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Description
Question; what has large, sharp, jagged teeth, and very small, sunken-in, eyes?
A few months ago, you'd have said Godzilla...A few months before that, you'd have said Five Nights of Freddy's 4.

The minute I saw this creature after I got off the cruise, I immediately knew what I thought of it. And I am shockingly surprised that NO one else had done this yet. "Like c'mon people; how do you not see it?"

I hope that this gives you all a chuckle...BUT...I do have an ulterior motive for finally doing this now. This is actually going to be a Rant about Five Nights at Freddy's 4. So - if you guys haven't played the game yet; though I doubt any of you who are reading this haven't but...

SPOILER WARNING:

Five Nights at Freddy's Four Rant commencing...

I'm just going to put it out there right now; saying this with little-to-no hesitation; Five Nights at Freddy's 3 was a better conclusion. (But that's the problem with Good Conclusions; sometimes they're so good, they goad you into wanting more.)
But despite how hyped and anticipated Five Nights at Freddy's 4 was...it was every bit the Lore-Killer we feared it would be.

BUT, before I go on, I definitely do have to say that without a doubt - FnaF 4 IS in fact the Scariest Game in the franchise. I had intentionally avoided watching Playthroughs of the game, with the intent of seeing the game with fresh eyes, and being unaware of what to do. But upon booting the game up, I realized how badly a mistake that I had made, and found myself unable to go on alone...And this works FOR the game...but also AGAINST the game, in many ways.

How does it work FOR the game?
Well, I would say without a doubt that when the game was being promoted, the most interesting part about the game, would have to be the Setting.
In the previous games, the danger feels a bit more contained and almost isolated. In each one, it took place in a fairly public place; with the first two games being in Freddy Fazbear's Restaurant and the third one in Fazbear Fright. For the entire span of the previous year, it gave the impression that the Animatronics were incapable or even uninterested in leaving the Restaurant locations...
This game however doesn't take place at the restaurant, or Fazbear Fright; no...It takes place at a House...
That right there completely changes the dynamic here. In the previous games, you were in danger, but it was more from the fact that you were in THEIR territory; you were intruding on their turf. And more or less, them trying to kill you was just a circumstance due to an unfortunate case of mistaken identity...Not in this game.
In THIS game...They're after you...That is their one intent; they're trying to get into this house, to get you. After the trailer premiered, everyone was so curious as to why the Animatronics were even HERE to begin with. It made us theorize that maybe after the restaurants closed down, whoever lived here bought the remains and brought them home, like collectibles. Unfortunately, the title screen of the game kills that theory almost instantly. So the question remainds...why did they come here?

But soon, the game working in tandem with the setting, gave us something else that was even more intriguing. Based on the contents of the room the player is in, and the overall height of the player, the game soon revealed that the game's unseen protagonist...was a Child...

...A Child...

How much more vulnerable can you get than THAT?! You're a child, seemingly alone in a house, with killer animatronics coming after you...and you're armed with JUST a flashlight? This sparked our interest and set off our imaginations even MORE than it had before. The questions came pouring back in...
"Why are they after a child? What did this kid do to make them come after him?!"

These features without a doubt made the game much scarier; and really goes into the feeling of helplessness that you're supposed to feel. In addition to that; you'll notice how much darker this game is - literally - than it's predecessors. Even though the lights were off, the offices were you were stationed, as well as other places, were lit-up enough to plainly see. Here, the ONLY light comes from the flashlight in your hand and whatever you point at. You actually do not see the entire room lit up all at once; which makes me think there are secret easter eggs in the room.

The game is completely changed up by requiring you to listen for ques rather than being able to see where the Animatronics are. This adds challenge to the game, as it can be very hard to hear the ques and interpret what they're supposed to mean. And it's nearly impossible considering that on MY laptop, my speakers don't work too well.

So those are all the things that work...Time for the plethora of what doesn't work...

Ironically the list of things that DON'T work for the game - at least in regards to its place in the series are...
The Setting and the Protagonist being a Child...Wait what? I just said those were GOOD things about the game; how can they also be bad? Well for a ton of reasons...

Let me start off with the Kid...this was an unbelievably huge misstep. It's like I said up there, "What could this kid have done, to make the animatronics come after him?" Considering that they are shown hiding in the woods outside the house, they are without a doubt coming inside; they are making the journey all the way there...just to get this person...and it turns out the one they're after is a Kid?

