I think the biggest reason modern horror characters like Freddy, Poppy, Wally, Pomni, etc. are so popular is because of their childhood affiliation in general. If a child grows up with animated kid shows, and they want to feel more mature (as most children do), they're going to really like the idea of a show/game/etc. that takes those tropes, but twists it in a more demented way (sometimes psychologically like with Welcome Home and TADC). Not only that, but the designs are still based on childhood-related tropes, which means that actual children as young as 6 may still very much want a plush from these characters, despite not knowing their original franchise.

I think what really bothers me is that so much mascot horror now seems to exploit kids dopamine the way stuff like Candy Crush gets granny hooked. So much of it seems to be made for kids to buy merch, dlc and click a lot of content farm channels.

My parents banned FNAF from my home for a long time because it was “too scary”. Even though me and my sister were just making cheesy fanart

As someone who got into the initial popularity of Five Nights, I think most kids were interested mostly for the characters and world rather than the game itself. Don't get me wrong, it's incredible seeing how many layers are integrated into the first game, but more often than not I see discussions on the characters and world over the actual gameplay.

I think one of the defining factors of the effort/intent a Mascot/Kids horror thing has is how fast it makes merch. For example: the Garten of BanBan devs released merch immediately after dropping the first game. Where as Clown, the creator of Welcome Home, did not drop the Wally plush until the fall of 2023, 6 MONTHS after Welcome Home became popular. You decide which one is the Passion project here.

My mom is a preschool teacher and she was really disturbed to find out that some of the kids she teaches were watching content that was really not appropriate for their age like Five Nights at Freddy's. These are literal 3 and 4 year old that have no idea about fantasy versus reality. Parents really need to supervise what their children watch, especially on platforms like KZfaq. It's crazy how a child can watch a Bluey video on KZfaq and then the algorithm will suggest really creep Five Nights at Freddy's fan videos to them. Definitely a topic worth discussion. Some children love to be scared, but I do think parents need to know if the show is age appropriate.

Baby's first horror game was little nightmares, I've been apart of 5 nights at freddy since sisted location and as funky frogbait says there's not enough spaces for kids online flash has died and there was only social media and crudely made hypercasual games with ingames purchases

I think kids do need to be exposed to horror, or horror elements, so long as it is age appropriate. It can help children learn how to deal with fear and anxiety. The key phrase there is "age appropriate", there are a lot of unsupervised kids getting access to things on the internet that they are not ready for. This is not a problem of the internet but a problem of bad parenting, and it is not new, it is an age old thing. Before the internet and smart phones some parents would put there kids in front of a TV and let them just watch whatever. You can tell the people who do this, they are the ones that complain about sex and violence in media.

It’s a Pretty interesting conversation topic. Personally, I don’t see an issue as long as kids are supervised. Then again, I’m someone who grew up on things like Courage The Cowardly Dog, FNAF, and Treehouse of Horror. As a teenager I got into more “serious” horror (Evil Dead, Alien, etc) and immediately fell in love with horror in general. It’s a feeling of danger without the danger.

Okay this conversation is right up my alley! Hi I started indulging in creepypasta and horror content as a young kid around the age of 10 and because of my not so good homelife it ended up being more of a comfort for me rather than anxiety or fear inducing since it was a horror away from my reality. There’s comfort in horror that you can experience but turn off if it becomes too much for you; to this day I still indulge in all sorts of scary media to make me feel better and while it’s not like that for everyone, I can’t help but love it as a genre for all it did for me as a kid.

I used to be TERRIFIED of the “A Night on Bald Mountain” segment of Fantastia when I was a kid, but another segment in the same movie “The Pastural Symphony” is one of my favorite parts of the movie

I honestly don’t think that horror is necessarily a bad thing for a younger audience to be interested in, but I am against when it’s forced. Growing up my family was big on horror and that was a huge problem for little me

My 5-year-old cousin has SO many Poppy plushies. The first time I saw one of them I stopped and asked my aunt and uncle why she has it. They told me she saw it on the internet, liked it and wanted one. The damn thing freaks even me out, and I am known in my group of friends as the thriller and horror girl. And it's not like she doesn't realize that the thing is ment to be scary. Whenever she wants to play with one of them, it's often the monster that's chasing us and actively asks me to deal with it, either by chasing it myself, yelling at it to go away or even throwing it across the room. I'm almost certain she doesn't know it's from a horror game and despite the role the plushies tend to play in her games, she still likes them, she wouldn't have this many if she didn't.

Context on the Y2k thing: it was real, BUT there was a coordinated effort by software devs at the time to prevent it - that's why it didn't happen. it wasn't unfounded or part of computer phobia (tho that probably contributed to the response at the time) The issue related to how dates were stored at the time, namely many systems using 2-digits for the year (so 98 instead of 1998) so they couldn't distinguish 2000 from 1900. We may have another similar issue in 2038, when 32-bit signed integers hit their numeric limit (because we count seconds from Jan 1 1970) but that is already being addressed - many systems store dates as text now or use 64-bit unsigned integers which will last about 500,000,000 years when counting milliseconds

@Fionapollo 4:50 as someone who codes for a living and took computer science classes (plus an ethics class that went into some of the history as well), The Y2K concerns were very well founded. Had nothing been done, a lot of problems would have occurred. Now some of it might have been slightly sensationalized, but it would've been pretty bad. It only appears that the worries were for nothing because a lot of very smart knowledgeable people (engineers, coders, etc.) worked around the clock to ensure everything transitioned into the new millennium without a hitch. It's unfortunately a case of where because they did such a great job, no one noticed anything bad and thus everyone brushes it off as simple hysteria.

