Five Nights at Freddy Dev Admits New RPG Was Released Too Soon

FNaF World, the RPG spinoff of popular indie horror series Five Nights at Freddy's, was released sooner than it should have, its developer has admitted in an apology posted to Steam.

After being announced last September, World was given a release date of February 19 earlier this month. In a surprise, the game was instead released yesterday on Steam. And while it currently sports a "Very Positive" average from user reviews, there are a number of reviews on the store that point out serious issues with the game. These include a lack of information--for instance, there isn't a stats page for your characters, seemingly a major oversight for an RPG.

Series creator Scott Cawthon isn't shying away from these complaints and has in fact issued an apology for releasing the game before it should have been.

"This isn't exactly an announcement that I'm enjoying writing, but it's one that I feel I owe to the community," Cawthon wrote in a post on Steam today. "You know, I've been accused of rushing my games ever since FNaF 1, but I've never felt that I'd released a game too early… until now."

He goes on to highlight features that the game "should have had before release." These include "being able to see what abilities do during battle, or being able to see a stats page for your characters. These are features that any good RPG would have," he said.

World's Steam store page offers several "beginner's tips," which include explanations of the game's "unusual battle commands." These include things like the Waterhose (instantly kills enemies with less than 30 percent health) and the Jumpscare (stuns enemies for a few seconds) that you likely wouldn't otherwise understand.

"I got too eager to show the things that were finished, that I neglected to pay attention to the things that weren't," he continued. "I'm going to fix this, and I'll be updat[ing] the game with these features in the coming weeks. So I say this to a community that I've enjoyed and respected for over a year and a half now--I'm sorry. I will continue to add features to the game and make it right."

As of this writing, FNaF World remains up for sale on Steam, where it costs $10. There's no indication of whether Cawthon will pull the game from Steam until the missing features are added or if a message will be posted to the store page itself to indicate that development is ongoing. We've contacted Cawthon to learn more and will report back with anything we learn.

The first Five Nights at Freddy's debuted in August 2014 on PC and has since been ported to iOS. Three sequels were released in the following year, with the most recent, Five Nights at Freddy's 4, arriving last July.