Poppy Playtimehas yet to fully escape controversy, but the franchise won itself a good deal more respect after its third chapter saw a dramatic improvement in quality. NowPoppy Playtimeis set to continue into a fourth chapter, and many details are already available for perusal.
Without a doubt,Poppy Playtimeis perhaps the most controversialindie horror game. The game’s first chapter was solid, as was the second, but both lacked substance beyond fantastic animation and some great chases. The fear factor was missing, and the game’s plot did little to distinguish it from other mascot horror series likeFive Nights at Freddy’s andBendy and the Ink Machine. Fan concerns over NFTs, overzealous merchandising, and the alleged behavior of studio MobGames' founders added fuel to the fire.
What Poppy Playtime Chapter 4 Will Be Bringing To The Table
Fortunately for Mob Entertainment,Poppy Playtime’s third chapter won horror fans back. Its genuinely creepy sequences, such as those surrounding the characters Catnap and Dogday, mixed well with incredibly solid gameplay to make a great experience. Now chapter four is on the horizon, and there have been some developments around its contents. Fans already expect it to follow up with the ongoing plot surrounding The Prototype, an intelligent creature that’s been assimilating other monsters into its whole, but more concrete details have now emerged.
January 2025 Release Date
In the teaser trailerrevealingPoppy Playtime’s next chapter, the most hard-and-fast piece of info fans can parse is the release window.Poppy PlaytimeChapter 4 will be released in January 2025, barring any delays. Chapter 3 was released in January of this year, meaning that the distance between the chapters will be almost exactly one year. It’s also the longest gap between chapter releases for any of the chapters, and it could be longer considering how Chapter 3 was delayed.
The Black Sheep
Chapter 4’s teaser trailer focuses on a black sheep toy, a character that looks like one of the Smiling Critters from the prior chapter. This sheep has never been seen before, and is shown to be feasting on the remnants of the critter swarms from Chapter 3 (piled around in massive numbers).
In an interview with Game Rant, Mob Entertainment CEO Zach Belanger calledPoppy Playtimechapter 4’s villainthe one he has “been most excited about for quite some time,” so this sheep creature may not take on a central role given its small stature and lack of unique traits compared to the critter swarms. On the other hand, the sheep currently has top billing on the chapter’s Steam page, following in the footsteps of prior main villains.
A Setting Deep Underground
Mob Entertainment has been tight-lippedabout Chapter 4’s specifics, and the chapter’s Steam page follows in those footsteps. Little news is confirmed in-text, save from the fact that the player will indeed be going deeper than ever before. This is made even clearer by the pictures used on the Steam page, most of which show a clearly subterranean setting. Purple hand prints are also shown, confirming that the jumping hand mechanic from Chapter 3 will be making a return.
In Mob Entertainment’s aforementioned Game Rant interview, Zach Belanger also stated that “fans can expect the highest quality, most stable, most optimized, and the best user experience of any of our games yet.” This will be especially reassuring to thoseburned byPoppy PlaytimeChapter 2, which launched with a good number of bugs. The issue of stability and bugs has been less present as the chapters have continued to be released, but keeping standards high is always welcome.
