Game Theory- FNAF, Help Wanted 2 Proves Us RIGHT!
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00:00 about an end and a beginning and an end and an end.
00:02 There once was a boy covered in scars.
00:05 He was so ashamed of his scars, he refused to look in a mirror.
00:10 This lasted for so long, he eventually forgot they were ever there.
00:14 Years passed until one day, this boy would come to the edge of a dark forest.
00:20 There he saw a rabbit. He followed the rabbit as it scampered through the woods.
00:24 They went up over logs and around trees until he was eventually led to a beautiful flower.
00:30 The scar-faced boy, now a grown man, plucked the flower to give to his daughter.
00:35 But upon touching it, she died.
00:38 For the flower was poisonous, and the man returned to the forest to play.
00:43 Hello, Internet! Welcome to Game Theory, the show that encourages you to be Masked Off.
00:51 Ladies and gentlemen, it is time to conclude the year of FNAF.
00:55 With tales from the Pizzaplex books releasing every two months,
00:57 the Ruin DLC release back in July, and the FNAF movie happening in October,
01:01 2023 really did feel like the classic days of FNAF all over again,
01:05 where there was a new release happening every few months.
01:07 And to end the year of FNAF on an insanely high note,
01:10 Steel Wall decided to pull one final trick out of the Scott Cawthon playbook.
01:14 They released a second game within six months of Ruin,
01:17 a completely unexpected but very exciting sequel to FNAF VR, Help Wanted.
01:22 And let me tell you, they couldn't have released a more perfect game at a more perfect time.
01:27 Because at a moment of peak frustration with the fanbase,
01:29 when Foxy, Stanz, and Bonnie Bros had all collectively thrown up their hands in desperation,
01:33 this game swooped in to deliver the answers that they so desperately needed.
01:37 If the narrative of FNAF is kind of like a cracked piece of pavement
01:40 constantly on the verge of crumbling into dust,
01:42 this game was the cement filling in the crevices,
01:45 patching up all the holes in the narrative just enough to give the whole thing a solid foundation again.
01:50 At least for another couple of months.
01:52 And I really do mean that.
01:53 Not since FNAF 6 has there been a Freddy's game so determined to tie up loose ends
01:57 and deliver answers to the lingering questions that have been piling up in the background.
02:01 Basically, Help Wanted 2 single-handedly put a close on one major story arc,
02:04 while also opening the door to another, a next generation.
02:08 It's an ending and a beginning, all in one,
02:10 depicting a cycle of violence that shows that you're never truly out of the woods
02:14 when you're in the world of FNAF.
02:15 In short, it's probably the single most important game release in the last six years for this franchise.
02:20 So today, we're gonna solve this game together to see what it's trying to tell us
02:24 and where it's pointing the series moving forward.
02:26 So grab your Faz-wrenches and get ready to step into madness, theorists.
02:30 Today, finally, we're gonna see what lies behind the mask.
02:34 As the game opens, we're welcomed in as a new employee of the pizzeria.
02:37 "Fazbear Entertainment is offering a new on-the-job training position for a future pizza professional."
02:43 And after that short intro, we're immediately thrust into a pizzeria hub world full of training minigames,
02:48 all while Helpy cheers us forward from his little projector in the corner.
02:51 But very quickly, one question starts to rear its ugly head.
02:55 Who are we? Who are we playing as?
02:57 Throughout the various mini-missions that we're presented with,
02:59 one line that we hear repeated over and over again is,
03:01 "What makes you so special?"
03:03 Three separate characters all bring it up.
03:05 Moon, Baby, even Mystic Hippo.
03:07 "What makes you so special?"
03:11 "What makes you so special?"
03:13 "What makes you so special?"
03:17 Considering everyone keeps asking us, we should probably have ourselves an answer ready for 'em, right?
03:21 Well, we get a solid idea of who we might be,
03:23 thanks to plenty of explicit clues that are sprinkled throughout the game.
