Slappy Not Happy!
Goosebumps: Night of Scares is a 2015 mobile/VR-based/First-person video game developed by Cosmic Forces and Free Range Games, released as a tie-in to the Goosebumps movie coming out at the same time.
Rather than following the movie's plot, the game instead tells a whole different story; the player assumes the role of "Twist", a young boy who snuck into R. L. Stine's (the fictionalized version portrayed by Jack Black) mansion one night, only to discover Stine missing, and there are monsters on the loose...
As it turns out, Slappy the Dummy had escaped the book he's imprisoned in, and along the way had released various monsters from Stine's books. Stine himself ends up being sealed by Slappy in the same magic typewriter those monsters were created, and its up to Twist to find the missing pages of Stine's manuscripts and re-seal Slappy and his minions.
The game is followed five years later by a sequel, Goosebumps: Dead of Night, although it isn't as much a sequel as it's an Expansion Pack. Once more, Stine is trapped in his typewriter, and Twist had to figure a way to stop Slappy, but the dummy's craftier and far more cunning than in the original.
Goosebumps: Night of Scares and Goosebumps: Dead of Night contain examples of:
- Actually a Doombot: Yeah, the friendly and helpful Dr. Brewer, from the second stage of Dead of Night? That's actually his plant person clone from the book, intending to have Twist Lured into a Trap. The real Dr. Brewer is trapped alongside his daughter, Margaret, who will try to contact Twist halfway through the game.
- Anthropomorphic Food: Giant gummi bears from Goosebumps 2: Haunted Halloween shows up in the second game, in the last stage. Much like every other monster, they can kill Twist the moment they got too close, however as they appear after Twist got the laser, they can be killed en masse (for players who enjoys shooting at stuff — feel free to explode as many gummi bears as you want).
- Beard of Evil: Dr. Brewer's clone has one made out of wood in his mutated form.
- Composite Character: While Fifi the vampire poodle (from Please Don't Feed the Vampire!) shows up in the first game as an enemy, her ability to phase through walls to stalk the players isn't from her book; rather it seems to be lifted from the titular creature from The Barking Ghost.
- Deadpan Snarker: The Stine in this game is based on Jack Black's portrayal as seen in the live-action films, so that's pretty much a given.Stine: "I could be writing romance novels and be a billionaire... instead of writing horror stories for kids and be a multi-billionaire."
- Failure Is the Only Option: In Dead of Night, regardless of Twist's performance in the first level, he will fail to keep Slappy sealed permanently. Slappy must escape, and then ambush Twist using the spores from Dr. Brewer's plants, leading to Twist becoming a half-plant person and to seek Dr. Brewer for a cure.
- Fantastic Flora: The second level of Dead of Night, set in Dr. Brewer's basement, from, uh, Stay Out of the Basement, where much like the book it's based on is entirely swarmed with oversized plants. Some of the plant-based hazards also includes Man Eating Plants lifted from You're Plant Food!
- Forced Transformation: Stine has been captured alive by Slappy and turned into his own typewriter, and can only communicate with Twist by typing instructions.
- Genre Shift: While both games are firmly rooted in the Survival Horror genre, which the first follows through and through, however the second game has its final level inexplicably becoming a FPS, where Twist (upon obtaining the laser) goes on a shooting spree against giant gummi bears. It feels like a PG-version of Doom, to be honest.
- Gotta Catch Them All: You're not going to pass any levels in either of those games without collecting all the missing pages to Stine's manuscript. They're mostly quite obvious, tucked away on shelves and in drawers, but occasionally some of them are carried around by the Lawn Gnomes who stole them, and can only be retrieved by finding and smashing those gnomes.
- Hands Looking Wrong: The second game, Dead of Night, sees Twist infected by plant spores from Dr. Brewer's basement and subjected to transflormation, which he realized after looking at his hands and seeing them turning green and developing a wood-like texture.
- Harmless Enemy: Lawn Gnomes (from Revenge of the Lawn Gnomes) are the only enemy type which doesn't kill Twist on sight, and inversely, it's possible for Twist to easily smash them to bits. Their purpose in the game is either to alert other more dangerous monsters of the player's presence, or hide pages of Stine's manuscripts until the player took down the gnomes and retrieve the papers.
- Heroic Mime: Twist doesn't say a single word in either of the games, not even when he's spoken to.
- High-Voltage Death: Once the player, as Twist, got hold of the Laser, they can use it to zap and electrocute various enemies, including blowing up oversized Gummi Bears. Also this is how Slappy is finally taken down in Dead of Night, getting pushed into the activated Tesla Coil.
