With the release of The Super Mario Bros. Movie in 2023 and a new season for Arcane: League of Legends on Netflix coming this year, it’s no secret that gamers ADORE watching their worlds come to life on-screen. Although game-to-movie adaptations have been a thing since 1993, I’m a relative newcomer to the genre.
For some, video games are more immersive than TV and movies. For others like myself, video games can disenchant you from the characters and storyline (if it exists) while you sweat bullets and clench your teeth for a hard-earned victory.
My boyfriend and his roommate can spout off just about any video game lore (defined as “body of knowledge” by Oxford) you can think of. As a storyteller and book lover, I hunger for their level of knowledge. Clicking my mouse between security cameras in the Five Nights at Freddy’s game while my boyfriend and his roommate belly laugh at my incompetency isn’t so enchanting, but it is a way to immerse myself in their world.
When I saw the FNAF movie, my appreciation for their hobby in gaming grew exponentially.
I hold this notion that every artist has some franchise over which he/she experiences creative jealousy. This is when some piece of art is so painfully creative that it cannot possibly be replicated ever again. This produces a sickening jealousy I like to call “creative jealousy.” FNAF does this for me as a writer.
Five Nights at Freddy’s (FNAF for short), written by literary genius Scott Cawthorn, seems at first like a frustrating PC game with too many iterations and creepy characters spawned from a nightmare. Upon investigation of in-game easter eggs, learning each animatronic’s name, and wondering how the protagonist got himself in such a dangerous situation in the first place, the unique story unfolds. A PC game attains literary levels of plot points.
You can find endless YouTube videos explaining FNAF lore, so I will spare you the entire scintillating story and keep it simple.
You, the player, are to survive your first night on the job watching surveillance cameras of a run-down pizza joint steeped in mysterious mishaps. The only controls involve your computer mouse. You can click through several security cameras’ live footage, you can assess your surveillance room, and you can shut the gates on either side of your surveillance room. The trouble is that your operations are powered by a single generator, which limits the amount of time you can close the gates.
As you click through the live feed, you will notice some of the animatronics disappearing from one room and reappearing in another. When your heart skips beats and you question your senses, gameplay becomes urgent. Your goal is to watch footage closely and time the gates correctly before an animatronic enters the surveillance room and ends the game… and YOU!
This is no shallow horror game, however – built for quick shocks and cheap thrills. The story behind the blood lusting animatronics involves malicious business practices, family affairs, and child kidnapping. For any of my readers who haven’t yet seen the movie, I wouldn’t want to spoil your joy of discovery. You’ll have to see for yourself how these evils connect to mildly unsettling animatronic suits at a pizzeria.
The FNAF movie functions in two ways: It answers questions for lore experts, and it is viewable as its own self-contained story. No matter your level of FNAF knowledge upon purchasing your movie ticket, it is sure to fascinate any audience with a knack for horror, thriller, and the supernatural.
Good storytelling is good storytelling, even when stuffed inside a spring-locked animatronic suit.
Leave a Reply