In December of 2021, Steel Wool Studios released one of the year’s most anticipated games. Unfortunately, the hype for this game caused an almost unattainable standard to set itself in stone. “Five Nights At Freddy’s: Security Breach” had a lot to accomplish in just one game. They were trying to live up to the fandom’s expectations and excitingly continuing the complicated story. It was no easy task, especially after the creator, Scott Cawthon, retired early from the franchise. Everyone expected the game would perfectly hit every point needed. Sadly, however, this game falls short. Very little of this game felt anywhere near satisfying. Nothing hit like it was intended, which was not helped by the early release date. So naturally, many fans wonder what went wrong with this game.
The most glaring issue in the game is just how unfinished it is. The game is full of bugs, glitches, and errors to the point where it is nearly unplayable. Not unplayable in the way that makes it impossible to play; no, it is unplayable because it is unfun. Whether it be the unnecessarily hard-to-navigate levels, or enemies spawning right on top of the player, several things take away from the game’s fun. For example, there are several times where a player could be carefully running through an area, making sure no enemies are anywhere near them until Chica randomly teleports right on top of the player. An utterly unfair event that causes rage in a player who should be feeling fear and having fun.
The “magically teleporting” enemies also don’t function quite right. They are unable to navigate around the smallest of obstacles. The game designers did not program the characters well enough, so they caused many bugs. In addition, the AI for animatronics seems to be half done and poorly implemented. Every slightest obstacle is unstoppable to these buggy animatronics. They are bumping, floating, and flying all over just because the programming didn’t allow such challenges to register. This issue can make escaping way too easy or extremely difficult, taking away all the fun for a player. These bugs extend to the security bots as well. The ability to sense the player varies hugely throughout the game. Sometimes a bot won’t see you at all, while other times, they see you from a place where they shouldn’t be able to. Navigation that was already way too difficult can now become impossible.
Soft locks are another way this broken game has little to no fun. Imagine players are trying to beat a section of the game; suddenly, they are being chased by one animatronic when you suddenly can’t get into one of the hiding spots. The problem may not go away after a respawn either if you respawn in a place where the enemy sees you no matter what. Whether someone is trapped in a scripted event or got there by pure chance, this is a highly frustrating experience a player could end up experiencing. The frustration grows more when one can’t tell that the game has soft locked. They could replay an image repeatedly, thinking they did something wrong only to reboot the game and find the situation 10 times more manageable. Punishing your player for doing nothing wrong is one way to take all the fun from a game.
The “Five Nights at Freddy’s” franchise is one of the indie horror games. So it may have come as a shock to many players when this game was not scary. But unfortunately, it relies too heavily on its jumpscares as the main scare factor. While the other games have intense suspense, just not knowing when an animatronic may appear. Unfortunately, this isn’t the case in the newest game. In most scenes, the only thing that could be considered “scary” is the ridiculous amount of security bots and bugs. However, there are a few scenes some think to be scary. The game part generally considered the most terrifying is the endo scene. The section has the same terror and suspense as the enemies slowly move closer to the player as they look away. The atmosphere is fantastic in this specific section; however, it lacks everywhere else. Sadly, the fun of fear present in previous games is gone in this entry.
Among all the issues, one of the most glaring is the characters. Most of the characters have specific personalities, which had seldom happened in previous games. Unfortunately, other than a few other animatronics, most characters have nothing too distinguishable. However, this concept wasn’t flawed; the development team didn’t implement it well. As a result, most personalities are underutilized, very few aspects get highlighted within gameplay. The only character the player gets to know well is Gregory, the player character. The issue here is the fact that Gregory is incredibly annoying. As a character written as a child, he sounds nothing like it. He speaks in weird ways that no child would ever even think. The fact that they decide to make Gregory violent and almost bloodthirsty. If they wanted the child character to talk to emphasize the fear of being lost and stuck in a mall overnight, they should have made Gregory afraid. Make him feel and express the fear the player is also supposed to experience. This solution would have made the game more fun, and the player character wouldn’t be so annoying.
The game has way too many problems to be an official release. However, these problems don’t mean there isn’t anything good about the game. The graphics and voice acting are excellent, and certain sections are fun. Unfortunately, the absurd amount of issues in the game make it almost devoid of fun and can ruin the entire experience. This game needs significant updates, and it feels like the game should almost be reworked from the ground up. This game was a massive disappointment in a majorly successful series. All we can do is hope that the next game will be better.