I'm going to say it right now that...part of the appeal of the ENTIRE Five Nights Franchise...is the fact that the Animatronic Characters are SO likable; sympathetic even. In FACT, the back-story behind the characters is literally the ONLY thing that got me interested in the series. I admit that it's true, when critics of the game say that the game is rather superficial; the only thing that kept me interested in the series was the Lore.
Let me put things in more perspective; I recently took to playing Slender: The Arrival. Slenderman is probably one of the most famous popular culture horror icons right now, so it seems only natural that he'd be given a few games. The only problem is...Slender is essentially an archetypal urban legend/internet myth. He has no definite lore outside of random appearances and chasing people...Because of this, Slender has absolutely no motive. Usually to me, what's more important than "What" an evil character does, is "Why" they do it. But in the game, you're not given any clue or indication as to what Slender wants or even WHAT he is. And considering that the game ends with an inevitable death that you've been trying to avoid...it makes the game utterly pointless. I'm all for games where you don't survive, but even in those games, you should walk away from the game with new information, to be different than you were than how you started. In Slender: The Arrival...You start out scared, you run away, you die and you end still scared...There's no sense of accomplishment at all with this. You don't know why Slender does any of this, therefore you don't really care what happens. The characters from FnaF are different.
The idea that these Animatronics were actually just little kids, innocent victims of a depraved mad-man, whose souls are at unrest and are forever tethered to the Animatronic suits, actually makes them more interesting. Sure it doesn't justify what they do, but it does make it more understandable...And Like I said above, their attempts to murder the player, is just an unfortunate circumstance, due to a case of mistaken identity...They're trying to kill their murderer, but they can't recognize the man. So they lash out at any poor security guard who inadvertently steps in their path. Their intent was more-or-less good as they're trying to stop a murderer, who unfortunately got away.
They're usually a bit finicky around adults during the day, but they only become homicidal at night...BUT the game also clearly demonstrates that they're perfectly tame around children. They don't hurt children because why would they? They ARE children. It gives you a sense of relatable fairness in the creatures; like all they want is peace and justice...

In this version...they're trying to kill a kid. And just like that, all likability that the characters once had is thrown out the window. They used to be sympathetic and relatable creatures that inadvertently lashed out at whatever unfortunate security guard got the night-shift, but now they legitimately come off as malicious; especially because, it seems like they're zoning in on this one specific kid; specific enough to make them leave the restaurant and come after him.

But that's not the only problem the character being a kid represents...It's ultimately exactly like I said above; being a little kid makes you feel much more vulnerable...almost too vulnerable.
With the previous games, you were still relatively in the same amount of danger, but you were still a full-grown adult, (or at the very least a teenager; 18-20). People in that age-span can think more quickly, survey a situation and can more likely come up with smart strategies to stay out of danger...As such, you felt - a rather undeserved - degree of confidence that even if the Animatronics got you, the character was still able to at the very least fight back, and maybe get away...
Children are more prone to panic and make bad decisions. Plus, children are small and weak. If a character like these animatronics were to get their hands on a kid, the poor thing wouldn't stand a chance. It's like ripping the wings off a butterfly; it's cruel because you outmatch the insect in every single way, that mutilating it like that, is utterly pointless and comes off as vindictive...
And to those of you who are ready to debate; YES this IS different from "Among the Sleep." In that game, you not only play as a child, but as a TODDLER! (That's certainly how you can get MORE vulnerable.) But there's a huge difference between that game and this one. For the one hand, the kid in that game gets through almost completely unscathed, but the kid from this game - regardless if you win or not - isn't given such a luxury. Secondly, that game is all purely psychological; a means for the kid to interpret how he sees his Mother when she can be "scary". And plus, the end of the game reveals no malicious intent; it's more or less an accident...This game comes off more like a hunt, and the kid is the game.

I feel I've covered everything I can about the kid, so now I'm going to talk about why the setting works against the game. And it works hand in hand with so many OTHER elements of the game, that paint a very particular feel for the game. The thing is..."This doesn't feel like a Five Nights at Freddy's game at all."

