I’m going to be honest, I hesitated on writing this review given I played through Five Nights at Freddy’s 4 and never gave anything too much thought. I vividly remember when playing the game hearing my friend go on about how PewDiePie was railed for not finding this game scary after playing three others back to back (Man, if only we lived in a world where being him being a fascist was still not as controversial as his opinions on the “HAR HAR HAR HAR” game) but my experience was definitely in line with his. Five Nights at Freddy’s 4 is notable to me for being the first truly narrative focused Five Nights at Freddy’s game and where the series started to step away from its horror roots (Well, I say roots, but this game came out 10 months after the first).

For those who are reading this review as a part of my Five Nights at Freddy’s mini review series I just so happened to find myself in and do not know much about me, I am a very rhythm centric person and this game is very much designed around having good hearing. The gameplay loop consists of a child in his bedroom, reliving a never ending nightmare stemming from this said putting his Brother in the mouth of an animatronic which would proceed to bite off his frontal lobe. Given that premise and the fact you’re in a bedroom, there isn’t much to defend yourself. In fact, the game is very minimalist in both its gameplay and presentation. You have two doors to each side of you, a walk-in closet in the middle of your bedroom, and your bed behind you. There isn’t a camera system to watch out for the animatronics but instead you rely entirely on your ability to the animatronics breathing behind each bedroom door, as well as rustling in your closet and on your bedspread. It is kind of genius in its approach. However there’s one problem that I have with tasks you are required to complete…

It is piss easy.

There isn’t a good way of putting, nights one to five are genuinely the easiest in the entire franchise and the new animatronics don’t do the game any favors given they look like Coldsteel The Hedgehog inspired animatronics. The only animatronic that looks even remotely terrifying in the new design is Foxy which is without a doubt my favorite incarnation of Foxy, no questions asked. The latter half of night five offers easily the greatest blatant switch in this entire franchise that I will not discuss in depth as I truly want whoever is reading my review to play and experience it for themselves. Though, the two new animatronics did keep me on my toes, although I’ll say that Nightmare Fredbear did so in a way that was entertaining while Nightmare Lucifer just kind of kept ending runs at 4:00 AM because he’s a dick. There is also a rhythm mini game that lets you skip from 12:00 AM to 2:00 AM (Yes, I have gone this entire retrospective without mentioning the mini games and no, I am not sorry because I feel as if the Atari styled minigames ran their course before the third game ever came out).

I’m definitely being a bit negative towards the game, but to be fair, this game followed up what is in my opinion the greatest entry in the franchise. The story of the kid who shoved his Brother in the mouth of the animatronic didn’t solve anything (Especially when you learn that you didn’t even see The Bite of 87) and the locked box just felt it was there to have data miners dig through the game to solve whatever ARG was going to tease the next mainline entry. Ultimately Five Nights at Freddy’s 4 just feels like a filler game. I don’t have much to say about it and the fact I replayed the entire game minus its night seven just to form the opinion that I have no strong opinions is the biggest shortcoming of this entry. Also, dream theory is stupid, fuck you Scott for even attempting to make that canon.

Rating: C/B-
Genre(s): Point and click adventure, survival horror