Five Nights at Freddy's creator Scott Cawthon has been dealing with a chaotic end to 2023 following the accidental release of an official (and unfinished) Roblox game that went live after an unfortunate mixup, which he described as a "huge blunder".
Fans noticed Five Nights at Freddy’s: Survival Crew, developed by Metaverse Team Frights, pop up in Roblox and eagerly dived in, quickly discovering the game was clearly unfinished, even broken in parts. Cawthon took to Reddit to deal with the debacle, which was apparently due to a communication error:
"What a screwed-up day. Yes, there is an official Roblox game being worked on; I'm actually a big Roblox fan and play it a lot with my kids. But the fact that this was released today is one of the most baffling, insane things to ever happen in my ten years of working on FNAF."
Cawthon says the game is still in its infancy and that due to what he describes as "a huge misunderstanding", he had approved a skin for use, and this was somehow "interpreted as release the game". He's promised to fix the launch for 2024 and implores fans: "I hope everyone can at least believe me when I say that this was a game in its testing phases and was in no way ready to be released to the public."