaught of scummy or overpowered tactics players of both sides can use to turn a match into living hell for their opponent(s), some of which can completely suck any joy out of a match for one side entirely. Most of these tactics are known to the devs and some of them have been around since the launch of the game back in 2016. Yet the vast majority of them still lack any effective base-game counters. This resulted in said tactics becoming EXTREMELY popular, and as such can be encountered almost every second match if you’re unlucky. The only way to have a reliable chance against them is by using certain perks... bringing me to my next point. [u] The never-ending Band-Aid Fixes [/u] Ah yes, The Band-Aid Fixes. What I mean by this is that BHVR’s design philosophy goes as follows: Don’t fix the problem itself, release perks that kinda help with it. They also do this with the aforementioned tactics. The thing is, there's only four perks slots, but countless situations that require specific perks, the lack or presence of which can often change the outcome of a match. Let me visualize this for you. Imagine you've got a hole in the wall of your apartment and the developers are your landlord. Naturally, you tell them about the problem. Now what the developers of this game do is instead of stuffing the hole, they hand you a painting and tell you to hang it over the hole. You can already tell that there’s no possible way this could go wrong, but hey, better than nothing, right? Well, except you have 20 holes in your apartment and it looks like shit, but the landlord only gives you 4 paintings and tells you to deal with it, maybe tells you to screw yourself while you're at it. Replace paintings with perks, you've got yourself Dead by Daylight. But hey, it gets even better. Those perks I talked about? You know, the ones that are that are the only way to make those situations bearable? Yeah, they’re usually locked behind paywalls. And not just in-game currency. Real, cold, hard, cash. Even the only reliable counters to the scummy tactics I mentioned earlier. You know, the ones you encounter nearly every match? You may be able to guess why this is a problem, and the devs have been continually ignoring said problem since the launch of the game 8 years ago. And why wouldn't they? It makes them money, after all. So you better have your wallet ready if you want to have a chance in those situations, because it’s gonna cost you. [u] Conclusion [/u] I could go on like this for a while, you know. I still haven't talked about the hackers, the bugs (so, so many bugs), or the horrible grind, but these are the worst offenders and I'm running out of characters, so I'll keep it brief: Dead by Daylight is a horribly unbalanced, unfun mess that I wouldn't recommend anyone getting into. Do NOT buy this game.