03:25 First and foremost, we know that we're a Faz technician.
03:28 Midway through the game, you unlock a Faz wrench that allows you to access a secret back area of the pizzeria.
03:33 In that back room, there's a glowing tower that should look familiar to anyone who played through the Ruin DLC earlier this year.
03:39 An inhibitor.
03:40 Back in that game, these devices stopped you from being able to remove your AR-enabled Vanny mask.
03:45 But that's silly, why would that matter here?
03:46 It's not like we're wearing a maaaaaask.
03:48 Or are we?
03:49 Sure enough, deactivating the tower allows you to reach up and remove the AR mask that's been stuck to your face since you first booted up the game.
03:58 Suddenly, you see that this entire time, you've been inside of a derelict pizzeria.
04:02 Worn down.
04:02 Decayed.
04:03 And this isn't just any Ruin pizzeria, it's the FNAF 6 location.
04:07 Complete with a recharge station and a Freddy Spaghetti hole front and center.
04:11 Not only is this just a fantastic mid-game twist that completely recontextualizes everything that you thought you knew about this game world,
04:18 but it also helps confirm who we are and why we're down here.
04:22 You see, us having a Vanny mask?
04:23 It's weird, right?
04:24 Like, who are we?
04:25 Why would we have something like this in our possession?
04:28 Well, it has to do with our job.
04:29 In Ruin, Helpy tells us that these AR masks were worn to help technicians navigate through the destroyed pizzaplex.
04:36 Now, when I first saw that in the game, I was convinced that it was a trick just to get us to wear the mask and teach us the mechanics of this new game.
04:42 But here we are in Help Wanted 2, in a destroyed pizzaplex wearing a Vanny mask.
04:46 And right there on the wall is a poster telling staff members to make sure they remove the mask at the end of the day.
04:51 It proves that what Helpy was saying, at least in this moment, wasn't a trick.
04:54 The mask is in fact a real tool that's used by Fazbear technicians, for as strange of a concept as that is.
05:00 So, we're a technician for the restaurant, sure.
05:02 But that's not the only thing we know.
05:03 Our next clue comes in the form of the FazWrench.
05:06 Midway through the game, you unlock this tool which allows you access to the back area of the pizzeria.
05:10 Upon unlocking it, the mystic Hippo Carnibooth says that the key is familiar to us.
05:14 "Look at Mr. Gumbel!"
05:15 "He is familiar to you."
05:16 So, we know that we're someone who's used this tool in the past.
05:19 Immediately, that should bring to mind one person, Cassie's dad.
05:23 Earlier this year in the Security Breach Ruin DLC, we were introduced to a young girl named Cassie,
05:27 who goes on a mission to rescue her friend Gregory from the destroyed remains of the derelict pizzaplex.
05:32 Along the way, she too obtains a FazWrench and says this.
05:36 "A FazWrench? It's just like my dad's."
05:38 It's a pretty explicit connection there, and that's not all.
05:41 In the Fazzer Blast arcade games in Help Wanted 2, we repeatedly hear the Carnie say this.
05:45 "Now, you look like you got it. We're prized for the little one!"
05:49 So, we're a FazTech who also happens to be a parent.
05:52 Cassie's dad is literally the only character we know who truly fits the bill.
05:57 But, so what? What's the big deal if we're playing as Cassie's dad?
06:00 It's not all that interesting.
06:01 And you heard what Moon said.
06:02 "What makes you so special?"
06:06 We're special in some way.
06:07 And let me just make this perfectly clear.
06:09 All dads are special, okay?
06:11 They have very important roles in their kids' lives.
06:13 That's something that makes him very special, at least in my book.
06:16 But obviously, we're talking about FNAF.
06:18 The joys of parental responsibility?
06:20 Not what these characters are referring to.
06:22 In a theory that I posted a couple months ago, I proposed that Cassie's dad wasn't just any technician.