- Jump Scare: Used in all of the death scenes; the moment Twist gets killed, the player gets a cutscene of the monster lunging at him with a menacing shriek before the screen abruptly Smash to Black. Some notable bad endings...
- A Graveyard Ghoul pouncing on Twist with her Deadly Hug.
- Will Blake chomping on Twist.
- Murder the Clown prepping to bash Twist's brains with a giant lolipop.
- An Annhilator-3000 frying Twist via Eye Beams.
- Giant Maneater plants ready to devour twist.
- Falling into the stream of the indoor garden, and suddenly surrounded by piranhas.
- Grabbed by giant gummi bears while trying to find that switch on the Tesla Coil...
- We'll be here all day, really!
- Lily-Pad Platform: The basement stage of Dead of Night has Twist getting to the other side by crossing lily pads atop a massive indoor stream. Be warned that the pads have a tendency to sink every few seconds — poor timing will lead to Twist falling into the water, which turns out to be filled with piranhas.
- Ray Gun: The Laser gun from Into the Jaws of Doom is a compulsory pickup by Twist in the final level of Dead of Night, and it's capable of vapourizing enemies in the last stages as well as the only item capable of defeating Slappy permanently.
- Mecha-Mooks: The Annhilator-3000s from Toy Terror: Batteries Included are in both games, although their portrayal is closer to the movie, in that they're small mechanical creatures standing to Twist's kneecaps instead of the human-sized Killer Robot in the book. They're Stationary Enemy-types in the first game, standing in a fixed position while scanning the area with their rotating head-beacon (and frying Twist with Eye Beams the moment he gets caught) while in the second they're capable of moving around, and can only be destroyed by sneaking from behind (yet another trait lifted from the gamebook).
- Mission Control: Stine basically serves this purpose in both games, guiding the player's character, Twist throughout the levels, tutoring them on the controls and how to avoid monsters. In Dead of Night the second and third levels have Dr. Brewer (actually his clone) and Nikola Tesla serving this role.
- One-Hit-Point Wonder: Twist, who gets killed immediately as soon as any monster got the drop on him (except for the gnomes). Which makes sense, given that he's a young boy against Slappy's minions.
- Only Known by Their Nickname: The Player Character is simply called "Twist". Because as Stine said, "Every book needs a twist".
- Potion-Brewing Mechanic: Dr. Brewer's basement lab in the second game has a potion-mixing machine, and Twist must collect various plant samples across the level to be used for the machine in order to create an antidote reversing the transflormation effects Slappy had inflicted on him.
- Schmuck Bait: The game loves throwing choices to explore obvious traps for Twist, all which leads to quick Game Over scenarios. For instance, choosing to investigate that shaking coffin, which obviously contains a monster? Get ready for a Jump Scare of a Graveyard Ghoul pouncing on and eviscarating Twist...
- Subverted in the final level of Dead of Night. The Tesla coil from Into the Jaws of Doom shows up, and much like the book, the player is given the option to "move" the coil. In the book, moving the Tesla Coil will activate it, which quickly leads to a quick, gruesome and humiliating High-Voltage Death for the player. But in the game, the Tesla Coil doesn't activate until hitting a switch, so Twist can drag and push the coil along without being shocked.
- Survival Horror: Albeit a Lighter and Softer entry in the genre; as Twist players will be spending most of the games avoiding dangerous monsters that can kill them on sight, and have the monsters sealed back in the books they're from to win the game.
- Tennis Boss: The Final Boss of Dead of Night, Slappy, can only be taken down by firing a charged laser shot into his own projectiles, reflecting them with enough energy to send Slappy into the Tesla Coil.
- Transflormation: Early in the second stage of Dead of Night, Twist suffers this fate thanks to the escaped Slappy infecting him with Brewer's plant spores, and must Race Against the Clock to find an antidote to reverse the effects. This fate happened to Dr. Brewer and his daughter Margaret Brewer, which Twist will be tasked to save in the same level.
- Rewarding Vandalism: Twist is free to smash up everything he can find in Stine's mansion, including vases, mirrors, ceramics, plates and dishes, porcelain Chinese lions, as long as it's breakable it will end up broken.
- Undead Barefooter: The sole Graveyard Ghoul who shows up in both games goes around shoeless.
- Weapons That Suck: How Slappy is defeated in the games; by collecting all the pages and completing Stine's manuscripts, Twist then sucks Slappy and his minions back into the book where they're from. It doesn't work in the sequel, though — Slappy can only be taken down by the Tesla Coil in the Final Battle.
- Wham Shot: At the start of the second level of Dead of Night, an escaped Slappy got the drop on Twist, who passes out... and wakes up in Dr. Brewer's basement. Then he sees his hands
◊ and realize Slappy had infected him with Brewer's plant-spores.
