My Friendly Neighborhood

Muppets Take Manhattan, Muppets In Space, Muppets Christmas Carol, Muppets meet Resident Evil. That last one isn’t from my childhood (Resident Evil defo is though), but rather the infusion tagline that best describes what is a new classic survival horror title. From Evan Szymanski, the Ducky developer, My Friendly Neighborhood brings us back to the 1990s, and has us trapped inside a closed TV studio that’s filled with sentient puppets that have run a-muck, causing havoc.

I reviewed My Friendly Neighborhood back in 2023, and after two years locked on PC, the game is finally on consoles. Has my opinion changed? Not really, I still think this is a fantastic game that, over the years, has seen updates and new content, which makes it even better. But if you want me to explain again, then read on!


These puppets don’t need strings

Now, I understand that Evan Szymanski despises Mascot Horror, and I’m quite inclined to agree. While I did enjoy some elements of the Five Nights games, and the Poppy Playtime games are decent… I do utterly hate the shallow capitalisation, and very samey approach to horror designs and all. Even the recent Finding Frankie just oozes the same mundane, shallow tripe the sub-genre has been spewing out for quite a while now…

And My Friendly Neighborhood is very much the anti-mascot horror game, and more frankly, a very friendly survival horror game at its core. If Crow Country had a lighter-hearted sibling, then this is it. Even children can play this, despite some mild scares. At its core, My Friendly Neighborhood, or MFN, is quite a wholesome, sweet game, and very light on the violent horror. It’s much more slapstick, comedic, and while the puppets are quite menacing in their nature, their designs are quite colourful, and it plays well into something looking cute, but being dangerous more effectively than what we tend to get with mascot horror trash.

MFN is about Gordon, a repairman and former Vietnam War vet, who is down on his luck and facing the chop from his employer if he doesn’t shape up. The last job of the day takes him to the long-abandoned MFN studio, which appears to have an active antenna, recently coming to life after so many years off the air. As Gordon enters the studio he is greeted by Ricky, a sentient sock puppet who advises him that everything is alive and well, with the show coming back on the air.

Gordon, under orders from his boss, has to shut down the antenna, but it’ll take a bit of legwork to reach the top of the tower, which is locked off, and he has to deal with the other puppets in his way, who are far less friendly than Ricky.

What follows is far different from any Resident Evil, or be it, any traditional horror game for that matter. You are working towards one goal, and that is reaching the tower to switch off the signal. What follows is a series of smaller, interwoven objectives, finding keys, special items, and dealing with the roaming puppets. But there are some original twists and turns in the plot department. Being that, you have a choice to help out key characters or not, and instead of being a total devastating force of destruction, you’re more restraining and holding back the puppets, rather than outright killing them.

If not in the right hands, the whole thing could’ve ended up being super cheesy and naff, but honestly, I found much of MFN and its message incredibly endearing and a nice change from the usual doom and gloom. I won’t say much more on the story, as it’s nice to go in as blind as possible, and figure things out yourself and make the calls to help or not.

But the setting is very cool, Gordon is likeable, and Ricky is a nice little conscience character to deliver some exposition and moral thematics that don’t feel over preachy. There is plenty of lore, but it’s not overcomplicated, or up its own arse like certain other mascot horror games. It’s a well-constructed and wholly thoughtful story that does something different as a horror game.


Muppet Evil

While the story brings new energy for the survival horror genre, the gameplay is pretty pinpoint to how a classic RE game would play.

Gordon is somewhat trained in combat, so he’s able to use weapons like a big wrench or weird guns that shoot letters of the alphabet. He’ll need to explore various environments in a massive interconnected map, collecting key items for locked doors, combining special items to progress further, or to solve puzzles that reward you, yep, you guessed it, more keys! You’ll be doing a fair bit of backtracking as you’ll gain keys and other items which open up new areas in previously visited ones.

Along the way, there will be, of course, dangerous puppets looking to give you a big old cuddle to death, but they can be dealt with one of the few weapons on offer, including a makeshift/unusual handgun, shotgun, grenades, and a mini-gun, which you get through a secret quest. 

As for the exploration, MFN smashes it as the world is wonderfully designed and paced out to incorporate a nice amount of searching, backtracking and discovery that will keep you invested and hooked. Playing this again and knowing where everything was didn’t stop me from just getting immersed again, and it had me playing quite a fair amount of the days I was reviewing it. MFN has all the right elements, executed in the best possible way to encourage meaningful exploration and discovery of new puzzles, items, and backtracking that gives you a sense of accomplishment, only great survival horror games can deliver.

And while the main setting is a TV studio, there are plenty of neat quirks and creative choices made that make it vastly more interesting, and in line with something like the Spencer Mansion. I will admit, the last section of the game feels a little rushed, and while the last couple of areas are cool, they don’t last long at all. It would’ve been good to get a little more time here, or maybe even something completely wild to throw us off a bit.

There’s no secret lab, thank god, but there’s also a feeling of the developers kind of not knowing where to focus the wrap-up on, and rush through a couple of ideas they had clearly.

Combat is fairly straightforward, nothing complex or exciting. But it’s the resource management, deciding on what puppets to restrain, and the back of forth of exploration and managing danger that makes things interesting. Plus, the lateral elements are generally quite thoughtful, engaging, and do make you think a fair bit, and are always quite a joy to resolve. There were a couple which I didn’t like, especially in my original review. But I was less frustrated with them this time around, even though one or two moments still had me scratching my head in annoyance. But the puzzles are far better than most recent Resident Evil games, that’s for sure.

Plus, there were a couple of cool secrets to find here. I mentioned one weapon requires a neat little detour, and some other loot creates goodies that need some additional work, which I find quite charming and cool. There is, however, one secret room which, while I get the intention of as it makes fun of Five Nights, just felt utterly disappointing since it took so much legwork to resolve.

Aside from that, the world design/map is engaging and immersive, with lots of fun details and discoveries. While combat is not all that enthralling, the resource management and decision-making are thoroughly enjoyable and gripping. And best of all, now the game has seen several updates, there are quite a few new inclusions to add a massive amount of replay value. Such as additional game modes, and of course, the secrets you can find and switch on after your first playthrough. MFN feels like a classic survival horror game, with all the great additional content, the excellent puzzles and world design, and thrilling encounters and resource management that will leave you in a cold sweat.


Overall?

My Friendly Neighbourhood still stands out as a stellar survival horror experience, which does things quite differently. It’s an enjoyable, light-hearted, yet still unnerving at times, horror experience delivering refined excellence for lateral, exploration and resource management gameplay.

I am so thankful that survival horror continues to see a boom after it’s revival from the grave many years ago on the indie scene, and with the likes of Crow Country, MFN is just another brilliant horror game that makes fun of the mascot horror tropes and trash, and giving us something honest, oddly wholesome, and still kind of scary with great, survival horror tropes we will never get tired of.

+++ Compelling survival horror gameplay and design
++ Nice story with plenty of heart
++ Great amount of additional content

- Some naff moments with a poor secret or end areas

An Xbox Series X/S review key of My Friendly Neighbourhood was kindly provided by the publisher