06:27 Instead, he was none other than the Bonnie bro from FNAF 4.
06:30 You know, the kid that wears the Bonnie mask who helps Michael torture his crying brother to death?
06:34 We know from Ruin's item descriptions that Cassie's dad's favorite character was Bonnie.
06:39 In that game, we were also able to collect both an old-school Foxy and Bonnie mask.
06:43 Which was an odd detail when you consider that there were no other OG animatronic masks present,
06:48 like Freddy or Chica.
06:49 That seemed to be referencing the masks that both Michael Afton and Bonnie bro were wearing
06:53 on that fateful day in 1983.
06:55 Those details, coupled with a few other things, led us to the whole Bonnie bro conclusion.
06:59 But now that the full game's out, it certainly seems definitive that our theory was right.
07:04 You see, towards the end of Help Wanted 2, we're given the chance to light fires next to the gravestones
07:09 of some very familiar missing children.
07:11 Light them in a specific order, and you unlock a secret chest.
07:14 A chest that contains none other than that old Bonnie mask.
07:17 When you collect it, we see the text, "This looks familiar."
07:20 It also unlocks an achievement called "Lost Luggage."
07:23 This right here, this was our mask.
07:25 It was one that we thought was lost to time.
07:27 One worn during that horrific accident of 1983.
07:30 Speaking of that date, in order to find the game's secret ending,
07:33 we have to unlock six creepy voodoo doll plushies.
07:35 Each one hidden behind very explicit in-game actions.
07:38 In one, you go to Sister Location's private room and type in a very specific date.
07:42 I bet you can guess what it is.
07:44 1983.
07:46 And that year just keeps coming up.
07:47 Multiple minigames take place during Fall Fest, which, in the previous VR Games DLC,
07:52 was specifically called out as being in 1983.
07:55 That is why we're considered special.
07:57 Because we were part of that fateful day.
07:59 Because by killing the crying child, we sent William on a murderous rampage.
08:03 It's a memory that we, as Bonnie Bro, have tried to repress.
08:06 And that's not just me speculating.
08:08 We know that Bonnie Bro has been actively trying to avoid these memories based on Mystic Hippo asking us this.
08:13 "Do you remember?"
08:15 It's also why, when we collect one of the first secret voodoo plushies,
08:18 we get a trophy in-game whose description reads, "Retrieve a memory."
08:21 Basically, by playing this game and getting these secret objects,
08:23 we're forcing ourselves to confront memories that we've buried deep in our psyche.
08:27 We're coming to terms with the trauma of our past.
08:29 We're accepting it as something that happened that cannot be changed, only atoned for.
08:34 Which then brings us to the game's endings.
08:36 If you play through the game normally, just by completing the various minigames Helpy tasks you with,
08:40 you eventually unlock the six members of the FAS Force,
08:43 the FNAF universe version of the Transformers,
08:45 because, let's face it, at this point, FNAF has literally parodied every IP known to mankind.
08:50 Once you complete the collection, the lights flicker, and suddenly a charging station appears,
08:54 which opens up to reveal the hand of our dear friend Glitchtrap.
08:57 Another flash, suddenly the Nightmare Staff bots appear, attacking you.
09:01 Glitchtrap has won. He's tricked us.
09:03 He's used Cassie's dad's love of collectibles against him.
09:06 Much like the tapes in Help Wanted 1, these action figures contained parts of him,
09:10 his memories, his essence.
09:12 By gathering them all together, we've once again made Glitchtrap whole.
09:16 With Princess Quest being the canon ending in Security Breach,
09:18 it means that Glitchtrap lost his hold over Vanessa.
09:21 He needed himself a new helper, so he lured us in,
09:24 the last human employee remaining, and got us to put the pieces back together to reawaken him.
09:29 The cycle once again repeats.
09:31 That's why we see him reaching out of the charging station,
09:33 just like during the Burn Trap ending.
