FNAF: In Real Time Isn't Very Good (Analysis / Rant)

The title is a bit of an understatement, really. It kind of blows.

This may seem like a strangely-timed post, given that the game came out, what, over a year ago now? Well, I'm the kind of person that likes to play a game that I'm interested in before watching other people play it, which is probably not uncommon. Anyways, I was going to play this game around its release, but then I forgot it existed completely and never got around to it. When watching Markiplier's recent FNAF streams where he booted it up, I was like, "Oh yeah! That game exists! I want to play it before watching this". So I did, and it sucked.

There's obviously a lot of hard work put into the project. The animations are pretty cool most of the time, the audio is great most of the time, and there's a general aesthetic competency and polish to the game that sometimes is lacking in fangames. Some of it comes from it being directly pulled from FNAF 1's style, but whatever.

That's looking at the game. Actually playing it stinks.

All of the parts that are lifted directly from FNAF 1 are just as good as they are in that game, but pretty much any and all changes deviating from that blueprint are just bad. I'm going to do this in a list style that's got no real order to it, and a lot of these reasons are going to be ones that you've likely already seen. It's just the nature of critiquing something like this.

1. What stood out to me initially was how useless the "Minimap" was, in the sense that it didn't provide any sort of benefit to the gameplay. It felt like it was just there to waste your time. The actual "gameplay" of avoiding animatronics wasn't scary, or challenging, it was just annoying, and when that's gone after unlocking Night 5, it literally serves zero purpose aside from wasting time in between night attempts, which gets VERY annoying when you're doing the harder nights. especially combined with the long Game Over screen. I would have much preferred just the "Fazbear Employment Console" or whatever it was called, being expanded upon and completely removing the "Minimap" altogether.
2. This one's very much a nitpick and personal opinion, but I really, really don't like the "night preview" images. They feel extremely incongruent with any other art style in the game, and the art style that they do have is really off-putting for me. It looks like those bad fake 2D Minecraft mobile ads or something. It's hard to explain.
3. On the topic of personal opinions, while the "crazy jumpscares" are funny and somewhat interesting, they completely break any kind of tension that a jumpscare could have. Chica spinning wildly to slap your balls over and over, again, while funny, just feels out of place.
4. Guess it's a good time to talk about the tone of the game too, which is all over the place. It feels like it's taking itself way too seriously in some aspects and not seriously at all in others, and the kind of whiplash that you get from it is insane and also absolutely annihilates any tension. Potentially going straight from the super-intense intro to a stupid joke on the main menu screen, to an intense first night, to a dumb jumpscare, to another intense night, to "Holy Fazballs", to another intense night, to a challenge night where the phone call is a complete meta joke just makes you wonder what you're actually supposed to be feeling at any given moment, and it surely isn't supposed to be confusion. I feel like they had the perfect blueprint right in front of them for blending humor and fear in the first FNAF game. FNAF 1 had funny little easter eggs like the nose honk and "Don't poop on floor", all while not destroying the tone. The phone calls are also humorous in many aspects, while not detracting from the fear. In fact, the little bits of levity the phone calls provide BUILD on the tone by being taken away as the game progresses. Instead of following the blueprint, they decided they knew better when they clearly didn't. That actually seemed to happen a whole lot in the game, but we can get more into that later.
5. Might as well get it out of the way: Brother sucks. Brother sucks so insanely hard. Everyone's said it, but it's not exactly something I can skip. I won't get into any of the weird stuff the creator has said about the character, just because it's really not relevant, but it certainly doesn't help its case. Everything about it sucks. The design is stupid, the voice is stupid, its role in the game is stupid, the paper plate is REALLY stupid, even the minigame that it appears in is stupid. It is a quintessential example of what NOT to do when inserting a character into an already-existing universe. It replaces the role of an already-existing character, essentially edging Golden Freddy(and the Puppet) out of the plot. It's secretly more important than ANY other character, while also having zero impact in the actual gameplay as well as extremely little screen time. It's so painfully edgy that there's no possible way to take it seriously. It has no legacy, no interest, and no soul behind it. I don't see any possible path forward for this character that doesn't involve a complete overhaul, including design-wise because dear God it looks dumb.
6. The game's still buggy. I know that it's a free fangame, so I'm not expecting extensive patches or anything to fix it all (even official FNAF games don't get those, right, Security Breach?), but there are some major issues that seriously impact gameplay. Characters teleport oddly, making it hard to track them, there's weird hitboxes in the minimap and minigame sections, the animatronics in those sections can also get stuck, and I'm fairly certain that some of the characters clip into each other if they stack on the cameras, but I'm not 100% certain of that one. The biggest issue is the teleporting, though, as it makes the game much harder than it's supposed to be.
7. The fact that you have to beat both "20/20/20/20 mode"-which is extremely difficult-as well as one of the worst designed "challenge nights" that I've ever seen, just to finish the actual game, stinks. It's a really nonsensical design choice, and not something that I've ever seen before in a FNAF fangame. I'm well aware there have been cutscenes and lore hints and other bonuses hidden behind very difficult challenges in actual FNAF games, but to lock the actual conclusion of your game behind one of the most unfun nights possible makes zero sense to me.
8. That terrible night is, of course, "Power Surge". I have no clue how somebody thought this was a good idea. Taking away the cameras from FNAF 1 is like taking away the flashlight in FNAF 2. Sooner or later, Foxy's going to jump you. I can understand, in some aspects, how to control Freddy without cameras, given that he laughs when he moves. I figure that if you count the laughs, you can know where he is and when he's actively attacking to at least some extent. But as far as I'm aware, Foxy doesn't make footstep noises unless you're watching the cameras, or if he does then it's not within a reactable amount of time, especially given that he can come down either hallway. This results in the night being pure blind luck as you swing from side to side, closing your doors randomly, hoping to stop Freddy and Foxy while also not running out of power. Maybe I'm wrong, and maybe there is a way to accurately block both of them every single time without using the cameras. But even if there is, it would require so much trial and error just to figure it out that any and all fun that could have been had in the night is drained. If you look at the challenges in "A Bite At Freddy's" (which are actually very fun), you can see what they were going for, and how short they fell.
9. I saw a lot of people commenting on how cool the Foxy boss fight on Night 3 was. In some aspects, I agree. I really like boss fights in FNAF games, like those in Frickbear's 3 and Saturday At Freddy's. It's great when it feels like you're facing a huge, singular threat that you're barely able to stave off, even if there are multiple animatronics active. The foxy night kind of has that same feel, but it is strangely lacking in a lot of areas. I think the music adds to the experience, and the animations certainly add to the experience, being absolutely insane and panic-inducing, but once you figure out how scripted the whole night is it loses a lot of its luster. Another thing that detracts from it is its placement in the game. Having it happen on Night 3 with a normal animatronic that goes right back to its normal form afterwards is just strange to me. Having any weird deviation like that for a single night in the middle of a FNAF game is strange to me, in fact. This should've been reworked into Night 5 or 7 or something, maybe using a new, different animatronic that we're not familiar with to add to the tension (hmm, I wonder who could've been used?), or even just made into a challenge. As is, it feels out of place.
10. I've read things about the main developer being terrible to work with and pushing the staff in unhealthy ways. Because I have no verification of these statements, I'm not going to cast judgement on them one way or another. I don't know if they're true, or not, so DON'T assume that they are because you read this. I felt like it was worth including in any case. If anyone has any clarification on anything involving this, please leave it in the comments.
11. I know it's Five Nights At Freddy's, and in-game storytelling has never been its strong suit. However, I don't know how I feel about at least half the story of the game being told completely outside of it. It makes experiencing the story just from playing the game feel disjointed. Once again-FNAF itself has this same issue sometimes (even though I'd argue it has it at least a little less). But it's worth noting anyways. The story itself is kinda weak, too, and the melodramatic delivery of it makes it difficult to take seriously. The story, and, to be frank, the entire game, feels like it's been infused with "Theatre Kid" energy, if you get what I'm saying. And that's not a good thing.
12. The "In Real Time" label is somewhat of a misnomer, considering that it kind of isn't. Making it a bunch of videos instead of a 3D environment leads to shortcomings in the realism, like not being able to see the animatronic move past the doors, or noticeable moments where there's a lack of animation. I know it's so much easier said than done-translating the original FNAF into a 3D space while still making it look like the original FNAF would be extraordinarily difficult. But I still feel like it's worth pointing out.

