Review of Poppy Playtime Chapter 3: Avoid sleeping on CatNap
Our Verdict
Poppy Playtime Chapter 3 is an enthralling entry into the iconic series, bringing even more fearsome foes, perplexing puzzles, and juicy lore than its predecessors, and building upon existing mechanics and narratives to bring you a fresh and frightful experience. Unfortunately, some performance issues and bugs hold it back, but should Mob Entertainment roll out those promised fixes, it deserves a near-perfect score.
The series Poppy Playtime has a moniker that undoubtedly comes before it. You've probably heard of Huggy Wuggy by now, or at the very least seen a thousand of them in the wild, whether or not you've played the first two chapters. Its distinct visual aesthetic, captivating gameplay, fascinating premise and location, and plenty of lore make it a well-deserved celebrity, however, and over the last few years, it has solidly earned its spot in the horror hall of fame.
Now that the happy hour has arrived, the narrative continues, with CatNap attempting to induce a deep slumber for all of us. As your gas mask in stand-in, I will guide you through this Poppy Playtime Chapter 3 review. Well, and I'll try not to provide any spoilers, but I can assure you that Playcare is full of surprises, so it's best played without any prior knowledge.
Naturally, the conclusion of Poppy Playtime Chapter 2 was a little dramatic, with the train we were riding on colliding and Poppy warning us that she wouldn't let us get off. However, let's set that aside for a second. Chapter 3 opens with a throwback animation presenting the Grinning Critters and, most significantly, Poppy Playtime’s CatNap, the primary enemy of this new chapter.
As usual, the animation is quite gory, with a collection of terrified animals pleading for CatNap to put them to sleep. After some dubious accusations, Playtime Co. has virtually removed the contentious cat from the record—erasing all of his advertising images and recalling him from sale—according to a brief news article. After that, we're back at the Poppy Playtime factory, where we're thrown into a chute and have to try to get out of a garbage crusher before anything more happens.
The third chapter takes place at Playcare, the orphanage established under the factory by Playtime Co. and Poppy Playtime's Elliot Ludwig. Playcare's courtyard serves as a central hub, branching out into several destinations that you must go through in a certain sequence, much like the Game Station in Chapter 2.
The courtyard, with its artificial grass and painted sky evoking a scene from Sesame Street, is marvelously foreboding. Of course, it's seen better days; there are massive dings, broken toys, and broken furniture all over the place. It's a fantastic focal point that really conveys the well-known contrast between youthful innocence and the horrors of what transpired in the factory. Approaching it truly inspires a feeling of terrified amazement.
There are several distinct places on the map, each instanced independently. The Sweet Home—a big, old building that served as the orphanage itself—the school, the Playhouse—a structure with multiple play areas inside that looks like a circus tent on the outside—and the counselor's office are the places you visit in that order, with sporadic detours to control rooms behind the scenes. As always, each area has its own aura and hazards, which adds to the suspense and terror of exploring them.
The gameplay sticks to the blueprint established in the prior two chapters. Your main objective is what motivates you to walk into each place, where you have to solve puzzles, utilize various equipment, navigate your dangerous surroundings, and get out of tense pursuit scenes.
The problems in Chapter 3 do a fantastic job of adding new aspects to the same framework seen in the prior chapters. There's no denying that these puzzles are now much more challenging, with new elements like turrets and GrabPack attachments contributing to the intricacy of each task.
In Chapter 3, the stakes are raised by more than just the problems. When I initially entered Sweet Home, I was pleasantly shocked by the claustrophobic terror that awaited me. I was left hopelessly roaming down endless hallways while being pursued by shadows while I made a valiant attempt to return to reality. It doesn't stop there, however, as Deep Sleep does an incredible job at drawing from a range of horror subgenres, keeping you on edge and defying your expectations at every turn.
The first actual pursuit scene you come across, which involves a figure that Mob Entertainment has kept completely secret prior to release, is another excellent illustration of this. This chapter deviates from the prior two's linear pursuits by having you weave through several rooms and halls while figuring out riddles to unlock shutters in time to make your getaway.