Like I said earlier in the review, the game feels much more malicious, because they are leaving the restaurant and coming after YOU in a residential area. But it gets worse than that; because a lot of recognizable features of the series are abandoned, whereas archaic elements from the original are forced back in. What is usually considered to make the series unique, is the fact that you use a camera-security system in order to survive. Here, there is no camera system - and this is a problem in two ways...
Firstly...you have no idea what is going on out there, and where the animatronics are and what direction they are coming from. Instead, you have to rely solely on audio-cues...Noises, in order to deduce where the monsters are coming from...Except, as I mentioned before; not everyone has speakers powerful enough to where you can actually HEAR what the noises are. The first screen I saw of this game, asked me to increase my volume level to where I could hear the cricket-sounds. I cranked it up to full power, and even put on a pair of headphones...still no crickets. In addition to that, the Five Nights series has been notoriously famous for what I can only describe as "extraneous background noise". I'm convinced that only two noises from the original game actually worked to serve the game-play; Chica rattling in the kitchen and Foxy banging on the door. Other sounds like Freddy's "Dub-Dub-Dub," "the Merry-Go-Round music," and others, actually made the sounds NEEDED to hear, impossible to detect. This works against this game as well, because you don't know what distinguishes one sound from the next, AND this game goes for "extraneous background noise" too!
The Second reason this doesn't work; ...it makes the game incredibly boring. The other games could get tedious, but with the camera, you could "explore" other parts of the restaurant...In this game, you are completely confined to your room...And you can't see jack-shit. This is the first time the series has employed almost completely animated character models, and you BARELY get to see them! Part of why the camera was so needed, was because you were able to get good-looks at the characters; which made the game interesting. What is the point of giving these characters monstrous, nightmarish upgrades, when we barely get a glimpse of what they look like? The answer is; there is no point! I found myself actually WAITING for the animatronics to come kill me I got so bored.

With the removal of the camera, I also mentioned that some archaic things got pushed back in. It's been said that this game makes many references to the original game, almost like a "coming full-circle" kind of thing. I do see the similarities; you have Chica attacking from one side, Bonnie from the other, Foxy dependent on how much you watch him, and Freddy basically being able to attack at near-random. So...why is this a bad thing? Well quite simple really, because there is a return of a rather basic feature, that makes even LESS SENSE here than it did in the ORIGINAL game...
Are you telling me...that this kid...lives in the ONLY house in the WORLD...where the doors to his bedroom CANNOT STAY CLOSED?!?!?! In the first game, keeping the doors OPEN would've drained power, but it was easily forgiven. HERE, it's completely nonsensical to suggest that these doors not only do not stay closed, but the fact that the kid actually opens them FURTHER when he walks to them. (Like I said; kids have no survival skills - they're like damn manatees.) In fact, I actually think that would be a better challenge for the game, where the "Audio-Cue" would make more sense. Say the doors were closed, and you had to listen for when the door-knobs start rattling; indicating that an animatronic was trying to open the door. You would then rush to the door and have to hold it close to keep them from coming in. Maybe if the gap in the door was wide enough, flashing the light at them would cause them to back off. That would've been a better plan I think.

Other choices are much more aesthetic, but they serve my overall point. With the past three Five Nights games, the title-screens featured a rather threatening and unique feature in that, they were constantly staticky and showed one or more of the animatronic characters occasionally glitching out. This one highlights how different it is as a game, because the most prominent feature is...the setting; it shows the house, on a hill, in what looks like a large bit of land, all in red. It's surrounded by woods...And if you look close enough, you can make out Freddy, Bonnie and Foxy's silhouettes, menacingly turned toward the house...Not only does this deviate away from the familiar theme of the games, but it also brings the malicious-factor back to the characters. They aren't simply emerging from the woods on an unsuspecting house...they're waiting. They're calculating, strategizing a plan of attack...waiting for the opportune moment to strike; when everyone is asleep? Maybe when the parents are out of the house...Either way, this game became a whole lot more threatening.

So; with a completely different setting, a completely different theme, a completely different title screen, and a completely different protagonist - who will later be revealed to have little, to nothing to do with the overarching story...What exactly does this game feel like?
Well it's simple...
...It feels like a different, generic survival horror game, with the Five Nights characters pasted into it. I have expecting this game to be about the "Night-Blites" or whatever. But instead, it has these recognizable characters, doing something they wouldn't normally do.