Very nice the eye animating ountro! Letting children to see horror media, for me, is 50/50. Is very tricky subject based on the content, event's or how kid friendly can you managing to do a horror project for everyone! Still, it is a nice subject to having a conversation for time to time, especially nowadays!

20:40 - 20:55 I think it's also worth mentioning that MOBGames also has a youtube channel (EnchantedMob) that had kid content. Their channel originally started off as being minecraft music videos for various games (see: FNAF, Undertale, DDLC, and BATIM) and then went off to make a series called "fazbear and friends" with minecraft FNAF characters in a very kid-friendly way. Then, he went on to introduce other fandoms, and eventually used their series to introduce their game Poppy Playtime. I remember watching the series with my little sister, so that was both of our introductions to poppy playtime, and i imagine it's the same for many other kids

Oh good, so I'm NOT the only one noticing that Tumblr nightmares in a bright and colorful coating are starting to leak into reality. Good, thought I was losing my mind for a bit there with nobody else talking about it.

The way I see it, well, it boils down to several things: Perspective. -As a kid, horror is often something that seems imposing and risky compared to the lofty cartoons they saw on the regular. So naturally, this discomfort indulges their curiousity only to give them something they haven't experienced before. Nevermind the fact that what exactly qualifies as "scary" is never the same thing twice. Deception by Nature: It is meant to feel comforting and nostalgic, something that you will never get back no matter how much you want it. Then, it pulls a bait and switch to both shock you, but also push you with the temptation for more or an explanation. Changing Times: unlike the late 20th Century, the 21st Century is practically defined by a quantum leap in technology and accessibility. Of course, this lead to the rise of a platform most brushed off as a trend. All in all, moderation is key here

even as a horror fan this is always an interesting conversation. Growing up in the early 2000s to 2010s I was around my parents who were avid horror fans, but they always tried to keep it relatively age appropriate, showing me classics like jaws and taking me to see Coraline in cinema when I was fairly young, and as I got older showing me more films and horror games they felt were good for my cultural education that I was mature enough to handle. At the end of the day horror media is a art form, and challenging kids with increasingly complex media to meet their cultural needs is a very important part of development imo. Now I'm an adult I'm a massive horror fan myself, but I have noticed with the rise of the internet an increase in children being exposed at increasingly young ages to fairly inappropriate horror through the fanworks for different media such as FNAF. I'd say stuff like FNAF itself isn't overtly inappropriate for young children (depending on their maturity and ability to handle it), but some of the fanmade content, ARGs inspired by it, and similar horror content may be. I'm a huge supporter for actively making the safety and well being of children a priority of in the internet as parents seem increasingly disinterested or distracted on this front, but at the same time I feel adult spaces should also be respected. In the same way you don't do overtly inappropriate adult stuff in a children's space, I feel it's important to have adult spaces as well where children should not be allowed in. The internet introduces a paradox where unless parents step up and take responsibility for their children, we're soon going to be seeing an increase of incredibly restrictive and inappropriately controlling law from government trying stop this issue via brute force methods like IDing. This wouldn't be fun for anyone, and it concerns me because what governments sometimes find inappropriate for kids is stuff like the queer community, and may use these laws to censor important information for youths. All in all, this is a very difficult balancing act of a multitude of factors, and predatory companies targeting children for merch sales does not improve these matters what so ever, muddying the waters further.

I am a FNaF OG fan here and I love Poppy Playtime. As much as I will admit, I hate the fact that kids are now the target audience takes away what the games/series were supposed to made for. And I do get that the creator of FNaF is a bit, in your words, "an idiot" but it's okay if you don't like him or not (just don't be those people who send death threats). Also, I want to point out that Poppy Playtime is not a cash grab like BanBan is (we all hate that game let's be honest here). Chapter 3 has redeemed the series, despite KZfaq kids being all over it. What I'm trying to say is that you can enjoy horror (except Banbon cuz the devs are a bunch of grown ass men acting like spoiled children) if you either not think of the people who made these games at all or just flat out ignore the horrible KZfaq kids stuff. Sorry for the long comment, I just wanted state my opinion here.

Stuff like Courage the Cowardly Dog, Scary Godmother, and Grimm Adventures of Billy and Mandy probably set the foundation for my interest in horror and horror adjacent content.

I only just now noticed some symbolism in the background pattern of your videos. Not sure if intentional, but if so bravo.

Not much of a hot take, but I say that horror aimed at kids/younger audiences is good. It allows them to experience (and therefore come to some form of understanding of) fear. When it becomes over monetized, then, well, it's no different from any other form of media intended only to make money. Plus, adults can enjoy some of it just as much as kids. Coraline, Little Nightmares (not particularly kid-targeted, but I imagine it has some appeal for them), TADC, and many others have sizable adult followings.