Although I love horror games, I don't think pursuit scenes are all that great; in fact, I find them to be the most annoying. I do have to give this pursuit credit, however, for how intense it is at first, as you scurry and do your hardest to make sense of the maze that lies before of you.
This part definitely takes a few tries (or a good walkthrough) to get through because there isn't much room for error and you have to figure out the route to survive. In my experience, this makes the fear less real because you become too familiar with the monster, but it's well worth the effort and gives you a great sense of accomplishment when you succeed.
All of this builds to an epic battle with CatNap at the conclusion, when we manage numerous systems at once while using a number of techniques we've learned during the chapter. This part is nearly exactly like the FNAF games. A really rewarding end to an incredibly stormy chapter, it's nerve-wracking and also a little melancholy as you defeat yet another nemesis. As always, it also begs additional questions and gives you a tantalizing peek at what will happen in the following chapter.
The story is just as dark and twisty as we've come to anticipate from this series. It keeps expanding on the Poppy Playtime universe, revealing some really intriguing nuggets of information that should keep theorists occupied for some time to come. It also raises a number of new questions, all of which I am eager to learn the answers to. Though it's the longest chapter we've got so far, Chapter 3 isn't short on content—you might spend three to five hours reading it if you take your time and pay close attention to all the little nuances.
You get even more details about the history of Playtime Co., Play Care, and all of the Poppy Playtime characters, such as CatNap and the Prototype, via cutscenes, environmental hints, and those collecting VHS tapes. It's delicious, and the thrilling conclusion has me glued to the edge of my seat, eagerly awaiting Chapter 4.
Chapter 3's sound design carries on with its delightfully creepy blend of background sounds interspersed with occasional musical pieces to heighten the mood and excellent voice acting from both adversaries and friends. The feeling of urgency in the moment is further enhanced by some really creative compositions that also use bells and sirens.
So what is the performance of Poppy Playtime Chapter 3? To be completely honest, I was only able to play the PC version of the game for this review, so I am unable to speak on Chapter 3's performance on the Switch at this time. In terms of PC graphics, they are stunning overall and a significant increase over the previous two chapters. There are jaw-dropping settings and an overwhelming amount of gory details, making it difficult to take it all in at first. Additionally, there are seldom any framerate dips or stutters, load screens load quickly, and the controls seem fairly snappy overall.
Sadly, there were a lot of flaws in the pre-release version that I was able to test. There were several places where a lack of polish hampered my experience, from batteries and cables not functioning as intended to monsters becoming stuck in shutters or phasing through objects. I can only be thankful that checkpoints are rather frequent, or I might have ended up throwing my keyboard and mouse out the window.
Positively, Mob Entertainment has already committed to releasing minor updates every day after debut. When I contacted the development team, they reassured me that all of the issues I pointed out were known bugs that had been or were already recognized and would be fixed as the staff worked to update the game every day of the week.
Because of this, I'm going to give it the benefit of the doubt in this situation and have trust that these problems will be fixed quickly, allowing us to soon appreciate this amazing chapter in all of its grandeur. To be really honest, however, I wish these glitches hadn't plagued my initial playtime and that it had been put in the oven to bake for a further week or two.
Poppy Playtime Chapter 3 is an all-around amazing continuation of the beloved series, bringing some captivating new features to the mix while retaining all of the enchantment that made the previous two volumes so beloved. If the game receives the attention it needs in the next updates, it should amaze every PP fan out there with its abundance of captivating puzzles, scary chase scenes, and surprises.
Check out our Poppy Playtime Chapter 1 review and Poppy Playtime Chapter 2 review if you need a refresher, or visit our Poppy Playtime Chapter 1 walkthrough to discover where it all started. In case you want your own wuggy to huggy, we also have a very fascinating Poppy Playtime interview with Mob Entertainment and a list of the top Poppy Playtime toys.