Five Nights at Freddy's Roblox game debuts by accident because series' creator 'approved a skin'—devs say it was a beta, then nuke its Discord over unholy NSFW content | PC Gamer

An image of Freddy Fazbear from the as-yet-unreleased FNAF Roblox Game t-posing in front of a security camera with a threatening aura. — (Image credit: @PlainTrace on Twitter/X / Metaverse Team Frights)

Five Nights at Freddy's, a cultural gaming giant big enough to have its own movie (that was apparently Just Okay, according to critics) has come to Roblox—wait, hold on a second, it's gone. Now it's in beta? Oh, but the beta's been "taken down for a few weeks." Err.

The whole thing was a comic misunderstanding according to the series' creator Scott Cawthon (thanks, IGN) who is otherwise retired after significant donations to right-wing parties brought him under fire from LGBTQ+ members of his fanbase. In a response on the game's subreddit, Cawthon writes:

Cawthon maintains that the game was in its "infancy" and never supposed to come out in the first place: "apparently there was a huge misunderstanding when I approved a skin, and it was interpreted as RELEASE THE GAME." Which is an interesting snafu, since you'd think the people making the game would have the most knowledge on whether it was releasable or not. They could've checked. This game release could've been an email.

Best I can tell from the footage of this thing, Five Nights at Freddy's: Survival Crew appears to have been a Dead by Daylight-style multiplayer game where Roblox characters try to avoid the Fazbear himself. Only, it's severely under-polished—here's a good example, courtesy of Twitter user and FNAF YouTuber PlainTrace.

new fnaf roblox game goes hard pic.twitter.com/igBBkY0I4IDecember 20, 2023

Despite this, the game's developers put a big BETA stamp on it, and appear to be treating the whole thing as a test. The game itself is being developed by Metaverse Team Frights. There's a Discord server, but you can't chat in it—because, as players observed, it devolved into complete NSFW anarchy. I've have a couple of examples here courtesy of Calad.

The second image here includes straight-up pornography and erotica, so I've taken the liberty of censoring it with some black bars and my Baldur's Gate 3 character.

A post that reads: "Discord update for y&rsquo;all. The server is in meltdown mode." With a very saucy, family un-friendly event. — (Image credit: @caladtheman on Twitter/X.)

A post that reads: "AND I MEAN. MELTDOWN MODE." With some choice censorship on my part over some straight-up pornography and erotic fiction. — (Image credit: @caladtheman on Twitter/X.)

With the caution of someone stepping onto a minefield, I decided to poke my head in to see if the anarchy was still ongoing, and was met with this: first, an insistence that the game was a beta rather than an accidental release, in direct contradiction to Cawthon's words. Second, an announcement that the game would be disabled "until [it] comes back for beta."

Messages that read: "@everyone Thank you all for your feedback &amp; for playing the game - we really value the feedback from the community! We&rsquo;ll be taking it down for a few weeks to plan for our next beta test, and come back better for round two. All purchased items will be available at that time again. More to come soon!" And: "Chat is disabled in the server until the game comes back for beta. Thank you to everyone for your interest in the game." — (Image credit: FNAF: Survival Crew Discord server.)

Every single channel has been scrubbed clean. There's even an initial announcement from December 18 that still shows two "#Unknown" channel links. I feel like I've just sleepwalked into a hidden government base somewhere and found a bunch of files blotted out with black REDACTED ink. How the Five Nights at Freddy's: Survival Crew situation develops from here will be interesting to say the least, if this cursed object even comes out at all.

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Harvey's history with games started when he first begged his parents for a World of Warcraft subscription aged 12, though he's since been cursed with Final Fantasy 14-brain and a huge crush on G'raha Tia. He made his start as a freelancer, writing for websites like Techradar, The Escapist, Dicebreaker, The Gamer, Into the Spine—and of course, PC Gamer. He'll sink his teeth into anything that looks interesting, though he has a soft spot for RPGs, soulslikes, roguelikes, deckbuilders, MMOs, and weird indie titles. He also plays a shelf load of TTRPGs in his offline time. Don't ask him what his favourite system is, he has too many.