The Challenges of Adapting Five Nights at Freddy’s (2014-2022) Across the Media

This study analyses the process of adaptation between a short story titled Into the Pit (2019) into the video game Five Nights at Freddy’s: Into the Pit (2024), with a heavy focus on the narrative. It shows the struggles faced by writers when adapting a text from a different medium; especially into a medium that is far more active in terms of audience engagement (from conventional short story into a video game). According to modern trends, many fans are dissatisfied with modern adaptations of original texts; often critiquing it for changing elements present in the original text which further changed the meaning of the original media. This study argues that the process of adaptation often includes changes that would affect the storyline and how audience would receive the adaptations; oftentimes for the worse. The study itself also limits itself on the narrative and plotlines of the texts; as the process of adaptation often impacts many other aspects such as characters and characteristics, artistic elements, and (to an extreme extent) genres. Video game as a form of adaptation is also something that is very new to the world of creative industries. As such, it is important that this study chooses a new medium in order to establish ground rules for future video game adaptations as a baseline to follow.

Five Nights at Freddy’s, horror, adaptation

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