The acquisition of indie games by larger publishers results in the abandonment of ingenuity and experimental individuality in the gaming industry. Games in indie franchises are decreasing in quality in exchange for increased marketability. When success encourages additional content beyond a game’s original scope, freedom is lost to external companies and these partnerships lead to the mismanagement of popular indie intellectual properties.
Large publishers began taking note of indie games’ success in 2016, subsequently acquiring not only intellectual property, but also entire indie studios. While these acquisitions offer smaller studios a larger platform for their games, reducing workloads and gaining job security for developers, indie developers simultaneously lose control over their original IPs for both past works and future projects.
As the horror genre has some of the most successful indie games, particular franchises from this genre demonstrate how external publishing companies or game developers veer away from the original vision of the games, pivoting instead to a commercialization-based production.
The popular franchise Five Nights at Freddy’s exemplifies an overly commercialized IP that lost sight of its original quality and horror aesthetic. Created by Scott Cawthon in 2014 and 2015, FNaF 1 through 4 exist as point-and-click games set in a single location with animatronics lurking in adjacent rooms, attempting to jump scare and kill the player until daybreak, creating the series’ renowned tension.
Over time, the franchise grew with 11 main story games, eight spin-off games, three novels and an ongoing film adaptation series. Maintaining a small team in Cawthon’s first collaboration, the production of three novels with author Kira Breed-Wrisley between 2015 and 2018 did not inflate commercialization nor ruin the nature of the horror.
These issues began in 2019. As each book was remade into graphic novels, Cawthon concurrently partnered with game developers to produce a new main story FNaF game — Security Breach, developed by the larger Steel Wool Studios for a 2021 release. In short, this game is substandard, featuring unending bugs and lore developments that upended Cawthon’s original narrative intentions, where the story initially ended with the fourth, then sixth game.
Similarly, the 2023 film adaptation leaves much to be desired. An IMDB reviewer claimed that “its biggest problems are character development, overall storyline, and horror factor.”
Despite its shortcomings, Steel Wool Studios’ financial ability to widely market the game, especially given its lack of truly terrifying elements that may alienate some audiences, led to huge commercial success. With new FNaF content attaining financial success through external partners and commercialized production, the franchise has lost its original spark, quality and horror.
Another notable example is the Little Nightmares franchise. Released in 2017, the first game received positive reviews, highlighting the hypnotic, atmospheric and suspenseful horror of being a small child in a massive, dark and dangerous world. In contrast to FNaF, which retained its creator, Little Nightmares eventually abandoned the original game creator, Tarsier Studios, and the publisher, Bandai Namco Entertainment, continued to expand the franchise.
Attempting to capitalize on the success, a comic series and mobile game developed by Alike Studios was released. A TV adaptation and another comic series were planned but remain unfinished and have little publicly available information. Clearly, these expansion attempts into other formats were unsuccessful, likely due to the lack of collaboration with Tarsier Studios.
In 2021, Tarsier Studios released Little Nightmares II, receiving high reviews. Upon its completion, Tarsier Studios claimed it was the final game in the series in an interview with IGN. However, since Bandai Namco holds the rights to the Little Nightmares IP, Tarsier Studios had no say in the continuation of Little Nightmares III, which was released without its involvement on Oct. 10.
Now developed by Supermassive Games, reviewers found the game too expensive for its length, empty and unfulfilling, and many urged fans to wait for Reanimal, a similar game from Tarsier Studios. Despite the backlash, merchandising unseen for the first two games was released with Little Nightmares III, including a novel and promises of a stop-motion animated project.
Like FNaF, Little Nightmares now leans toward commercialization, discarding the creator’s original intentions. Unwilling to take the experimental risks indie developers can, Bandai Namco used the Little Nightmares IP for a low-risk, high-reward release, a common choice by large publishers, and ultimately devalued the franchise for easy sales. With the monetary success of Little Nightmares III and plans for the release of additional expansions, the franchise is unlikely to end here.
To avoid the depreciation of indie IPs through commercialization and publisher acquisitions, successful indie developers should look to Steve Gabry and his production of Sally Face — a psychological horror, mystery, puzzle and adventure game — as an example of staying true to the nature of indie games. Released between 2016 and 2019, Gabry received overwhelmingly positive reviews, yet chose to produce a sequel with only two additional artists.
Although Sally Face has merchandise available, extraneous content has never been produced to inflate its popularity or audience beyond the scope of the game. Gabry’s unwillingness to surrender his creative freedom and continued development of experimental games exemplifies a positive way to manage popular indie IPs.
Like FNaF and Little Nightmares, Sally Face debuted with an engaging, deep and fantastical gameplay, with a narrative and world that captivated a niche audience. Gabry chose to maintain his uniquely creative art style, storytelling, atmosphere and horror to continue to engage and grow this audience. This occurs without unnecessarily expanding or diverting the story or original niche to market the game more easily.
Pursuing the expansion of IPs by maintaining their original alluring qualities must be the industry’s priority, rather than the push for financial success. Ensuring quality is retained throughout merchandising and franchise growth is essential to maintaining the alluring experimental nature of indie horror games. As such, large publishers must elevate the integral part of their successful indie IPs — their original, uniquely inventive creators.
Allison Bonaventura is a sophomore double-majoring in comparative literature and anthropology.
Views expressed in the opinions pages represent the opinions of the columnists. The only piece that represents the view of the Pipe Dream Editorial Board is the staff editorial.