I was very much avoidant when it came to horror, or really ANYTHING that scared me, when I was a toddler, and even into Elementary school! I would find myself watching a few scary things here and there, And Halloween specials of my favorite shows, as well as Halloween events at my elementary school really helped ease me into the horror genre! As I grew up, I became introduced into more eerie things! Tim Burton, Henry Selick, and those stop motion creepy family films were some of my earliest intros into creepy media! I even liked some of them, but most of the things I liked about things had nothing to do with any scary things that were in the movies or shows, but rather other things that I focused on instead of the horror! (Like Monster House, I loved that movie as a kid because of the creative concept of a house that’s not just haunted, but straight up *alive!* all the horror elements were secondary to me. Also, I usually watched the film in broad daylight with the windows open, so it wasn’t nearly as scary to me!) It wasn’t until in middle school, Invader ZIM finally planted the seeds of maybe…just maybe…I might actually like scary stuff and I just refuse to accept it! In all honestly, I think ZIM first helped me explore and embrace my random humor abstract creative side, and from there, finally make the jump from just playing computer games and experimenting with MS Paint to actually explore the internet (with parent’s permission and a healthy knowledge of online safety!) and from there, I discovered a bunch of other Invader ZIM fans, as well as other awesome things related to other stuff I like! (LEGO WALL-E Stop Motion was a big factor in my early internet years!) I still was too scared of scary things unless one of my brothers was with me! I was in high school when FNAF came on the scene, and before that, I was actually interested in scary things, but mainly because my brother was really into Slenderman, and games like Amnesia! At the time, the concept of scary animatronics hunting you was something I already was scared of! (The Chuck E Cheese animatronic always seemed just…a hint…off!) and couple the fact that I hated jumpscares, I was NOT READY to even look at FNAF unless, again, my brother was with me! Eventually though, all those years of tangentially experiencing and exploring horror media, from the kid friendly things like Halloween field trips and tv specials, to more creepier things like my first intro into creepypastas, and even more darker, more mature (for kids, I mean) shows and episodes that feel more geared towards older kids, I finally began to actively seek out a few horror related things! Goosebumps, The Mask (not really horror, but I still count it at least for its zany comedy!), and even films like Coraline, really engaged me in the horror scene! Eventually, after high school, and into college, I FINALLY introduced myself to FNAF, and by extension theorizing, ARGs, and the indie creation scene as a whole! I think, if it wasn’t for channels like Game Theory, Film Theory, Night Mind, and others, I never would’ve gotten introduced into the concept of Alternate Reality Games, and Independent creators! And now, I’m 100% on board with all of that! And while I’m much less scared about a lot of horror media (still have a few fears.) I also realized that horror, while a popular choice, does not need to be the only genre that one can use in an ARG or indie project! I guess, I have online horror to thank for showing me the path that I would eventually want to take for my own creative journey!

I feel like the mascot horror games are easier to not be afraid of because of how much lore the fans put into it, hell, I've played 2 FNAF games like once but I know all the lore that people have found,

I immediately stopped a video to watch this!

IMPORTANT NOTE about Y2K: it apparently didn't come to be not because it was never a problem, but because there were industry professionals banding together and working on solutions tirelessly so it wouldn't happen. We shouldn't downplay or forgetthe power that our genuine collaboration have.

I started loving horror when I was a young teen... but not for the reasons one might usually have. I was an imaginative kid, and I would always love to write or play make-believe scenarios where I (or an OC) could change the monsters from bad to good; or, if not that, I would empathize with them in the way that, a lot of people saw them as scary, and I thought perhaps that the reason the monsters _acted_ scary was _because_ they were seen as scary. Like, "If people see me a certain way, why bother changing their minds? I'll become the thing they think I am." And that line of thinking would always make me pity the monster(s) and want to be their friend or help them somehow, even if it was all just fictional. (P.S. I finished that age regression video I mentioned in an earlier comment on another of your videos, and it's up now! Thanks again so much for allowing me to use your definition as a source, I made sure to credit you and shout you out in the video!)

I've been watching Horror since I was... probably 5. Goosebumps from 9 or ten, and have had a lifelong fascination with the creature from Alien. Also I spent ALOT of time watching late night black and white 50's horror scifi since 10 or 11 after my parents went to bed and I'd sneak out to watch the after midnight stuff. I'm in my late 30s now and I find it hilarious how much people I was raised with who Themselves had similar experience with Horror works have become so sensitive towards their kids gaining access to such. ~shrugs~

I have always had a big interest in horror, even though I used to be very cowardly. I actually miss my low scare tolerance as nothing really hits the same anymore, even the old classics. Personally I didn't really have a computer till I was around 11/12, but many old lets play channels that did horror were my favorites, as well as a creepypasta channel that started doing tech stuff and unfortunately deleted their creepypasta stuff a few years ago due to copyright problems. 11 mile drive video was such a vibe, a real shame nobody had it backed up (and yes, I know other channels have it. It's just not the same.). As for mascot horror, idk, it can produce something interesting on rare occasions but the way it's progressed is... to be blunt, pathetic. I don't care for it in a horror sense, but I am a sucker for stories, and they are mystery/story driven. If only the "big shock" would stop being dead kids. Like I get it's bad and all that, but I just want something new. I also don't like the whole merch and marketability stuff as well. Frankly if the algorithms could just return to normal horror, that would be nice. As for the thumbnail question... Yeah, what about em? Not everything has to be made for kids or with them in mind. If anything, I think the ipad kid stuff is straight up neglect. The internet doesn't need to be childproofed, kids need actual parants who will monitor them and take steps to help them avoid things that aren't meant for them. Just because something has a cartoony or bright artstyle does not mean it is for kids, heck, even if something is a fan made thing for a series targeted at a younger audience doesn't even mean it's for kids. If some parents would just learn a little internet literacy and ACTUALLY interact with their own kids on a regular basis, some of the problems we got now probably wouldn't be as big as they are.

small point about y2k, that fear wasn't entirely unfounded. As a developer there were legitimate changes that needed to be made to old dos systems particularly in the finance area so that things would continue to operate. The date really would flip and cause problems. Another fun thing is the year 2038 which is another bug in a similar vein that's not nearly as publicised. I'm personally making changes for that one in my job.

