JR's is a Five Nights at Freddy's Fan Game developed by a team led by Ramenov.
You play as a paranormal investigator looking into supernatural events at a restaurant called JR's. A spirit called Paulbear is assisting your investigation, as he wants to pass on but the ghost haunting the restaurant has a vested interest in harming him. Together, the two of you aim to get to the bottom of what's going on.
Gameplay revolves around using the cameras to monitor the animatronics for signs of paranormal activity and taking note of which robot you think is possessed. The stability of the animatronics degrades over time, and they will attack you if their stability reaches 0. While this can be staved off by calling them in to make repairs, calling the possessed animatronic will automatically result in a Game Over.
JR's provides examples of:
- Art Shift: The gameplay inside of JR's is in a photorealistic style, while The Barrens are depicted with low-poly 3D graphics and the cartoons on the VHS tapes are in claymation.
- Ascended Extra: The Mangle goes from being one of the many animatronics hunting you in Five Nights at Freddy's 2 to the Final Boss of this game.
- Bears Are Bad News: Freddy as always, though this time he's no more dangerous than any other animatronic. Averted with Paulbear, who even helps you out during gameplay if you ask him.
- Bittersweet Ending: At the end of the game, the Ghost is finally trapped within Limbo, ending her threat for good, and JR's is finally shut down. Five years later, however, the animatronics are refurbished to be used in a new location that the investigator Jeremy picked up a job as nightguard for... with the implication that he's about to become the victim of the Bite of 87.
- Composite Character: This game's version of Mangle derives their appearance from their Five Nights at Freddy's 2 incarnation, but has origins more akin to Ennard from Sister Location; namely, both are built out of parts from all the other animatronics in their respective games and are their creator's final gambit.
- Creepy Doll: Marionette and Balloon Baby are far more disturbing looking than their original toy counterparts.
- Easter Egg: Clicking the nose of the doll on top of the monitor makes a honking sound.
- Easy Level Trick: On earlier nights, it's possible to easily complete the level by just guessing which animatronic is haunted instead of using the cameras to look for clues first. This is because the massive stability penalty for guessing wrong is easily offset by how few times the spirit switches animatronics. From Night 3 onward, there are enough animatronic changes per night that guessing willy-nilly will quickly lead to the player's demise.
- Electromagnetic Ghosts: If the ghost is possessing an animatronic, the camera they're on may begin flickering. The animatronic's stability counter in the control panel can also start glitching out.
- The Ending Changes Everything: The final cutscene after Night 6 reveals that JR's takes place five years before Five Nights at Freddy's 2, making it a Stealth Prequel.
- Final Boss: The Mangle, a monstrosity created to be the Ghost's new vessel.
- Game-Over Man: Every animatronic has a unique illustration that reveals who was haunted at the moment of your death. In the final night, it is based on the one from Five Nights at Freddy's 2 — the point of view of the dead protagonist who's stuffed into an animatronic as Freddy watches. Getting killed by The Mangle at the end shows the FNaF2 game over again, but with her in Freddy's place.
- Interface Screw:
- When the ghost is inside an animatronic, it will affect the camera of the room it's currently in. On Night 1, the haunted animatronic will always cause the camera to flicker whenever it's on-screen; in later nights, it will gain more possible effects, and will switch between them on the fly. These are: making spectral handprints appear for a short time when it enters or leaves the room, moving the camera away to hide itself off-frame, or turn the camera off as long as it's in the room.
- During the final battle, the ghost will attempt to permanently break all the cameras. If it succeeds, it will also break your flashlight, followed by it bum-rushing you.
- Mechanical Abomination: The Mangle is the final form of the spirit haunting JR's, cobbled together out of the establishment's six animatronics. The end result is a hulking metal beast with a snow-white fox's face, at least half a dozen limbs, and a tail with a crude owl animatronic on the end.
- Stylistic Suck: The Barrens and its inhabitants all look like they belong in an early 3D game, with low-poly shapes and simple textures. However, this simplicity was very much intentional.
- Uncanny Valley: The animatronics in this game are made to be as realistic and creepy as possible, and needless to say, they succeeded with flying colors.
- Unexpected Gameplay Change: The majority of gameplay takes the form of a Social Deduction Game where you have to figure out which animatronic is possessed, the robots can't kill you unless they're left unrepaired for too long or you accidentally summon the haunted one, and the night doesn't end until you solve a given number of possessions. This is thrown out the window on Night 6,which returns to the gameplay of Five Nights at Freddy's 2 where you have to wear a mask or use a flashlight in order to fend off the animatronics seeking to enter your office, and wind the Marionette's music box in the meantime.
