Good ol' Scott CawthonÂisn’t ready to hang uptheÂFive Nights at Freddy’s– or better known asÂFNAF– series anytime soon. According to a recent leak by the ESRB, the indie developer is ironing out plans to launch a horror-puzzle game for PSVR titledFive Nights at Freddy’s VR: Help Wanted, filled to the brim with the series' signature animatronics and incoherent plot.News began circulating on the dedicatedÂFNAFÂSubreddit, with users asking if the freshly-minted ESRB rating was a mistake or something being leaked out:
Unsure if this has been posted before, but FNAF VR Esrb pagefromr/fivenightsatfreddys
(Side note: for all you non-Americans out there, the Entertainment Software Rating Board or ESRB is a self-regulatory panel that assigns age and content ratings to new games as a service for parents).
If you are like us and rushed to the ESRB website, you would be out of luck – the rating has been pulled entirely, seemingly confirming that the listing is likely real and was mistakenly pushed. Regardless, many people were able to capture screenshots of the listing which flesh-out the information a bit more:
The listing states:
Five Nights at Freddy’s VR: Help Wanted
Platform: PlayStation 4
Rated T: Fantasy Violence
“This is a VR puzzle/horror game in which players assume the role of a repair person tasked with monitoring/repairing animatronic characters at a pizzeria. From a first-person perspective, players explore dark hallways, complete puzzles, and attempt to avoid menacing, malfunctioning animatronic figures. The game contains frequent screams and jump scares, with the words âYou Are Deadâ appearing on screen after players are attacked.”
So let’s deconstruct this a little bit. First off, this listing is an immediate boon to PS4 owners out there – in late 2018 Cawthon announced that the gamewould be receiving a console port of the original games that was already 20% done. And while there was chatter of a VR game in the works, it was never explicitly stated that the game would be coming to PSVR.
Meanwhile the description is more-or-less what we had heard from Cawthon before on the subject of the VR project. Originally, he stated that the development was being done with developer Steel Wool Studios (Bounce, Mars Odyssey) to create a game focused on “repairing” animatronics up-close-and-personal. The description ofÂFive Nights at Freddy’s VR: Help WantedÂsounds like exactly that. Even better, we can expect to see a full stage-performance from the nightmare beast that is Freddy Fasbear.
At the moment, we don’t have any idea whenÂFive Nights at Freddy’s VR: Help WantedÂwill be released – in November 2018 it was 40% done, and the registering of an ESRB rating may be an indication that a formal reveal is coming sooner rather than later. And even still, it wouldn’t be the developer’s strangest launch (something Cawthonhas become infamous for). Nonetheless, allFNAFfans and PSVR owners will likely relish the opportunity to break out the headset and head into a new pizzeria.