(This is the part where I got bored of the rant; will continue it later)

Description
Question; what has large, sharp, jagged teeth, and very small, sunken-in, eyes?
A few months ago, you'd have said Godzilla...A few months before that, you'd have said Five Nights of Freddy's 4.

The minute I saw this creature after I got off the cruise, I immediately knew what I thought of it. And I am shockingly surprised that NO one else had done this yet. "Like c'mon people; how do you not see it?"

I hope that this gives you all a chuckle...BUT...I do have an ulterior motive for finally doing this now. This is actually going to be a Rant about Five Nights at Freddy's 4. So - if you guys haven't played the game yet; though I doubt any of you who are reading this haven't but...

SPOILER WARNING:

Five Nights at Freddy's Four Rant commencing...

I'm just going to put it out there right now; saying this with little-to-no hesitation; Five Nights at Freddy's 3 was a better conclusion. (But that's the problem with Good Conclusions; sometimes they're so good, they goad you into wanting more.)
But despite how hyped and anticipated Five Nights at Freddy's 4 was...it was every bit the Lore-Killer we feared it would be.

BUT, before I go on, I definitely do have to say that without a doubt - FnaF 4 IS in fact the Scariest Game in the franchise. I had intentionally avoided watching Playthroughs of the game, with the intent of seeing the game with fresh eyes, and being unaware of what to do. But upon booting the game up, I realized how badly a mistake that I had made, and found myself unable to go on alone...And this works FOR the game...but also AGAINST the game, in many ways.

How does it work FOR the game?
Well, I would say without a doubt that when the game was being promoted, the most interesting part about the game, would have to be the Setting.
In the previous games, the danger feels a bit more contained and almost isolated. In each one, it took place in a fairly public place; with the first two games being in Freddy Fazbear's Restaurant and the third one in Fazbear Fright. For the entire span of the previous year, it gave the impression that the Animatronics were incapable or even uninterested in leaving the Restaurant locations...
This game however doesn't take place at the restaurant, or Fazbear Fright; no...It takes place at a House...
That right there completely changes the dynamic here. In the previous games, you were in danger, but it was more from the fact that you were in THEIR territory; you were intruding on their turf. And more or less, them trying to kill you was just a circumstance due to an unfortunate case of mistaken identity...Not in this game.
In THIS game...They're after you...That is their one intent; they're trying to get into this house, to get you. After the trailer premiered, everyone was so curious as to why the Animatronics were even HERE to begin with. It made us theorize that maybe after the restaurants closed down, whoever lived here bought the remains and brought them home, like collectibles. Unfortunately, the title screen of the game kills that theory almost instantly. So the question remainds...why did they come here?

But soon, the game working in tandem with the setting, gave us something else that was even more intriguing. Based on the contents of the room the player is in, and the overall height of the player, the game soon revealed that the game's unseen protagonist...was a Child...

...A Child...

How much more vulnerable can you get than THAT?! You're a child, seemingly alone in a house, with killer animatronics coming after you...and you're armed with JUST a flashlight? This sparked our interest and set off our imaginations even MORE than it had before. The questions came pouring back in...
"Why are they after a child? What did this kid do to make them come after him?!"

These features without a doubt made the game much scarier; and really goes into the feeling of helplessness that you're supposed to feel. In addition to that; you'll notice how much darker this game is - literally - than it's predecessors. Even though the lights were off, the offices were you were stationed, as well as other places, were lit-up enough to plainly see. Here, the ONLY light comes from the flashlight in your hand and whatever you point at. You actually do not see the entire room lit up all at once; which makes me think there are secret easter eggs in the room.

The game is completely changed up by requiring you to listen for ques rather than being able to see where the Animatronics are. This adds challenge to the game, as it can be very hard to hear the ques and interpret what they're supposed to mean. And it's nearly impossible considering that on MY laptop, my speakers don't work too well.

So those are all the things that work...Time for the plethora of what doesn't work...

Ironically the list of things that DON'T work for the game - at least in regards to its place in the series are...
The Setting and the Protagonist being a Child...Wait what? I just said those were GOOD things about the game; how can they also be bad? Well for a ton of reasons...

Let me start off with the Kid...this was an unbelievably huge misstep. It's like I said up there, "What could this kid have done, to make the animatronics come after him?" Considering that they are shown hiding in the woods outside the house, they are without a doubt coming inside; they are making the journey all the way there...just to get this person...and it turns out the one they're after is a Kid?

