Finding Frankie

Mascot horror! For a sub-genre that has some of the most prolific horror games in the last 30 years, there are massive gaps between FNAF and Poppy Playtime. There is a huge market to create a horror game where you run away from big, cuddly, horrifying monsters in a fun-themed setting, and be it all lore-driven with a disturbing backstory. Enter Finding Frankie, a parkour-centred mascot horror game, where you are the lucky contestant of a lucky dip which sees you visit Frankie’s Parkour Palace in a bid for a massive cash prize. But imagine Charlie and the Chocolate Factory taking a dark, murderous turn …. Oh. Imagine that with a giant killer robot rabbit, parkour and a killer soundtrack.


What is Finding Frankie?

Finding Frankie is the latest in an oddly short line of mascot horror games, which aims to deliver the chills, jumps cares, running set pieces, iconic monsters, and of course a line of merchandise that will make the publishers lots of money (you can buy Henry Hotline and Frankies dolls on eBay as I write this review).

The gimmick with this mascot horror title is the parkouring, as you’re a contestant in Frankie’s Parkour Palace, a mega structure filled with trampolines, wall running, death, and many, many giant saw blades. The rules are simple: parkour like your life means it, or you’ll lose your life. In return, 5 million dollars, and a badge that says you survived.

That’s the gist of Finding Frankie, and in all fairness, it’s quite a compelling one. We do get a lot of running away in horror games, and even more so in mascot horror games, as you don’t tend to have a means to defend yourself like in say, RE7. So being able to run, escape monsters and evade death traps in a colourfully disturbing setting is neat. And now, having played this game like 7 times, I respect and even love a couple of things about it, but feel it falls somewhat short compared to another mascot horror game, where playtime is the key event.


Frankie!? Where are you?

The setting and premise do shine through, as I love the idea of a sinister indoor adventure park doing a battle royale with parkour. And while the vibe and general tone of the setting is nothing new, be it a toy factory, restaurant and now an indoor park, the developers have made the absolute most of what they had here. And I can tell this is quite a low-budget production due to the short length and some limitations, which are clear as day. They do bring about a genuinely terrifying place, covered in blood, death, and funny-looking rabbits wearing silly hats that brought disturbed chuckles from me a good chunk of the time.

We get water park themed rooms, epic chases through colourful hallways filled with locked doors and pit falls, mazes bathed in darkness and a room filled with trampolines which brought the worse set piece of the game (more on that later). It’s all here as you might imagine, and I loved that.

Alongside the great setting are a limited, but inventive roster of characters, including Hotline Henry, a devious-sounding humanoid with a phone for a head who can’t stand the infernal ringing of the phones. Deputy Duck, an unwilling helper and companion through some of the game, and Frankie himself, or the few there are! While not leaving the same impact as Mommy Longlegs or the Doctor from Poppy Playtime, I did enjoy the performances from the voice actors, the designs, and the unnerving presence they brought about. Plus, I felt bad for poor old Deputy Duck …

That said, there is very little in lore to find and read up on. I know these types of games have lots of scattered information revealed over time, and this is just the first (out of multiple possible games) Frankie game, so I will give it some slack. But the building blocks of the mystery, from what I gathered, are not all that compelling right now, and it seems like this is more to drive speculation from fans, which it is. Fans are already going mental thinking about what the actual f*** is going on, and that’s kind of cool. To be honest, when these stories reveal much more, they lose some magic, and usually it revolves around a major event that sets things in motion. i.e The Hour of Joy, for those who know.

Finding Frankie has a deep, dark mystery with many questions, like why the police don’t shut down the adventure park after finding multiple bodies, and Frankie is on his 57th season of steaming murders… It’s weird, and I would bash it more, but I do see a very twisted sense of humour.

Plus I did like the little tidbits of randomness that kept me invested, like seeing a big Frankie rabbit in the basement helping me out in one section, or finding the CEO's office, which was genuinely one of the most chilling things I’ve played in a video game. It’s downright creepy.

Overall, the setting enemies and little mystery bits are cool, even if the story is lacking for me at this moment.


Oh, there you are Frankie .. my what big teeth you have

Right, let’s talk about all that lovely parkour then!

As the unlucky contestant, you’re quite spry on your feet, being able to endlessly sprint, slide, wall jump, swing from monkey bars, and do epic sliding jump kicks which launch you across great distances faster than a SpaceX rocket … before they explode.

