Franchise · Tertiary · since 2014
Five Nights at Freddy’s
A horror game made of security cameras and a battery meter, built by one person in a few months. The five mechanics the whole thing runs on, who is coming down which hall, and the games in order.
Uh, hello? Hello, hello?
Phone Guy, night one
A horror game made of security cameras and a battery meter, built by one person in a few months, and it reset what a horror game needed to be. You cannot move, you cannot fight, and you cannot even look at two places at once. Every single thing you do costs power, and the power is the clock.
That constraint is the whole design. Checking a camera costs you. Closing a door costs you more. So the game is really a resource-management puzzle wearing a jump-scare costume, and the reason it works is that you always know exactly how you died, and it was always something you chose.
Click a camera, or use the arrow keys. Each switch costs power; they move while you are not looking.
Power left
Night 4
The whole game
Two doors, two lights, eleven cameras and one battery, and every one of those costs power. The horror is a spreadsheet you are losing.