*The content of this post may contain some creepy/uncanny images or sounds.*
*The topic has been approved by Professor Zinman through email.*

I can confidently say that this image of a bear below will trigger your childhood memory, somewhere in the back of your head.

This is Freddy, from the horror game Five Nights At Freddy’s(or FNAF for short). He is an animatronic robot at a pizza restaurant called Freddy Fazbear’s Pizza, and he resembles a bear. In the game, there are three other animatronics each taking the shape of a rabbit, chicken, and fox. All four of them are possessed. The player is a nightguard, and the objective is to stay inside the office and survive the animatronics’ attacks by using flashlights and closing doors. The player can use the security cameras to locate the animatronics. The doors and cameras run on a battery. If the battery runs out, the power goes out, and you lose. If you manage to survive until 6AM, you win.

Until now, this game seems like a very sight-focused game. However, audio is much more important than what is seen on the screen. To win this game, the player has to focus on audio-related clues. The game entirely focuses on the “absence of action.” The player cannot move anywhere, whilst the “creatures” can move and will do whatever they can to come for the player. As a result, the player will have to gather as much information as possible, and that is where all the audio comes in handy. Or maybe, the sounds will put you through an extremely horrifying experience. In this post, I will be delving into the sound design behind this game, and how it enhances the horror of it.

First of all, let us begin with sounds that give clues.

This is an example of sound giving you hints. At first, the sound of pots and pans clanging around may not seem helpful at all. However, after some rounds, you can notice that this sound is heard only in the kitchen, when the chicken(named Chica) is not in sight of any camera. Therefore, it is a hint that points to which animatronic is where, and that saves you some precious battery life to win the game.

*This audio may sound unsettling. *

Freddy laughs, only when he is moving from one room to another. Although this may feel like some non-diagetic sound made to scare you, Freddy’s laugh helps you to calculate how close he is to the office by counting the number of times he laughs. This audio and the kitchen noise above may be unnerving and creepy, but it is helpful because it provides the clue to a certain pattern in an unpredictable environment.

Now for the diegetic and non-diegetic sounds. This video shows the fox animatronic (Foxy) running down the hallway and banging on the door. There is also a buzzing sound whenever you pull up the camera. These noises are all diegetic, that is, what the in-game world could be making. They do not provide any help like the ones above, but create a more immersive environment for the player.

*This audio may sound unsettling.*

This here, however, seems somewhat non-diegetic. It is played when an animatronic suddenly appears right in front of the door. This kind of sound effect is called a “stinger. ” They are sound effects that are used as short bumpers in television shows, radio, and such. In horror-themed audiovisual productions, these bumpers are used to make the audience “jump a little.” Overall, they are sounds to simply immerse you into the game and make you concentrate.

The third type of sounds are ones that are harmful. They prevent you from concentrating, give out red herrings, or are just there to scare you.

Let us take this for an example.

The deafening sound of our desk fan can even be heard over the camera feed. The camera already makes a loud noise when it pans from one side to another, and all the while you have to deal with the incessant blare of the fan. This sound impedes you from acquiring useful information from other sounds.

This phone call (coming from a guy who referred to as the “phone guy”) is a pre-recorded message from another employee that tells you about the animatronics; what they do, how to avoid them, and so on. It is somewhat like a tutorial. However, as the nights pass, the information this recording gives becomes meaningless, as the topic of the recordings stray away from important things you have to know in the game. As a result, it becomes a red herring, and distracts you from trying to hear clues such as Freddy’s laugh.

And last but not least, there are sounds that exist with one meaningful purpose : to scare you. There are two types of these sounds. One is “ambience sound,” and the other is “vaguely vocal.”

*The following audio clips contain EXTREMELY unsettling sounds.*

This creepy, droning sound is ambience, and it plays throughout the entire round. This sound is closer to non-diegetic, because unlike the diegetic sounds above such as pots, pans, and fans, this sounds rather otherworldly.

Vaguely vocal sounds seem human, but not human at all at the same time. We often declare human-like things disturbing when it falls in the “uncanny valley.” The vaguely vocal sounds are similar, except that it goes in the uncanny valley of sound. The audio above is an actual human voice that has been reversed, toned down, and sped up to give off a feeling that Chica(the animatronic in the video) is possessed. Freddy’s laugh can also be categorized as vaguely vocal. Also, on the fifth night, the phone recording’s sound is also reversed and garbled up. These non-diegetic sounds are only intended to scare the player, and aren’t much of a help. Rather, they are a distraction.

In video games, especially ones where players have to deeply focus in an environment, detail in sound is very important. Five Nights At Freddy’s is the best example of these kind of video games, and remembering what we learned in class about sounds in film, I decided to look into some factors in the game that I could relate to. Writing about not only film but audiovisuals as a whole was a great experience!