Most of these skills are greatly tested with various obstacles and terrains, be it running along moving platforms, running away while being chased, hopping over massive saw blades, and jumping on trampolines (yay!). The concept is solid, and the execution is mostly good.

Again, it’s worth noting that this is not Mirror’s Edge, and very much so a lower-budget affair. For the running, sliding, and jumping, for the most part, it’s good, and the platforming that comes from it is stable, enjoyable and the right amount of intensity needed. As for some of the other manoeuvres… they’re rubbish. I found swinging from monkey bars to just be janky as all Hell, and the wall jumping/run is so underused I wondered why they even included it in the 2, maybe 3 sections I saw it in.

It’s quite clear this was all new ground for the developers, and for significant parts of the game, they were confident in their design skills. Coming to some of the parkour stuff, it should have been massively refined or thrown out altogether. The swinging could work if it were like DOOM: Eternal, and the wall running worked decently, and could have been utilised in more set pieces, but you can tell the developers had so little faith in the monkey bar swing that it only comes up three times in the entire game.

It is a shame as much of the parkour is fun, not stellar, but good enough and reliable enough to be enjoyable. But this limitation with parkour manoeuvres results in a fair bit of repetition, and a desire to see/play more. However, what works for the movement works especially well when it comes to the chase sequences and a couple of other set pieces.

Speaking of some of these are downright awesome, and the game, while being short, does pace everything out quite nicely. The chase sequences are grand, intense, relying on quick thinking, reaction times, and reflexes. At moments, the chases do feel very, very close, and a bit too trial and error for my liking, but honestly are still good fun. Other moments, such as the maze where you have to find old-timey phones, a human-sized conveyer belt of death, or the finale, which is just f***ing epic, are pretty darn awesome, giving Poppy a run for their money.

What I didn’t enjoy so much was the constant use of finding circuit breakers… This game loves getting you to find and interact with several circuit breakers in a short amount of time to open a gate to the next area. When I did this 4 times within 5 minutes, I was just bewildered and a little irritated This became the main lateral thing to do in the game. It became so dull by the half way point, but one moment it did work was in a basement section where you’re being stalked. Here it worked, and once in a chase sequence it did also, otherwise it was just lame.

So in general, it’s a mixed bag but more good than bad. With great set pieces, pacing, chase sequences, some good scares, it does come with limited parkour, one dull puzzle that repeats itself over and over, and some cheap moments which let it down slightly.

Those cheap moments could be avoided if the game had better accessibility options, or just options such as brightness, which have been in gaming since the dawn of gaming. But at its core, Finding Frankie has a solid gameplay loop, with some massively inventive set pieces, and a good understanding of utilising most of the parkour elements. It’s a shame that some of the parkour stuff is so flat, and annoyingly, a couple of other smaller elements are utilised all that well either.  The Deputy Duck companion can emit a flash of light, and has a useful radar feature, but is seen for about a third of the game … which made me question why even have him?

However, my gripes aren’t major, just disappointment overall. Plus, this game has an insanely good soundtrack! I’m not kidding when I say I love the soundtrack, especially the Hotline Henry chase, and the finale. These tracks just slap something good and make the game just that bit sweeter in my opinion. Oh, and one line of dialogue uttered in the finale will go down in gaming history. If you know, you know the line I mean!

Oh, and Finding Frankie needed an encounter replay feature, as some of these moments are so good they’re worth playing again.


STOP MESSING UP MY… Overall

Finding Frankie is bound to find the sweet spot in the mascot horror market, as it has all the right elements to be a cult classic, even if there are some rough patches to iron out.

While I did find some disappointment and annoyance with certain parkour elements, accessibility, and the story, I did vastly enjoy the weird characters, the awesome set-pieces, the amazing soundtrack, and the general vibes. There is a lot here to like, and it’s worth playing through the “eh” bits for sure. I managed to play this like 7 times, and never got bored through any playthrough.  

I did enjoy my time with Frankie and in his horrifying parkour palace to the point where I hope there is a sequel so that the rough edges are smoothed out and we get a better experience from the developers. Worth checking out and wishing the developers all the best, so that Frankie and his streaming show can be renewed for season 58!


++ Compelling concept and setting
+ Some cool monsters, and world building
+ Great set pieces and fun chases
+ Awesome soundtrack

-- Parkour movement could be refined and developed better
- Some cheap moments and lacking in accessibility options
- Quite short in length and lacks any unlockable modes or chapter select


The publisher kindly provided a review code of Finding Frankie