I think a lot of the kids consumption of this stuff also comes from just the lack of regulation like you talked about. Too many companies are lowering age ratings so they can get easy money from children, and the parents not going out of their way to research and see if the game is age-appropriate is a large problem. I really enjoyed this conversation! It’s very important to talk about and you’re very thorough and authentic. Also i love the animation, so smooth!! :3

When I was little, I didn't truly get into horror or scary things until middle school, I believe. I guess my start with the horror genre started in the Creepypasta era, back when it was at its peak. I didn't cosplay or make fanart, I'd just memorize the scary stories I'd read online and tell them to friends at school. It progressed into my last year of middle school when the first horror game I ever grew attached to reached popularity, Bendy and The Ink Machine. If I had to guess, the reason I didn't get into horror all that much at the beginning was a mixture of me fearing that I'd get in trouble for watching it and me being too scared to actually watch or read it.

I loved horror when i was younger because it made me feel something. I was so bored all the time tht i was willing to feel anything even fear

I am someone who is 11-15 and also loves horror (my favourite horror game is OMORI if anyone’s wondering) kids need supervision with some horror media. As a child I can say that having guardians know that you are interested in horror is necessary, both so they know what you can take in and be fine and so they can get you media relating to horror. Yes I have severe anxiety but at least for me that isn’t the cause of my mental illnesses. I’m not saying these things to be all “Ooooo I’m a kid and I love horror and I’m smart because I know I should have supervision but I don’t!”, I’m saying this as someone who has a family that knows I love horror, my dad bought me OMORI and my aunty but bought me a few horror/decently spooky manga.

It's the content farms not the original property

I adored horror as a child, and potentially even as a baby, since we have a picture of me propped up on dad's stomach as we watched ghost shows together. Weird travels, most haunted, ghost hunters, destination truth, unsolved mysteries (was more true crime, but did have supernatural segments), if I had access to it on cable, I watched it. I also have very fond memories of Goosebumps, Cirque du Freak, Demonata, and Scary Stories to Read in the Dark. The last one I first read in middle school, with the story about Harold sticking out most in my young head. Maybe it's because I was bullied as a child that I related to, then cheered when Harold getting his revenge in the end, although as an adult I will say maaaybe the murder was a little much. It was never explicitly stated he had killed Tom, buuut you're not getting a nearly complete untorn skin from a live person. Honestly, I think it's very important that children have access to some form of horror media. Not like SAW or Human Centipede style horror, but something more "muted". The movie version of Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, Coraline, or ParaNorman are good spooky movies for kids ages 8-12. Horror in children's media is important, since it lets them experience negative emotions in a safe environment and be taught how to process them by a parent. Sure, sometimes they can be traumatizing depending on the movie or concept presented in them, but eventually every kid realizes the monster in the closet is just a gnarly sweater poking out of it.

Herobrine may not still be seen as much or talked about us much to this day when it comes to minecraft, but I'm pretty sure personally that I think he's still in the game. Cuz every now and then when I boot it up I still see an unoccupied Steve in the distance or a random name tag that doesn't resemble my own just fly by on the screen below the map. Now you could put that up to I just accidentally went on to a public server. Except for one problem. I didn't have internet at the time and I was just playing offline. Making that physically impossible and just only added to the fear that you're being haunted by some unidentified mob.

the reason y2k didn't happen isn't that it was all baseless phobia, it's that a lot of work went in to making sure systems were updated and protected

There's another channel on KZfaq called Tale Foundry that has also done some really interesting videos on this topic. I definitely recommend checking them out

For me it was fran bow Sally face Little nightmares Alice madness returns

The access and freedoms granted by the internet I think are the biggest shift in the past 20ish years, I was exposed to adult horror at a very young age but this was exclusive to what movies I could get my hands on (this was before we even had dial-up). Though regarding horror for children, Doctor Who went big on it in the mid-late 70s, their thinking being along the lines of , 'kids can handle anything as long as they know it'll be okay in the end' (though I'm struggling to find the source of that atm).

I remember back when I was younger I would enjoing a lot of creepypastas from the interenet, especially if it were video game related like EXE games. While a lot of them didn't age well it still entertained my small little mind

I got really in to fnaf back in third grade. I think it was right around the time fnaf world was releasing? I remember that one teaser where the characters were slowly being replaced by their fnaf world counterparts. It was a gateway for me. I remember scrounging around the internet for free point and click horror games. At about age 10-11 I got into creepypasta. Salad Fingers and Dont Hug Me I'm Scared were also series I remember distinctly.

REQUEST: Make a video talking about the upcoming Inside Out 2 and the fandom it gained centering around the new 4 emotions.

When I was young, the horror content I saw(illustrated books and a few video games depicting death) went from not really mattering to becoming very scary around age 8, when I became aware of death. Suddenly, "Maxwell Manor", an Atari game which opens with little pixel art skulls, became something I ran away into the next room from. I remember my brother experiencing it before me; we elected to avoid scary stuff for a while and I wanted him to play "Doom" first to find out how scary it was. There are a few parts in that game where the jump scares really are pretty good. Later on I gained a deeper appreciation of what horror does as a story device: from lighter queer horrors like Rocky Horror Picture Show, to intense "apocalyptic incel" thrillers like Miracle Mile, horror provides the templates needed to discuss the things that polite society won't. It's very different from wanting to view actually horrific, gory images, and it acts as a way of answering a lot of questions a kid might have. While visiting family I demonstrated to my nephew how getting too close to a squirrel might be bad by acting out the squirrel and "biting" by touching his hand and going "chomp". His reaction was instant and palpable and he immediately started warning his sisters of the squirrel 😂 I believe we need a lot of horror today because too many of the new things that have entered our lives have come with a "nothing to fear, let me help you with that" easy smile and wink. Meanwhile there are kids learning to be gang members and cultists on Roblox. The nephew and his sisters got Nintendo Switch last year as a way of getting them away from talking about Minecraft(which they wanted to consume in terms of KZfaq Minecraft media, not really playing the game). Maybe they just needed to be told that Herobrine would get them.