09:35 He has enough strength to reawaken, to take control,
09:38 and it's only then that the Staff bots show up to kill us.
09:41 But things aren't quite done yet.
09:43 After our death, we change perspective into the eyes of a Staff bot,
09:47 and not just any Staff bot, specifically, we're looking through the eyes of the one
09:50 who tells Cassie to take a mask at the beginning of Security Breach Ruin.
09:54 "Take a mask. Take a mask."
09:56 It would seem like we've been absorbed into the system.
09:58 Our consciousness is now part of this map bot.
10:00 We're trapped inside of it, forced to execute its commands.
10:03 In the ultimate of ironies, the mask that we were using to try and stop Glitchtrap
10:07 becomes the mask that we now give our daughter as map bot.
10:10 This is then what results in her getting that occipital implant.
10:13 This is how Helpy gets into her mind.
10:15 And this is eventually how the Mimic gets free.
10:18 To me, the way that you get this ending, it's highly symbolic.
10:21 By not accepting our past, by ignoring and repressing the scars of our past actions,
10:25 by not unlocking all those memory plushies, we've passed our mistakes forward.
10:29 And in the process, we manage to doom our own daughter.
10:32 Bonnie bro didn't just ruin the life of one child, he wound up ruining two.
10:35 Our actions have, in short, single-handedly prompted the events of Ruin.
10:40 But hold on, I just kind of glossed over a big detail there.
10:43 We're attacked by a bunch of corrupted staff bots, and then suddenly, we're in Map Bot?
10:47 Ow. It's kind of a big leap there, you know?
10:49 Well, at first, I thought that we were just scanned into the system.
10:52 The Mimic AI scanned our brains while we were wearing the Vanny mask,
10:55 and boom, we're now stuck as part of the AI program running the whole pizzaplex.
10:59 But looking closer at the details, I think there's actually another explanation here.
11:03 When you look at the Map Bot through the Vanny mask in Ruin,
11:05 it looks different from all the other staff bots that you encounter in the game.
11:09 It looks more... organic.
11:10 You can actually see what appears to be a brain stuffed inside of its head.
11:14 Compare that to how every other staff bot looks under that same AR lens,
11:17 and it's completely different.
11:19 Why would that be, though?
11:19 Well, it would appear as though our brain, or at the very least,
11:22 our organic matter, was stuffed inside of these robotic suits.
11:25 It's part of what's powering this particular bot.
11:28 But again, I ask, why?
11:30 This seems to be such a random detail.
11:32 Until you remember what a computer brain would be learning from studying Afton's behavior,
11:36 Afton stuffs his victims into animatronic suits.
11:39 That's what he did during the missing children's incident.
11:42 It's what we see Glitchtrap doing at the end of Help Wanted 1,
11:45 and apparently, it's what he did to Bonnie Bro.
11:47 He stuffed him into Map Bot here.
11:49 For a while, there's been a lot of confusion about the true nature of Glitchtrap.
11:53 Is it a virus? Is it Afton in the Mimic AI?
11:55 Was Burntrap the Mimic?
11:56 It's largely been left unclear.
11:58 But now, I actually think this ending is trying to give us an answer.
12:01 In the books, they make it explicitly clear that there are at least two Mimics threatening the pizzaplex.
12:06 First, there's a physical Mimic that's buried down in the basement.
12:09 That physically walks around and is able to kill people.
12:11 Then, there's the second version.
12:13 A more general AI program that's eventually able to get installed to run the entirety of the pizzaplex,
12:18 and is able to control and corrupt all the animatronics that work there.
12:21 Is this confusing? Yeah.
12:22 Is it frustrating? Most definitely.
12:24 But I also now see what they were going for with this storyline.
12:28 Remember how an AI works?
12:29 You train it by feeding it situational data,
12:31 and the data that goes in directly influences how it's going to behave moving forward.