I'm sure there's more I could say if I racked my brain, but it's way too late and I've spent way too long on this as is. The thing is, the only reason that I felt the need to write something like this is because there is so much potential in this game. If it was just one of the 7 million random fangames that get posted to Gamejolt every day, I wouldn't care. But this game had hype; it had a whole team working on it; it had every Youtuber under the sun champing at the bit for it; it had amazing animations and visuals; and, most importantly, it was toted as both a faithful recreation of the first Five Nights at Freddy's game and a reimagining with all-new content, mechanics, and story, which is something that the community was desperately wanting. All of that just for it to turn out to be a big wet fart is just disappointing.

Looking at the next game currently being developed by Real Time Studio, I find it eerily similar to Subliminal, a game which, funnily enough, shares a lot of similarities with FNAF: In Real Time. Amazing-looking games with a ton of hype around them, whose stories and gameplay couldn't match the quality of the visuals, or even really get close. With that being said, the new game doesn't have to share the same fate. It's clear in the trailers that the game looks amazing-no doubt due to a lot of the same talented people who worked on In Real Time. I just hope that whoever is working on the gameplay and story of the game learned from their mistakes, and I wish them nothing but the best.

Well, if you've read this whole thing, then I'm shocked. But I would also like to hear what you have to say about the game. Am I totally off-base here? Or do I have a point? I dunno.

Tl:dr gam not fun