Five Nights at Freddy's (universe)

The ***Five Nights at Freddy's*** universe refers to the *Smash Bros.* series’ collection of characters, stages, and properties that hail from the series of point-and-click, virtual reality, augmented reality, and free-roam games of the horror genre developed by Scott Cawthon, alongside Steel Wool Studios and Illumix. In the original games, the player must defend themselves against a variety of hostile animatronic mascots by using a number of methods, such as closing the doors in the animatronic's path, flashing the animatronic in the eyes with a flashlight, or even shocking the animatronic with a taser.

## Franchise Description

The history of the Five Nights at Freddy's franchise is deeply intertwined with its creator Scott Cawthon. Before the creation of *Five Nights at Freddy's*, Scott was originally known for creating otherwise family-friendly games, such as *Sit N' Survive*, *The Desolate Hope*, and most notably, *Chipper and Sons Lumber Co*., as well as religious-themed animations, such as *The Pilgrim's Progress* and *The Jesus Kids' Club*, with the former eventually getting a video game adaptation. One such game, that being *Chipper and Sons Lumber Co*., would received backlash from people, complaining that the animation and characters in the game looked like "animatronic dolls". This sent Scott into a deep depression. However, as he was ready to quit video game development, Scott realized he could take advantage of this and make it into a game, and thus *Five Nights at Freddy's* was born, released on August 8, 2014. After the success of the first game, Scott would then create a sequel 3 months after the first game, appropriately titled *Five Nights at Freddy's 2*, released on November 12, 2014.

The series became dormant after *Five Nights at Freddy's 2*. It isn't until March 2, 2015, that Scott released *Five Nights at Freddy's 3*. Scott had originally intended the third game to be the final of the series since Scott initially planned the series to only be a trilogy. However, due to the negative reception the third game received, Scott decided to make the third sequel 2 months after the third game's release, titled *Five Nights at Freddy's 4*. The fourth game received mixed reception, with some praising the game for the intense environment, darker and emotional storyline, and frightening jumpscares, while others criticized the same factor, stating the new mechanic were "an easy, dull, obvious trick", and noted being confused on what to do several times.

The series would once again become dormant for a couple of months, when Scott uploaded a series of different versions of the of 'Thank you!' picture, depicting the animatronics in the image into the characters of *FNaF World*, the title of the series' first ever spin-off. Scott would also upload 3 cryptic images with a blue box and texts overlapping the teaser image, all related to the recent game at the time, *Five Nights at Freddy's 4*. By January 21, 2016, *FNaF World* was released. When the game was first released, the game received very negative reviews. This was believed that the game was entirely rushed, due to the 3D overworld was changed into the 2D overworld, the sudden change when into battle, and the battle system. After receiving the reviews, Scott would then take the game off of Steam and re-release it on Gamejolt on February 8 of the same year. On Gamejolt, the game receive a total of 5 stars with around 4,000 followers and 2,500 ratings. It became one of the first best "games tagged in *FNaF*" for very long, although its placing is often switched with fan games. Characters from the game such as Old Man Consequences, Lolbit, Dee Dee, etc. would make another appearance in future titles.

On April 2016, Scott uploaded an image of the title and the animatronic, Circus Baby, on Scott's site; several more teasers would eventually follow. A later trailer revealed the release date of October 7, 2016. As part of the ongoing hype, Scott developed several "hoaxes" that kept conversations going. The first "hoax" was dropped in August on his site, suggesting the game had been cancelled due to leaks. However, fans soon discovered that the cancellation image, once brightened, revealed a news article detailing the closure of the in-game location due to gas leaks. The second "hoax" was much closer to the release date, in which Scott suggested he would have to work on the game for longer than anticipated due to its darker storyline, which would not be appropriate for younger players. Three days later, just as initially promised, the game released.

On an unknown date, both of Scott's known websites were turned to black for several months. Scott announced that he had stopped working on the game and began focusing on a new one. This was widely assumed to be a ruse, until Scott submitted a Reddit post that stated otherwise. A teaser image was added to fnafworld.com. Between August and November, there were three teasers of Freddy with a cake, Freddy close to three children, and Freddy juggling pizzas. This was speculated to be a pizzeria tycoon game, which was hinted back in June. The title of the game was confirmed via a teaser on scottgames.com. The game was released two days later.

### Freddy

Freddy serves as the basis of the Freddy Mask and Outfit DLC Mii Costume for the Mii Brawler.