12:35 There's even an example of this with the Endo Daycare minigame in Help Wanted 2.
12:39 You're teaching an AI program how to behave.
12:41 Good data going in gives you good behavior.
12:43 Bad data going in gives you chaotic behavior.
12:46 In the books, we see the basement AI being trained up with a simple code.
12:49 Rip off all the arms and legs of things that look humanoid.
12:52 And it does this over and over again,
12:54 in epilogue after epilogue to each and every one of our teenage protagonists.
12:58 The data that the basement AI was trained up on was simple, and it was non-specific.
13:02 But like a good program, it did exactly what it was told.
13:05 Ripped off all those limbs.
13:06 Now compare that to the PizzaPlex AI.
13:08 This was trained using a lot more data.
13:10 It was told to copy the behavior of actual humans.
13:13 And so it learned coded languages.
13:14 It learned a wider series of gestures and behaviors.
13:17 It learned how to play games and hang up clothing.
13:20 It was far more sophisticated.
13:22 So by having two different versions of the mimic in the books,
13:24 what we're really seeing are different ways that an AI can be trained up,
13:28 and how the behavior spins off of that.
13:30 So how's that all applied to the games?
13:31 Well, in Ruin, there's a key moment on the catwalks of Monty Gatorgolf
13:35 that show two entities working together,
13:36 but also acting separately, as they're able to argue against each other.
13:40 Helpy says, "I took care of the situation."
13:42 To which the mimic responds,
13:43 "Yeah, with my help."
13:45 They're cut from the same cloth.
13:46 They both started as the mimic program,
13:48 but they've evolved in different ways.
13:51 And based on all of that,
13:52 I suspect that the mimic Cassie runs from at the end of Ruin
13:54 is a parallel for the book's basement AI.
13:57 A simpler, older system that uses Gregory's voice to talk to us throughout Ruin.
14:01 This one just exists and executes two simple goals.
14:04 Kill things and escape from the basement.
14:06 But then there's the Pizzaplex AI.
14:08 I suspect that this is the more sophisticated system.
14:11 This is the one that's been trained up on Afton's data specifically.
14:14 It's the one that embodies itself as Glitztrap,
14:17 and it's also the one that speaks to us in the form of Helpy.
14:20 And we know this to be true because of what we see throughout Help Wanted 2.
14:23 In this one game, the AI is drawing from pretty much every past animatronic,
14:27 including characters like Scrap Baby and Lefty,
14:30 which are odd pulls considering they're characters that were never put on display for the public.
14:34 These were characters that only existed for the fake pizzeria made to entrap Afton in FNAF 6.
14:40 So the fact that the system here knows about them
14:41 means that they had to have come from Afton's mind.
14:44 It's also why in the Helpy Hospital minigames,
14:47 we see a kid's drawing of a burning pizza restaurant with Helpy running away.
14:50 That's how Afton was able to escape and live on.
14:52 His consciousness was contained within the Helpy AI,
14:55 which was able to survive the FNAF 6 fire.
14:57 And remind me again, who's the one that encourages us to play these minigames throughout Help Wanted 2?
15:02 The minigames that lead to the collection of the FAS Force toys,
15:05 which ultimately give us the bad ending?
15:07 Oh yeah, it's Helpy.
15:08 And not just any Helpy either.
15:10 Helpy spelled with an I.
15:12 That spelling detail actually matters.
15:13 You see, the name of the physical animatronic Helpy, it's spelled H-E-L-P-Y.
15:18 But in Ruin, that digital neural implant Helpy is spelled H-E-L-P-I.
15:23 And wouldn't you know it, in the game files for Help Wanted 2,
15:25 the Helpy on the projector screen is once again spelled with an I.
15:29 This is Glitchtrap, the mimic program trained up on Afton's data.
15:33 He's yet again trying to put the pieces back together.
15:36 And by completing his tasks and unlocking the FAS Force, you help him to succeed.
