Hi I guess I’m writing this now, lol. This randomly popped into my head one night and while it’s probably not the best idea, especially considering the kind of attention it’ll get me, I want to make it regardless. 

Even though I am not a part of this community and my interest in it doesn’t really exist outside of the fact that my art style originated from it, I wanted to make this post because I’ve had these thoughts in the back of my head for a while and I’ve wanted to air them out.

I would like to state beforehand, parts of this are definitely fueled by spite. You are free to take said parts with a massive grain of salt, hell if you disagree with anything I say in this, that’s totally fine. This is my opinion at the end of the day, and my opinion should not be treated like it dwarfs anyone else’s.

With all of that out of the way, let’s begin.

First off, I’ve noticed recently that there’s this shift towards 3D in the community. It’s not everywhere of course, there’s still plenty of people doing the traditional photoshop style of approach but, there is undoubtedly a shift. Hell, FNAW’s own creator has been doing that with his recent game, Waluigi Machines.

I do not think that FNAW should be treated like it has a rulebook, hell I don’t think any creative media should. With that said, this feels like such a fundamental misunderstanding of what FNAW even is. One of the core defining features of FNAW is the fact that it has a photomesh art style. It doesn’t really matter if some people don’t like that art style, you’re free to have your own thoughts and all of that, but the photoshop style is what FNAW is, it’s what it’s always been.

Of course styles evolve and what not, but this doesn’t feel like an evolution. This feels like switching to another style entirely when you didn’t like the first. I’m sure that the people doing this believe that there are more possibilities with doing stuff in 3D, but at the same time, you lose more than it’s worth.

Sure, you can accomplish more, you can do things that you couldn’t before, but the price to pay ultimately is a loss of identity. In almost every 3D project I’ve seen based on FNAW, there is no attempt to reimplement its charms and style into the graphics. Quite frankly, it looks like a beginner 3D project with stock assets slapped around and there happen to be Mario characters there.

I know that sounds ironic because that’s also what FNAW is, Mario characters slapped into stock PNG rooms but ultimately, the change is very blatant. It feels like an attempt to just transform FNAW into every other FNAF game, which is such a terrible idea.

It’s not even that using 3D for FNAW games is a bad thing, there are absolutely ways that you can bring in the old style and make it mix with the new. You can combine both 3D and photoshop graphics, you can do a lot of things with it, but. There isn’t even an attempt at that, hell there doesn’t even feel like there’s consideration towards that fact. It feels like people seeing 3D, thinking that it’s an improvement, and completely forgetting why what they had before was just as workable.

The thing that really rubs me the wrong way about all of this is that, there doesn’t feel like there’s any attempt at pushing the boundaries of what you can do with photomeshing. It feels like people scratch the barest surface, get bored with it, and move on. It doesn’t feel like there’s any further innovation or thinking outside the box.

Even simple things like decorating the environment or bending the images you’ve made to fit with your game more, I don’t see them often enough. It feels like people are just doing the same thing that FNAW has done for years, and instead of trying to push further, they get tired of it, go to something new and better, and get trapped in the same loop.

You doing the same thing, putting Mario characters in a creepy environment but in 3D doesn’t change anything, it’s just a coat of paint on the same cement wall that’s been cracking for fucking years.

Again, 3D isn’t even inherently the problem, it’s the way it’s used. It almost doesn’t even matter what you make your stuff with, if you’re just going through a loop of being uncreative and not innovating, it’s probably just your own fault.

The other thing that makes me pay attention to this more is how creators who do try to innovate are treated like clowns as a result. One example that I go to time and time and time again, is EpicTagey.

EpicTagey is a creator in the sphere who makes what I would personally consider to be very unique games. They are very much rough around the edges and while a lot of them are either mediocre or just flat out bad, there is an unmistakable charm to them. And no, it doesn’t just come from the graphics but also the gameplay.

None of his games feel alike, they’re all different in their own special ways. And even though his games are often very flawed, what I like about them is that there was still an earnest attempt at making something good.

This does not by any means shield him from criticism, I personally have a lot of problems with some of his projects, especially in terms of story for a lot of them, but. I think he is a really good example of innovation in this community.