(Sorry in advance for the text wall. I just wanted to get this off my chest.) Your brief comment about Ban Ban being the fear of Mascot Horror becoming sanitized for babies, and treating said babies as dumb, can also be applied to when Backrooms started to become more meme than monster! (I’m not entirely counting Kane Pixels’ original take on the Backrooms, as while it can be argued that his series began a trend of copycats and bozos trying to pull a “Too Many Cooks” on the Backrooms, his series is genuinely good, interesting, and is a very awesome take on the original Backrooms concept/creepypasta!) I feel that Kane’s concept of the Backrooms, was (and kind of still is to a degree) a great balance between the original post of the Backrooms and concept of liminal spaces, while adding some new twists and ideas to tell his own story! (Async is such a cool name for a company imo!) However, I understand and agree that a lot of people (not counting genuine fan works) took the concept of different levels and monsters in the Backrooms and just overran the halls with cheap, uninspired content, or overcomplicated, FNAF-story-level lunacy! I still love the Backrooms, both Kane’s version and the basic general version, as well as a few other takes on the concept! And liminal spaces are still very cool and media that taps into that weird, off-putting feeling like the game No Players Online, or even photos of empty school hallways, or CG Renders or digital photorealistic images of unnatural looking architecture or items, are super interesting imo! But even I agree that trying to make something scary by adding more stuff, when that something’s lack of stuff or small number of stuff is what makes it scary in the first place, is like trying to squeeze a circular puzzle piece and a square puzzle piece into a square hole at the same time!

As someone who grew up on the internet and is very much into horror because of it, I don't think it's the worst thing ever for kids to get into horror pieces of media? I can't think of an instance of where I was overly traumatized or freaked out by anything (at least nothing that I remember) but a lot of franchises and series that I got into at a young age I would not let any kids i know now interact with it! I loved ddlc as a kid but there's no way in hell I would let a 10-year-old watch a playthrough of it! Personally I was fine but it still is definitely not an alright thing for kids to be consuming. The same with things that I'm interested in that aren't even horror. Am I grateful for the friends that I have gained from being in the Danganronpa fandom? Yes, but also I should definitely have NOT have gotten into it the summer between 4th and 5th grade! I barley knew what swear words were at that point I was still getting into fights with my friends over robux 😭

My parents never let me watch horror movies or anything like that when i was younger and I still developed bad anxiety. Ironically, now that I’m older I actually gravitate towards survival horror games lol

Amazing video, Apollo! Tbh, it’s exciting to see how internet horror evolved from stuff like Jeff The Killer to the modern stuff like The Mandela Catalogue or The Walten Files (I’m still new to internet ARG horror so forgive me if I’m wrong haha) but dude I remember playing Slender in high school and that shit freaked me out. Now I’m 26 years old and most horror stuff just make me laugh tbh. (Although if you involve living spiders, I will cry like a bitch) Love the video and cannot wait for the next one.

When i was a very tiny kid, my sister watched horror movies and really scared me So I was surprised with myself when FNAF 1 came out that I loved it Mostly because let players screaming was funny That made me seek out more horror related stuff, and while I get scared, I still enjoy it. Also, cause of FNAF, i am looking for horror Like, I can't tell you if I like FNAF came first or the Creepypasta I can tell you I had more fun with FNAF Creepypasta, by the time I got my hands on it, lost its horror (Slender Mansion, anyone?) So, from a kid who hated anything horror to a preteen/teen who likes horror to an adult who loves horror I really think it depends on the age and if the kid themselves seek it out. (I will laugh at my like of Chucky cause as a kid he terrified me so much that I refused to watch his movie.)

Yeeeees! Another Fiona vid

While I was never into horror, there was a TMNT 2012 Episode that absolutely terrified me as a kid called “In Dreams”.

I love horror i grew up with horror stuff i dont remember what was my first horror thing but I loved fnaf and movies/videos like chucky and orphan and mlp horror and i still love those movies and games but sometimes i see them to be childish as im older (mostly with fnaf) but i still love those stuff plus love the horror games as a joke or for fun this was always a strange topic so sorry if im not making sense

I don't really have any big thoughts on this one. Culture being culture, the interest of a cartoon or child esc style being fused with horror, cool stuff. Nice Video as always, Apollo. Also, it's funny that in lore of poppy playtime, the toys were supposed to be the best thing ever, and now, irl they're popular kids' plushies. Poppy has fulfilled its destiny ❤🥳

If a parent buys a horror game plushie for their kid, well, I think the developers did a good job with the characters or entity or whatever, growing up we had chucky from child's play but my grandma had a few of thse dolls that people often relate to horror because of how uncanny they look, still, people are afraid of clowns or big mascot suits so its not out of the ordinary, I just think that there's too much media out there to really make an informed purchase about every single thing you buy, so hopefully we can be a little more transparent about this.