I'm going to say it right now that...part of the appeal of the ENTIRE Five Nights Franchise...is the fact that the Animatronic Characters are SO likable; sympathetic even. In FACT, the back-story behind the characters is literally the ONLY thing that got me interested in the series. I admit that it's true, when critics of the game say that the game is rather superficial; the only thing that kept me interested in the series was the Lore.
Let me put things in more perspective; I recently took to playing Slender: The Arrival. Slenderman is probably one of the most famous popular culture horror icons right now, so it seems only natural that he'd be given a few games. The only problem is...Slender is essentially an archetypal urban legend/internet myth. He has no definite lore outside of random appearances and chasing people...Because of this, Slender has absolutely no motive. Usually to me, what's more important than "What" an evil character does, is "Why" they do it. But in the game, you're not given any clue or indication as to what Slender wants or even WHAT he is. And considering that the game ends with an inevitable death that you've been trying to avoid...it makes the game utterly pointless. I'm all for games where you don't survive, but even in those games, you should walk away from the game with new information, to be different than you were than how you started. In Slender: The Arrival...You start out scared, you run away, you die and you end still scared...There's no sense of accomplishment at all with this. You don't know why Slender does any of this, therefore you don't really care what happens. The characters from FnaF are different.
The idea that these Animatronics were actually just little kids, innocent victims of a depraved mad-man, whose souls are at unrest and are forever tethered to the Animatronic suits, actually makes them more interesting. Sure it doesn't justify what they do, but it does make it more understandable...And Like I said above, their attempts to murder the player, is just an unfortunate circumstance, due to a case of mistaken identity...They're trying to kill their murderer, but they can't recognize the man. So they lash out at any poor security guard who inadvertently steps in their path. Their intent was more-or-less good as they're trying to stop a murderer, who unfortunately got away.
They're usually a bit finicky around adults during the day, but they only become homicidal at night...BUT the game also clearly demonstrates that they're perfectly tame around children. They don't hurt children because why would they? They ARE children. It gives you a sense of relatable fairness in the creatures; like all they want is peace and justice...

In this version...they're trying to kill a kid. And just like that, all likability that the characters once had is thrown out the window. They used to be sympathetic and relatable creatures that inadvertently lashed out at whatever unfortunate security guard got the night-shift, but now they legitimately come off as malicious; especially because, it seems like they're zoning in on this one specific kid; specific enough to make them leave the restaurant and come after him.

But that's not the only problem the character being a kid represents...It's ultimately exactly like I said above; being a little kid makes you feel much more vulnerable...almost too vulnerable.
With the previous games, you were still relatively in the same amount of danger, but you were still a full-grown adult, (or at the very least a teenager; 18-20). People in that age-span can think more quickly, survey a situation and can more likely come up with smart strategies to stay out of danger...As such, you felt - a rather undeserved - degree of confidence that even if the Animatronics got you, the character was still able to at the very least fight back, and maybe get away...
Children are more prone to panic and make bad decisions. Plus, children are small and weak. If a character like these animatronics were to get their hands on a kid, the poor thing wouldn't stand a chance. It's like ripping the wings off a butterfly; it's cruel because you outmatch the insect in every single way, that mutilating it like that, is utterly pointless and comes off as vindictive...
And to those of you who are ready to debate; YES this IS different from "Among the Sleep." In that game, you not only play as a child, but as a TODDLER! (That's certainly how you can get MORE vulnerable.) But there's a huge difference between that game and this one. For the one hand, the kid in that game gets through almost completely unscathed, but the kid from this game - regardless if you win or not - isn't given such a luxury. Secondly, that game is all purely psychological; a means for the kid to interpret how he sees his Mother when she can be "scary". And plus, the end of the game reveals no malicious intent; it's more or less an accident...This game comes off more like a hunt, and the kid is the game.

I feel I've covered everything I can about the kid, so now I'm going to talk about why the setting works against the game. And it works hand in hand with so many OTHER elements of the game, that paint a very particular feel for the game. The thing is..."This doesn't feel like a Five Nights at Freddy's game at all."

