u/hheccx

https://preview.redd.it/tomttsb83dch1.png?width=1155&format=png&auto=webp&s=8b4216f99621cdd77c175a837e0d9bc9559030cf

If you don't know, the Basilisk is 'king of the serpents', with a killer glare, a terrible poison, and a scorching (sometimes fire) breath. Given the fact that the creature pictured not only closely matches the description and abilities of a basilisk (compared to that of a cockatrice), but also looks more reptilian than the beast we got in the first game, i'd wager it's a safe bet that this is not the cockatrice that we're seeing. So does this mean that we won't be getting everyones favorite cock-headed abomination? No, I don't think so, and I think the implications of something like this could be quite interesting for the DLC

1. Totally Unique Enemies

This is something I could absolutely see them doing, so instead of getting something like the cockatrice, we get the basilisk, instead of a hydra we get a giant snake or something else with 3 heads (cereberus?), and instead of an evil eye we get some other tentacle horror. They might want to do this since it's possible they want to take the DLC in a more unique direction with its own roster of monsters to build its own identity instead of just 'DD1 and Dark arisen again', offering completely new enemies or 'replacements' of said enemies that sort of function the same but are actually very different. If this is the approach they go for I wouldn't be too bothered by it as long as we get to fight new cool monsters, but I would definitely miss some of the things from the first game, so I hope they consider that at least.

2. Variants

This is another very likely scenario, if not more likely. So while we do get the basilisk, we'll also get the cockatrice as a variant of it, with it breathing petrification (like in the first game) instead of fire. This also means that we would probably get less 'new' monsters overall, but we'd get more variations of said monsters (e.g hydra, archhydra, evil eye, gazer, etc.) meaning we'll be fighting mostly variants of existing and the potentially returning enemies to come. If they do decide to go this route, as long as they can still make the fights feel different from one another, than honestly I don't think this is so bad, but I sincerely hope we still get a few completely unique creatures with their own skeletons and animations, as it would add a lot to the games immersion.

3. Mixed approach

This is the direction that I'm certain they're going to go, we'll get some returning enemies and some unique, orignal ones, with plenty of variants between them, but certainly at the cost of some enemies from the previous games. Now depending on what we get and what's omitted, this might either be a delight or leave a sour taste in many mouths. In a perfect world we'd of course get everything from the previous games, but it might be better/more fitting to get something comepletely new, reimagined, or otherwise unique over what we've already fought. I hope we do get most of the big enemies from DD1DA at the very least, but more gimmicky mobs like death I can definitely see them omitting or replacing, only time will tell of course.

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All in all I just hope we get a good roster of new monsters that feel different and are actually fun to fight. I could definitely go without having literally everything from the first game and DLC if this is what we get, I just really hope that what we've been shown is not all that there is, but I'm confident that this DLC is still going to be good and fun, we just need to put our faith in Kento and hope he cooked