I actually didn't get into horror until I became an adult, when I got to a point where I could watch it without feeling too freaked out. It was Bendy and The Ink Machine that bridged that gap for me as I really liked that so that got me to check out some other horror media. But now because I like mascot and analog horror I feel like I'm invading children's spaces and I'm childish because nine year olds freely consume this stuff while I couldn't handle it until I was 20. (I mean, maybe I could've handled it in my teens had it been around back then, but not when I was younger than 10, no way.)

So the video game skated it got me into abandoned building exploration type stuff so when I got a hold of KZfaq that's immediately what I started searching up and with abandoned stuff comes a whole slew of Horror video game playthroughs and criptids let's just say I did not sleep that night but I was addicted

I liked that you included Slenderman in the thumbnail 👌🏼

When i was a kid i used to watch lots of Goosebumps, and Paranormal ghost shows, and dont think its a bad thing, kids need to become brave, also get interested on these topics so they can learn how fake they are later in their teens

On the note of how popular jumpscares and screamers used to be... This is still a random fear that brings me a little dread. They aren't as popular now but there isn't anything stopping people from putting them in random videos again. Imagine you're just watching hermitcraft or doctor mike and chilling and there is a random jumpscare halfway through the video with no warning or build-up. It would be out of place and not fit the video, but that doesn't matter. The only thing stopping that is the youtuber just not wanting to include it. Any video at all, COULD have a jumpscare waiting for you... Thankfully they seem to pretty much stay in horror videos so you can kinda expect. But that could change, at any moment there could be a trend of a bunch of random cheap scares.

I was terrified of horror growing up. My imagination was so vivid and active that it wasn't even about how scary the original thing was. My imagination would twist it into something way worse. So in order to sleep at night, I tried to avoid horror at all costs. I recall hearing about it, but that's it.

"I wouldn't let a two-year-old watch The Shining." XD Interestingly, a lot of movies and shows that look and feel family friendly often have scary parts that are on equal footing with the horror movies we know and love. (This means you, 1985 version of Alice in Wonderland :P)

As a youngling i loved horror anything, it was interesting seeing the crazy stuff that horror could get away with in terms of tone and gore, but I was never scared or frightened by it just interested. I never got genuinely spooked or had to be protected by horror cause everyone in my house all love anything horror related so saying that a horror was age restricted or to lessen it for the kiddies was beyond stupid to us and always assumed anyone that talked like that were snowflakes. It's fine of you can't handle some horror elements, but don't expect everyone to be on the same wavelength or need to be protected from something that's a non issue. Horror abd violent media isn't real, influential or harmful. Let people consume what they want and stop trying to run others lives.

I feel like goosebumps has sorta fell out of relevancy in later years as you hear very little about it, so using that argument is as effective as a band aid on a beheading

Kids are definitely fine to engage with (age-appropriate) horror content. I mean, look at Thomas the Tank Engine. You wouldn't associate Thomas with horror, right? Wrong. And I'm not talking about The Sad Story of Henry. No, Thomas started introducing the children watching it to horror with series 2's Ghost Train (aired in 1986, and adapted from 1972's Tramway Engines) and series 3's Thomas, Percy and the Dragon (1991, TV original). Not scary enough to qualify as horror? Well then series 5 (1998, also TV original) has you covered with a whole host of stories like Haunted Henry, Toby's Discovery, Stepney Gets Lost, and Duncan Gets Spooked which, while maybe not scary with their outcome or once you understand what's happening, are definitely meant to be scary in their presentation until the viewer reaches the end of the story. And while the series always had action packed episodes with crashes and accidents that would be scary to experience if they happened in real life (e.g. The Flying Kipper, Down the Mine, Dirty Object), series 5 also cranked those stories up to 11 with "scary-action" episodes like Put Upon Percy, Toby and the Flood, and Rusty and the Boulder. Now, obviously a kid that's old enough to watch Thomas or Thunderbirds (which also plays in that family friendly "scary-action" space) isn't nearly old enough to watch even something like Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (thank you, dementors), nevermind adult horror. But if you give them some age-appropriate horror to engage with, they will love it, potentially even after they age out of the target demographic. To go back to Thomas, plenty of people who were fans of Thomas as kids now make their own Thomas stories in programs like Trainz and put them on KZfaq for other older fans to enjoy as well. And this of course includes Thomas horror. Some of the most memorable Thomas fan content I've seen have been Thomas horror for adults (those videos always have disclaimers warning viewers that it's not meant for kids, don't worry, even the non-horror ones). From fantastic standalone stories like As Silent as the Grave, Photographic Premonition, and A Part of Me Stayed Behind, to series like the Blue Snowplow's Horrors at Hawin Lake saga and Daylight 3's Forrest Horrors series where people will eagerly wait for the next installment. You can find ghost stories and psychological horror (see above). SCPs (Victor Tanzig's SCPs of Sodor). Body horror (Shed 17, Sodor Fallout). Whatever your preferred flavour of horror is. All because a book series started in the 40s by a reverend and a TV show about a talking train dared to respect kids' intelligence and resilience and slowly introduced them to horror that was appropriate for their age.

I always find it interesting how horror has children appeal, for I'd say in moderation horror can be shown to kids. But I obviously don't think I'll be showing a 5 year old Halloween or Friday the 13th.

