Five Nights at Freddy’s: Into the Pit Review – Three Cheers For Pizza

There is little in the world that brings joy to children. Whether it is food, cartoons, or a precious character. So, what happens when these comfort items turn what should be a happy occasion to a horror filled nightmare? That’s what we’re going to find out in this iconic installment of the Five Nights at Freddy’s series.

Kids Love it Here

The story of Five Nights at Freddy’s: Into the Pit Review – Three Cheers for Pizza opens on Oz and his father driving to Jeff’s, a local pizza joint. Oz is sick of spending his summer Vaction eating cheap pizza, and watching the stains on the walls at Jeff’s.

One day as a prank, Oz decides to hide in the ball pit in the back of Jeffs. He finds himself transported to the magical land known as the 1980’s. It isn’t long before things go awry and a golden bunny animatronic chases after Oz. Thinking he can escape by returning to the ball pit, he runs. However his dad is kidnapped and replaced by the bunny. Oz must now save his dad before the golden bunny hurts everyone he loves.

An Adaptation through Time

Into The Pit will be familiar to many Five Nights at Freddy’s fans. The story was originally in-the first Fazbear Frights anthology by the same name. While adapting a store from a book to a video game isn’t new, the original story spent much of its time having Oz go back and forth through the pit to hang out with. a few friends that he makes in the 80’s.

The game decides to have this original section of the story be entirely cut. Instead, it focuses on Oz’s search for his father. This decision has players moving back and forth in time to solve puzzles. This refocus of the story makes the plot feel more cohesive as Oz searches for his dad. It also lends itself better to the pure horror roots of the gameplay. As players will need to run and hide to evade capture from the four animatronics.

Run If You Can

Gameplay focuses on evading capture primarily from Golden Bonnie, also known as springtrap to the fans. This means that there is no combat and getting caught means instant death. Much like other stalker games players can hide, which then has a mini game to stay hidden. These range from holding your breath to swatting away spiders. These help break up chase scenes which can be frequent.

The main issue is that the two main areas, The Pizzaria and Oz’s house, are both small, composed of about seven rooms each. So, players will be constantly running into and from the animatronics, due to the space constraints, which can become slightly annoying at times, mostly due to the fact that players can easily be chased into a corner and die.

I think in my session with the game I trapped myself at least twice. Especially when I was running for the next solution to a puzzle. Eventually, running from the mettalic horrors became routine. especially when using the sound distractions provided to the player.

A Puzzle a Day Keeps the Animatronics at Bay

The puzzles in the game are very straightforward. I was never stumped about what to do next. In fact Multiple times I was ahead of the game in term of solutions. The only part that might frustrate players is that items can only be used at specific points, which can feel very obtuse, especially for a specific puzzle.

This is added to the fact that Oz needs to be near an object to even see that it can be interacted with, leading to this awkward stumbling just so you can look for a specific point to use the item that the puzzle demands for its solution.

Should I Go Back?

Into the Pit does have an interesting way to get players to come back to the game for another round. In total, players can achieve five endings with thr first ending, called the Hobo ending, achievable in the first half hour of the game. The rest of the ending each have a trophy tied to them and players can expect each playthough to take around 2 to 3 hours.

However, much like other survival horror games little changes between each playthrough instead players will need to rely on speed running to pull any sort of reason to go back once they have achieved all 5 endings. Trophies themselves are instead revolve around certain actions a number of times with the hardest trophy being to not get caught in a single playthrough. Overall, an easy if somewhat time consuming platinum.

Dawn of the Final Night

Five Nights at Freddy’s: Into the Pit is a surprising game that while staying true to the Five Nights at Freddy’s lore, it still manages to carve its own identity. However, it is far from perfect but it’s these slight imperfections that players will see challenge from.

This game not only deserves to be apart of the franchis but also manages to be a game worthy to stand by itself. So, even those of us who aren’t Fazbear-pilled can still enjoy this game.