Scary Game (Spectator's POV) Review with James Paradie: Five Nights at Freddy's 3

Are you ready for Freddy? 

If you have no idea what Five Nights At Freddy's, check out my previous reviews: 

FNAF 1

FNAF 2

Ladies and gentlemen! Boys and girls! Welcome to Scared Sheetless' Five Nights at Freddy's 3 review! Today's spectacle will include a look at the third installment of the highly popular indie horror game franchise, Five Nights at Freddy's. Sit down at your security post, watch and listen real carefully. If you don't, prepare to be scared and perhaps stuffed in a Freddy Fazbear suit! Muhahahaahahaha! 

Thirty years after Freddy Fazbear's Pizza closed its doors, the events that took place there have become nothing more than a rumor and a childhood memory, but the owners of "Fazbear's Fright: The Horror Attraction" are determined to revive the legend and make the experience as authentic as possible for patrons, going to great lengths to find anything that might have survived decades of neglect and ruin.

At first there were only empty shells, a hand, a hook, an old paper-plate doll, but then a remarkable discovery was made...

The attraction now has one animatronic.

- Summary from Five Nights at Freddy's Wiki

The Good: 

• I liked how Scott Cawthon, the creator of FNAF, basically took some aspects that worked from the first game and interjecting it into the third game. You're back in a relatively small room (though not as small as the first game), because that claustrophobic feeling is, to me, more scarier than wide open spaces as we saw in FNAF 2 (even though I liked that change too as stated in my review for FNAF 2). He also brought back things that worked in FNAF 2 being the vent system and no steel shutter doors being a cheap way to keep the killer animatronics out. 

• I'm also very relieved that he got rid of the annoying jack in the box from FNAF 2, but in its place is you have to pay attention to three things - the cameras, audio, and ventilation - all three are prone to fail. If one, two, or all fails, you have to reboot them which takes a little while (or a long ass time if you're playing the game, I'm sure), but also makes it that you can't see what's coming and thus, can't stop them or see them coming. I was okay with this as I believe it made the experience a little more tense. 

• What's also cool is you can use an audio snippet of a child's voice (actually Balloon Boy's) to lure the lone animatronic to that location, thereby diverting it from going to your office. It doesn't always work, but when it does, it's a lifesaver ... literally. 

• I'm so glad the Atari style games have made a return, but this time with a slight twist. Every time you beat a night, you get to see more of Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria's demented and bloody past. However, it got old quick (see Middle Ground). But in a repentance for it's repetitiveness, there are secret mini-games that you can only access by doing certain things in the main campaign on certain nights. They could be as easy as clicking on a picture of Balloon Boy to access his secret mini-game, finding cupcakes throughout the security cameras, or by clicking on certain tiles in your office. I think that was really cool and if done right it unlocks the good ending. You don't have to do them, but you will get the bad ending. 

• I think the scares are better here than on the previous game. Scott did really good with the Phantom animatronics. Not sure if they were ghosts, I guess the word "phantom" would make one think of that connection. But imagine looking at the camera panel and going back and suddenly there's Balloon Boy* to scare you. My favorite had to be Phantom Freddy creeping in front of the picture window before ducking and jumping into your face. He did change it up, which was nice. Wish I could say the game for the rest (check Middle Ground). Good news about the Phantoms - they can't kill you, but they do cause system errors.
  
  *I originally wrote his name as Bubble Boy. Good thing I checked before publishing this or I'd have a lot of angry FNAF fans on my case! They're VERY passionate about getting the names right. 

• Some of the environments on the camera feed seemed like they slightly changed, which was pretty creepy. "Did I see that before?" And maybe I did, but I've watched the game twice now (2nd time strictly for this review) and I just keep on noticing different things.  

• What's funny is you only face one animatronic throughout the whole game. One would think this would be boring, but as the nights went on, Freddy upped his scares. It would be one thing if he just did the same stint over and over again. 

I was going to post Night 5 as my sample, but it gives away the ending. Night 4 is really good too. Check it out. 

Gameplay courtesy of Harshly Critical. 

Middle Ground: 

• The one thing about the Phantoms is their scares can get repetitive and lose their scary muster. 

• Atari style mini-games - As said before, I'm very glad they made a comeback. They were pretty much one of my main highlights from the second game. BUT they got too repetitive in this game. Basically you followed Purple Guy and once you got to a certain room he would kill you. Same thing over and over again with the only difference being a new animatronic. I think if they mixed up the way he killed certain people, it would've been better. Repetitiveness always get's a negative score by me (see my review of Alice: Madness Returns for an example.)
  
  In Scott's defense, I think he wanted it that way for a reason to show what happened and if you did certain things, you could open up hidden mini-games, so that's why this is Middle Ground. 

Final Verdict: 

I really think this was a step up from FNAF 2. The Phantoms put you on edge, the system failing added an extra bit of fright, no goddamn jack in the box, and all in all I really enjoyed watching it. We got to delve deeper into the horrid past of Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria and if you got the good ending, you set things right, and that's always a good thing, I think. 

Were there some things that we could've went without or changed? That's a matter of opinion. Sure, the Atari style mini games, at the end of each level, got repetitive and didn't add any new surprises to them, but at the end it all made sense and that spoiler is ...

Purple Guy is kind of a dick. 

Want to give Five Nights at Freddy's 3 a try? Click here. 

There is no wonder why there are so many FNAF's fans out there. The mega fans were definitely sad and even a lesser fan, such as myself, was a little sad when we thought this was the last one. 

Oh, how foolish we were to think that. (Review coming soon!) 

All images in this review were found using Google. They belong to their respective owners and are only used as a visual reference.