Like I said earlier in the review, the game feels much more malicious, because they are leaving the restaurant and coming after YOU in a residential area. But it gets worse than that; because a lot of recognizable features of the series are abandoned, whereas archaic elements from the original are forced back in. What is usually considered to make the series unique, is the fact that you use a camera-security system in order to survive. Here, there is no camera system - and this is a problem in two ways...
Firstly...you have no idea what is going on out there, and where the animatronics are and what direction they are coming from. Instead, you have to rely solely on audio-cues...Noises, in order to deduce where the monsters are coming from...Except, as I mentioned before; not everyone has speakers powerful enough to where you can actually HEAR what the noises are. The first screen I saw of this game, asked me to increase my volume level to where I could hear the cricket-sounds. I cranked it up to full power, and even put on a pair of headphones...still no crickets. In addition to that, the Five Nights series has been notoriously famous for what I can only describe as "extraneous background noise". I'm convinced that only two noises from the original game actually worked to serve the game-play; Chica rattling in the kitchen and Foxy banging on the door. Other sounds like Freddy's "Dub-Dub-Dub," "the Merry-Go-Round music," and others, actually made the sounds NEEDED to hear, impossible to detect. This works against this game as well, because you don't know what distinguishes one sound from the next, AND this game goes for "extraneous background noise" too!
The Second reason this doesn't work; ...it makes the game incredibly boring. The other games could get tedious, but with the camera, you could "explore" other parts of the restaurant...In this game, you are completely confined to your room...And you can't see jack-shit. This is the first time the series has employed almost completely animated character models, and you BARELY get to see them! Part of why the camera was so needed, was because you were able to get good-looks at the characters; which made the game interesting. What is the point of giving these characters monstrous, nightmarish upgrades, when we barely get a glimpse of what they look like? The answer is; there is no point! I found myself actually WAITING for the animatronics to come kill me I got so bored.

With the removal of the camera, I also mentioned that some archaic things got pushed back in. It's been said that this game makes many references to the original game, almost like a "coming full-circle" kind of thing. I do see the similarities; you have Chica attacking from one side, Bonnie from the other, Foxy dependent on how much you watch him, and Freddy basically being able to attack at near-random. So...why is this a bad thing? Well quite simple really, because there is a return of a rather basic feature, that makes even LESS SENSE here than it did in the ORIGINAL game...
Are you telling me...that this kid...lives in the ONLY house in the WORLD...where the doors to his bedroom CANNOT STAY CLOSED?!?!?! In the first game, keeping the doors OPEN would've drained power, but it was easily forgiven. HERE, it's completely nonsensical to suggest that these doors not only do not stay closed, but the fact that the kid actually opens them FURTHER when he walks to them. (Like I said; kids have no survival skills - they're like damn manatees.) In fact, I actually think that would be a better challenge for the game, where the "Audio-Cue" would make more sense. Say the doors were closed, and you had to listen for when the door-knobs start rattling; indicating that an animatronic was trying to open the door. You would then rush to the door and have to hold it close to keep them from coming in. Maybe if the gap in the door was wide enough, flashing the light at them would cause them to back off. That would've been a better plan I think.

Other choices are much more aesthetic, but they serve my overall point. With the past three Five Nights games, the title-screens featured a rather threatening and unique feature in that, they were constantly staticky and showed one or more of the animatronic characters occasionally glitching out. This one highlights how different it is as a game, because the most prominent feature is...the setting; it shows the house, on a hill, in what looks like a large bit of land, all in red. It's surrounded by woods...And if you look close enough, you can make out Freddy, Bonnie and Foxy's silhouettes, menacingly turned toward the house...Not only does this deviate away from the familiar theme of the games, but it also brings the malicious-factor back to the characters. They aren't simply emerging from the woods on an unsuspecting house...they're waiting. They're calculating, strategizing a plan of attack...waiting for the opportune moment to strike; when everyone is asleep? Maybe when the parents are out of the house...Either way, this game became a whole lot more threatening.

So; with a completely different setting, a completely different theme, a completely different title screen, and a completely different protagonist - who will later be revealed to have little, to nothing to do with the overarching story...What exactly does this game feel like?
Well it's simple...
...It feels like a different, generic survival horror game, with the Five Nights characters pasted into it. I have expecting this game to be about the "Night-Blites" or whatever. But instead, it has these recognizable characters, doing something they wouldn't normally do.

(This is the part where I got bored of the rant; will continue it later)