4:53 God I'm so sick of this being remembered as an overreaction by nutters. The Y2K Bug was real! The reason it "never happened" was because from about 1995 onwards, a global initiative was set up to fix the bug. It did't come to nothing, it was defeated by people who worked very hard to do so. When all said and done, for all the bells and whistles a computer can basically be boiled down to what happens when a clock and a calculator have a baby lol. If your microwave went back to 1900 on december 1999, then nothing serious would happen sure, but if the timelock in your bank got confused that would be a BIG problem. Satelite navigation was in its infancy in 1999, but relies on computers in the network keeping perfect time. This was not something that never happened, it was defeated by smart people who don't get the credit they deserve.

Tbh I think all kids are drawn to horror media. My mom told me she used to secretly watch horror movies on the TV when my grandparents thought she was asleep. I used to read creepy pastas and now kids are obsessed with horror games. I think there's absolutely a place for horror content that's made for kids specifically like we had Goosebumps and Are you afraid of the dark. I'd rather see my kid get spooked by playing poppy playtime than watching old school slashers I guess.

20:03 can you elaborate on that because I don't know where that is coming from.

i don't think having children's horror existing is the problem, it's how you get to it, having the merch sit out in the open might not be very nice for young children but i've also really noticed a lot of online streaming shows are mislabelled, it's harder to figure out what is what now i'm getting older too, is live action avatar really as scary as live action one piece? i haven't watched it yet avatar and one piece aren't what i have a problem with, it's that castlevania is the same rating and that show has a lot of gore and other adult themes, perhaps they need different ratings per season but no season is okay for 12 i think, basically i also think the gap between 9 and 12 is too big with 9 not being intense enough but 12 being overwhelming. death in paradise on bbc is 9 but there's always a warning played before it saying parental supervision is advised, a lot of shows are like that where you can watch it at a yuonger age if you have a guardian or friend who already watched it, that's how i watched one piece, it's a lot more fun for me to know when it gets intense so i have a better idea of what i'm in for. the sitcom allo allo that is quite old so not really relevant is 6 i believe and that makes sense since it doesn't have anything graphic but the story is about a cafe owner cheating on his wife during world war two with his employees who are also sex workers. so i would say it is child appropriate IF there's an adult there. i also watched a single episode of son of zorn on disney plus which also had a 9 rating only to discover they talk about sex openly and it has dark humor involving gore. perhaps i am misunderstanding how the system works or the european ratings are fucked up but you can't trust them to be accurate anymore. anyway my point is that if there was a children's horror show on disney it would be fine but it has to state clearly what it is and they really do have the space to add some feature to add more detail to the age rating

I just hope Daggz get their KZfaq partner program back. They lost is just because the word children is on the title of the video

Not gonna give my age or anything, that's just not something I'm comfortable with sharing. But as a relatively early teenager who's avoided horror my whole life, the idea of young children enjoying horror is really interesting to me. Until the past year roughly, I haven't really engaged with horror at all, and even when I do, it's in a controlled environment, like video essays on horror games for example. This video was super interesting and helped me to better understand some people and why they enjoy what they do! So uh very cool video lol yippee

I really don’t think children liking these things are an issue per se, I think the companies capitalizing on children liking their horror IP’s is where the problem lies. It’s a pretty predatory business practice to knowingly peddle disturbing content, albeit dumbed down, to younger audiences. It tends to lower the quality of the products and make older audiences hesitant to engage since it’s seen as baby stuff. If more energy was put into making their horror projects more generally good to the point where all audiences can feasibly be into them, but still not skimp out on horror elements mascot horror tend to dance around (eg. blood, more mature themes, etc). That being said I don’t think there’s anything wrong with explicitly making horror content intended for younger audiences, it’s just embarrassing when they try to act like it’s for anyone to enjoy. Say it with your chest that your game is for babies and no one will have an issue with it. Kids get to feel cool still and adults won’t go out of their way to dunk on your evil Sesame Street project. Everyone wins.

