It’s back….
This weekend, MOB Games decided to drop the first teaser for chapter 3 of their smash-hit horror game, Poppy Playtime. With chapter 2 being largely well received and ending on an interesting cliff-hanger, of course a follow-up was in the plans, but I’m personally a little surprised we got a teaser so soon.
This is a very short little teaser, it’s main purpose being to confirm that chapter 3 will release sometime next year, but it is quite impactful, and frighteningly disturbing in all the right ways. In one continuous shot, we see a Huggy Wuggy doll, followed by a Mommy Long Legs toy that has been broken in half. That’s a clever little reference to the two enemies that have been defeated in past chapters, especially with Long Legs having had her top half separated from the rest of her body after getting caught in a grinder. If you’re new to this franchise, yeah, things get a little crazy sometimes.
The shot turns up from the floor, and slowly focuses in on various toys scattered around, and in the center of them all is a red gas mask. The audio consists of a message from the Playtime Co. founder, Elliot Ludwig, and as his words end, cheering and applause can be heard, but the joyous sounds quickly make way for the haunting screams and cries of children. The video ends, surely leaving a pit in the viewer’s stomachs.
It’s only around a minute long, but it’s very interesting, and gives us a little bit to work with whilst we speculate what to expect in chapter 3. I guess let’s start with the centerpiece of that trailer, the gas mask. I personally find gas masks, elephant torture masks, and those kinds of things to be terrifying, at least hard to look at, so for me personally, chapter 3 already looks promising in terms of how scary it’s going to get.
But what the mask is, or what it symbolizes, is likely very dark and twisted. This detail doesn’t show up in the actual trailer, but the Youtube thumbnail for it shows some kind of red mist, or gas, behind the mask. This, combined with the children’s screams, and what we learned from chapter 2, my guess is that this mask was commonly worn by researchers and scientists while they were working with the orphaned children that were brought in the toy factory. Chapter 2 told us that children were bonded with toys, the pairs being chosen through physical and mental tests disguised as innocent games in the Game Station. Once the compatible pairs were designated, the children were killed, and infused with the toys, giving them life before they could be sold to the world.
I recently watched Superhorrorbro’s analysis on this teaser. If you don’t know, he runs a great horror game-based Youtube channel, and he speculated that these gas masks had a very dark purpose, and that once the children were prepared, scientists would put them on before they basically put all the kids in a chamber and gassed them on mass, thus the haunting atmosphere at the end of the teaser. This is highly likely, and I’d like to take it a little further and guess what was in that gas. At the beginning of chapter 2, we found the office of Elliot Ludwig himself, and on his desk where notes talking about his early experimentation with the poppy flower, and his discovery that it had rejuvenating properties. Perhaps the essence of poppy flowers was in the gas, so while it certainly killed those children, it also allowed them to be reborn once they were embodying a toy.
We could have to wear one of these masks when we play through chapter 3, depending on whether we come across where the masks had to be used while the factory was still operating. That could be an interesting gameplay mechanic to add, instead of just getting another type of grab pack hand.
Next, I want to take a look at Elliot’s message, quoted below:
There is nothing more gratifying to my soul than being the reason for a child’s smile. To be the spark that ignites all their hopes and dreams. We owe everything to these children. This company and it’s toys are nothing without them. That is why it is with enormous pleasure that as the founder of Playtime Co, I announce Playcare- Our very own on site orphanage. A child should never be left unloved, never without a hand to hold when they see a monster in their closet. May Playcare bring joy, inspiration and smiles to every child who enters these doors.
Playcare was teased as a sign in the final moments of chapter 2, and I suspected it was a sort of daycare. Turns out, it’s a full-on orphanage. So this told me that Playtime Co. didn’t have a deal with a separate orphanage like I had been assuming, and you know what? Why do that? Why use an separate facility? These past two chapters have shown just how ridiculously huge the factory is, so might as well just slap an orphanage on into the mix.
This was a short little teaser, but it offered a lot to speculate about, and it looks super creepy. Chapter 3 won’t be out for a while, but it seems that promotion has begun, so we’ll have more fun stuff to dive into as the months go by. I’m really excited to be talking about this game again, and it looks like it’s only going to get more fascinating, and more horrifying, from here on out. Below are links to Superhorrorbro’s channel, as well as the teaser trailer. Hope you enjoyed, and I’ll see you all very soon!
Superhorrorbro: https://www.youtube.com/c/SuperHorrorBros
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