And what did he get for that? A knuckle sandwich. This drama is long dead and it doesn’t matter much anymore, but. I remember when he released the original final entry to his Cabin Fever series, everybody went down his fucking throat for it, he was treated like the clown of the community and people would just relentlessly shit on him.

To this day, it is still a wonder to me how people think that they stand on any ground to call someone silly and a failure when their own projects are almost identical to each other, it’s quite something. Again, Tagey is not immune to criticism, and I’m sure there was good feedback mixed in there, but from what I saw, a lot of it was negative.

It didn’t feel like it was negative for the sake of improving him, it felt negative for the sake of, “I want to be an asshole to someone and this is my person of the week to do it to.”

This continues even to this day, I won’t be going into specifics for obvious reasons, but I’ve seen it a ton.

Getting back on topic, the point I’m trying to make here is. Innovation does not feel wanted in this community. If you try to innovate and it’s not the right kind of innovation for people, then more likely than not, it won’t be accepted. It is so unbelievably sad to see a community surrounding a game series so creative and innovative be this bitter and hateful when people try to do something new.

There’s no nuance to conversations on bad games either, the game is either good or it’s bad, it doesn’t feel like there’s an inbetween, it feels so black and white. 

To this day, I have seen barely any innovation in any of the newest games. Even in really good games like Switched in Time 2, it feels like the same thing that FNAW games have been doing for years, playing it safe.

There’s barely any attempt at introducing elements of the Mario series in the games, it feels like developers are just intentionally kneecapping themselves. Even in the most high quality games like FNAW Deluxe, there isn’t an attempt at moving forward.

It feels chained to the past, a past that, while interesting, was still very flawed. This part is very personal but. The FNAW series being set in some realistic version of the Mario timeline where everything’s serious and everything unnatural has to have some deep lore reason, it felt like it was chaining a ball to their hip and diving into the ocean.

There’s so much that you can do with FNAW, with the Mario universe, with all of these amazing concepts if you just use them right. And it’s so baffling that when people like Tagey try to do it, there is resistance and it’s treated like a joke.

In general, I’ve noticed a resistance to criticism as well. For example, when I tried to give my thoughts on Deluxe a while back on a server, there was resistance from almost everyone around me and even one of the developers.

I was told things like “you can’t make door mechanics interesting” etc, and it just floored me. It’s such a restrictive way to view game development, where it needs to resemble the original bar for bar and if it doesn’t, then it’s a failure. There’s no balance of the old and new, I barely see it. Even in the rest of the FNAF community, people are struggling and they don’t innovate enough, it’s just this desire to always be connected to the source material even though you can do so much more.

FNAW is not dead, not yet. Andy is still making games, hell he just announced Waluigi Machines, and there are still people making games, even if that number feels drastically low. The problem isn’t inactivity, the problem is the lack of motivation to change and push things forward.

If FNAW should get another renaissance or an era where people can appreciate it again, then something has to give. There needs to be some heavy hitting, creative games that push the boundaries established before.

There needs to be more attention put into the big names in this community, that way if it’s really good, more people will notice and check out the community. Until changes like that happen, I feel like we’re going to reach a point where almost everyone has left and it’s just a husk. I don’t want that to happen, but it very easily could, very soon as a matter of fact if no action is taken.

Again, a lot of this is just my opinion and there is a lot more to this conversation than what I’m saying here. At the same time though, I feel that most of what I’ve stated here is right.

Overall, that’s what I think about all this. I love FNAW at the end of the day, I would not be half of who I am now without it. That probably sounds embarrassing to some extent, but it’s the truth, lol.

And it’s why I’m so passionate about this. I’m hoping that when a lot of the bad apples in this community move on, that creative people can pick up and make FNAW into something truly unique again. My faith in that has been kinda waning as of late, but it’s still there.

Hell, maybe someday I’ll finish off where I started and make an actual good FNAW game instead of my past failures. Either way, that’s all.

I would love to hear your thoughts below but aside from that, thanks for reading my long, boring rant on a niche subject that I care a bit too much about.

Cya