Okay, let me give you some personal experiences with horror. In my psychological and sociological worldview of how people treat each other, horror is capable of teaching people that they're not as all-powerful, all-sane, or all-good as they think they are. I liked horror not just for the scares and thrills but because of the fact that it is a powerful tool to properly frame how power and freedom can both be abused and misused by others and how horrifically terrible the consequences of that misuse can be. Sure, other genres are capable of having the same effect, and to a certain extent what I want out of horror is less "shock and gore and super scary thrills" and more "fables" but I honestly do like and prefer this approach to horror for kids as it teaches them from an early age to be afraid of evil. They may not understand the *why should they* but as long as they understand that evil should be something to be feared and wary of, then it should be able to help them to be able to grow up into better people. In my opinion, the fear of evil is something that informed my childhood development rather well. Heck, it works so well that when I see even a small prejudicial comment come out of people's mouths without them really realizing that it is even prejudicial, or even a minor act of arrogance, I can identify it and feel perturbed by it, even occasionally pointing out that I am disturbed by the comment they made, even if I cannot put it into words why. I like to imagine that most child horror likes to put the consequences of one's actions into the spotlight. It is what kept me so closely fascinated by Abandoned By Disney and Five Nights at Freddie's because I thought the latter would dive deep into the consequences of William Afton's actions, the fact that William took away the lives of countless children and ruined several families. I wanted to see the FNAF games go deep into the corruption of Freddy's corporation, probably more or less like Neon Genesis Evangelion... wait a second. Did I want FNAF to be like Neon Genesis Evangelion? Oh my goodness, imagine how cool that could have been! Scott, you had one job and you not only blew it, you straight up did nothing to recover towards it. Anyway, as for Abandoned By Disney, it is basically the entire philosophy behind gLiTcH and The Shadow World, with the latter being the corruption of creativity and being the abstract concept of an entire mindset that can manifest into our reality and ruin everything. The former, on the other hand, is the exact opposite, it is the pure untainted creativity that just wants to chaotically go everywhere. Abandoned By Disney fascinated me, and I want to make something that not only pays homage to it but elevates its own concepts and pushes its themes into high gear. Also, your relationship with horror echoes my early relationship with horror up until I met several horror content creators like Pastra or the rest of the FNAF community (excluding MatPat because I seriously do not like the guy, his channel is honestly not the best despite being very well made. He's not a cynical, low-quality type of creator, if anything else I would say that his ideas are usually very interesting and the guy is a bundle of fun, and it makes it all the more painful to say that how he tries to pass off his videos as facts while barely being able to differentiate his videos' logic as being ironic because the guy clearly does try to pastiche a "funny know-it-all nerd who tries too hard to be cool with everyone" but it does not gel well with whenever he tries to be genuinely serious and gives rather great deductions compared to his batshit insane and out of nowhere, not brand-friendly and not realistically going to happen claims of things that he says are going to happen and if you disagree with him you are denying his facts. Honestly, I like the guy as much as I hate him, and when I found out that he was leaving the internet I was more concerned than anything else about his replacement because I am going to get the feeling that his successor is going to either have a look at his channel and have a "if it is not broken, then do not fix it" or, in the miraculous circumstance where this new individual actually has a great deal of better hindsight and retrospection, realizes that there are parts to MatPat that are scummy and he needs to scrub out the scum.) Honestly, it was one of the biggest 180s in my attitude towards horror as I first started to think "Meh, horror cannot possibly be that interesting or insightful" until I found out that it could not only be both, but a lot about horror can be rather great, especially for kids. It can be entertaining and goofy while still being scary as provided by that furry who created Lethal Company, it can be just scary but not downright traumatizing like Mandela Catalog and The Walten Files, and more, it can even just be certain parts of certain movies and it can just stick with people, it does not even have to be the core premise of the property it is in, it can just exist in some parts of some movies. Horror can be fascinatingly multi-faceted in just how it scares people and what function that fear can serve. However, the stuff that is horror but does not fit within my parameters of, you know, being healthy or made with the best intentions aka predatorily capitalistic horror properties are the kind of stuff that I honestly dislike. Horror should be something responsibly wielded, not something that is just dumped onto kids for the sake of profit.

tbh as an unsupervised internet access, creepypasta, and fnaf kid I don’t get why the abundance of child focused horror is an issue

Most people don't realize but Y2K actually COULD have been big. The problem was that a lot of credit cards and things like that only used the last two digits of the year, automatically putting "19..." In front. So what could have happened is just about everything with a date would come up not existing yet because the computer thought it was the year 1900. The problem was easy to solve, just add the missing digits. It was just a lot of work because so much needed updating.

Out of curiosity, some people call you Apollo for short and I was wondering if your username was to be split into two words, would it be fion Apollo or Fiona pollo?

Wasn't there a an Amazing world of gumball episode that started with a chain mail?

I think the children should engage in even more horrifying fiction, five nights at freddys isnt nearly as scary as coraline or the scene in watership down where the rabbits get buried alive. I wrote a story where a woman got her head crushed by her husband when I was twelve kids these days are weak. (Hyperbolic on the weak statement i think its fine to not grow up reading watching horror lol)

16:24 not me playin minecraft rn 💀

6:04 it would be even scarier if you don't know 10 people :P

As someone who grew up on horror, i have to say there's nothing wrong with kids watching and enjoying horror media as long as the parents are monitoring what content is in said piece. Now that said mascot horror is honestly crap to sell toys

nothing to fear but fear itself, right?

The issue is the dark subject matter in some of these games like kidnapping and child murder

the problem is that kids will buy anything cute and not care what francise its apart of.

Legit I'm such a whimp, I went through this vid as a podcast just to be sure 😅

Im a fan of mascot horror, but i really like psychological horror as well. A game that uses psychological horror well in my opinion is Omori. NO kid under at the very least 9 if you wanna stretch it should play that game. It might make them want to do an *OYASUMI~~*

Fnaf game came out when I ten year old😊😊😊😊

Slenderman cosplays… are you sure those are cosplayers? I apologize this is an awful joke…

I think whe are in the most "safe" era for childrens

Tbh I've never cared for horror and it goes doubly for stuff like five nights at Freddy's. Just feels like nonsense for angsty teens

My only problem with FNAF is the creator is kinda a horrible guy. But that's not about the horror. (also it uses cheap-ass jump scares)

Yeah, I’m not making video games for children, not if it’s horror, at least.

Never been a big fan of the horror genre myself. The media surrounding horror content and some small subgenres can be interesting though Take BatIM, I would never have even considered playing the game until I started listening to music born from the game. After listening to many amazing pieces like "Artistic Hallowing" and "Face Reality" I've become intreged enough in the universe that I'll actually get the game just to understand the songs better. It's fascinating to me the horror can provoke such works That being said, I do enjoy some horror games, like the Dark Pictures anthology series Hiten, too, has got me interested in some subgenres through thier Goretober video Also, I've actually been watching things on KZfaq on "I Have No Mouth But I Must Scream". It's a very fascinating story. I came across it through the hate monologue, specifically this one kzfaq.info/get/bejne/bqx6a9OFsJ6yaH0.htmlsi=UsLnxE0O6hIVKCHF

Haha i hated horror when I was young XD I’m neutral towards it now, but yeah I’ve seen a lot of FNAF-like games floating around :O it’s interesting how it blew up so much