Five Nights at Freddy’s has gained a massive cult following, showing once again that games don’t need to be produced by massive AAA studios with million-dollar budgets to be interesting. But is FNAF OK for kids to play?
FNAF is billed as a horror game and is creepy with jumpscares, meaning it is unsuitable for young children. If your child is able to watch horror films without much trouble and is at least 12-years old, then it is fine for them to play it.
Let’s look at this game in detail, what it is like, whether it’s suitable for children, and also consider which FNAF is the scariest game. So let’s look at this game series that started off back in 2014.
Is FNAF Kid Friendly?
FNAF stands for Five Nights at Freddy’s. It is a horror game which is supposed to scare you, so it is not particularly kid friendly.
It is an online horror game that sees you take the role of a nighttime security guard at the famous restaurant Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza.
Originally a point-and-click survival horror, the goal for the player is to survive five nights as a security guard without getting caught by the mascots.
You will have to face scary creatures like Freddy Fazbear, Bonnie Bunny, Chica the Chicken, Foxy The Pirate and Golden Freddy.
There isn’t much graphical violence or gore, as once the mascots catch you the game is over and sends you back to the menu. The game is more psychologically scary than anything, as it makes you fear for an impending jumpscare. This is why many people wonder if FNAF is for kids.
The suspense and gradual buildup as you frantically switch between the different views is more of a mental scare, rather than being confronting with torture or inappropriate visuals.
Your main task is to track the movements of the creatures via the restaurant’s security cameras. However, you have a very limited amount of electricity that you’re allowed to use per night to operate the security doors and lighting.
Once you run out of power for the night, you can no longer operate the doors or lights. The camera feeds, hallway lights, and doors all operate via electricity, so you have to make sure you have enough.
What Age Group Is FNAF For?
As the game involves jumpscares and horror elements, it is not suitable for very young children. At a minimum, if a child is relatively emotionally mature and not frightened by dolls or mascots, then they will be fine to play the game.
Generally, the game is likely too scary for someone under 10 or 12-years old.
Keep in mind that ingame audio sometimes discusses child abuse, murder and predators, so if you think this is inappropriate for your child, don’t let them play the game.
Violence is only really depicted in low quality cartoon graphics, especially the original game, so visually it is not so confronting that any child over 8-years old couldn’t deal with.
Given the many videos on sites like YouTube of people playing through the game, if you’re unsure as to whether the game would be appropriate, you can watch a playthrough and see how the content matches up to what kind of games you want your child to play.
Is FNAF Scary?
The game has gained a cult following due to it being creepy, and the use of jumpscares does make it scary. The animatronic will also let out a shriek when they get into the security room and you lose.
You don’t have very good cameras to keep an eye on the mascots, and their picture is very grainy while also using power quickly. There are also no cameras in the hallways immediately outside the office, and they must be checked with lights.
The kitchen camera only provides an audio feed.
The general atmosphere of the game is creepy, with phone messages that play each night telling you why the mascots kill, and the inability to look at multiple cameras at once to keep an eye on the whole restaurant.
As you survive each night, the game will also become harder, making the experience more intense.
Golden Freddy is another animatronic that doesn’t attack like the others. However, his presence alone makes everything go haywire that until then you were depending on: the security doors and lights stop working, meaning any nearby mascots can get in immediately.
FNAF also scares you via the slow reveal of why the animatronics roam the hallways: they contain the remains of murdered children that an ex-employee stuffed in there to hide the evidence. The buildup of this story is another scary factor that plays on your mind.
What Is the Scariest FNAF?
One of the more recent titles is held to be the scariest, Five Nights at Freddy’s: Help Wanted. This is the first one to officially launch in Virtual Reality form, making the immersion even greater than can be achieved via the originals.
The VR field of view is very limited and the detail on the animatronics is very high.
An honorable mention would be the Five Nights at Freddy’s 4, which puts you in the shoes of a child in their dark room, having to check both the beds, two doors and closets for incoming threats. You can also hear the breathing of the animals.
The animatronic animals also appear very terrifying for kids in this version, making the jumpscares all the more scary.