15:40 He's now back in full control of the Pizza Plex, ready for Ruin,
15:43 ready to create a new servant in Cassie to finish what Vanessa started.
15:47 But if I've learned anything from Steel Wool, it's that you can't always trust the first ending you see.
15:51 Remember that creepy plushie that we unlocked earlier?
15:53 Well, there are six of them in total.
15:54 Each one unlocked via a seemingly random series of actions.
15:57 Put a code into the Whack-a-Mole game backwards.
15:59 Make a weird soda mixture only during a complete electrical shutdown of the factory.
16:03 Shoot a random rocket ship during various Phaser Blast minigames until you get to FNAF 2.
16:08 At which point, you pop balloon recreations of the animatronics
16:10 to unlock a final boss battle against a cutout of Springtrap.
16:13 Like I said, these get bizarre, and they get convoluted in a hurry.
16:17 But the main thing you need to know about them is that by collecting them,
16:19 you unlock a glitched coin that allows you to play the fourth and final version of Princess Quest's arcade cabinet.
16:25 At first, it plays just like your normal Princess Quest minigame.
16:28 You swing your sword, you kill the glitchy bunnies, you collect the keys.
16:30 Simple. At least until it's not.
16:32 You open a door, and you suddenly find yourself standing next to someone playing an arcade cabinet.
16:36 Next thing you know, the princess is standing there in the room with you.
16:40 *laughs*
16:42 Are you kidding me?
16:43 Oh, this is nuts!
16:44 The real world and the digital world are leaking into each other.
16:48 Reach into the screen, grab your sword, and suddenly, you are the princess.
16:52 "Who's the princess now? BLEH!"
16:53 Glowing sword in hand, we fight our way through the glitching bunnies until we meet the old Red King.
16:58 We give him our vani mask, and in return, he gives us the glitch trap plushie from Help Wanted 1.
17:02 And this is where things go really off the rails.
17:05 Out of nowhere, the sister location elevator appears.
17:08 Hop in, and suddenly it takes us inside of a giant claw machine, with a giant vani staring in at us.
17:13 We offer up the glitch trap plushie, revealing the true glitch trap.
17:17 She crushes him, and then fades into darkness.
17:19 Doing so unlocks a trophy named "Consequences."
17:22 The description reads, "System threats found. Repair complete."
17:25 So...what was all that?
17:27 Well, actually, it seems pretty explicit.
17:29 Glitch trap was the system threat.
17:31 By crushing him, he's been deleted, and the wider AI system's been repaired.
17:34 We won!
17:35 Except, is that possible?
17:36 Didn't I just say that the other ending showed us the start of ruin?
17:39 For that game to exist, which we know it does, glitch trap has to survive here.
17:43 So is this secret ending not canon, then?
17:45 Just a cool reveal with no substance?
17:47 No, actually, I don't believe so.
17:48 For the first time ever in this franchise's history, I, MatPat, believe that both endings are canon.
17:54 Let me explain.
17:55 I do think that we're destroying glitch trap in the vani ending, but I'm not exactly sure it's a system-wide removal.
18:00 Instead, I suspect that this ending is specifically about Vanessa herself.
18:04 We've known since the original Help Wanted that Vanessa, glitch trap, and Princess Quest have all been inextricably connected.
18:10 For those of you who don't remember, the Princess Quest minigame originated back in the 2D version of Help Wanted,
18:15 where they needed a game to replace the original mechanic of piecing together the missing 16 tapes from Tape Girl.
18:19 Here, we watch as Vanessa, the princess, falls victim to glitch trap.
18:22 In Security Breach, you beat Princess Quest 3, which shows glitch trap being defeated,
18:26 and Vanessa walking out of the pizzaplex freed, leaving the vani mask behind.
18:30 So the fact that we're now playing Princess Quest again tells me that we're not fighting to remove glitch trap from the pizzaplex system.
18:35 Instead, we're yet again fighting specifically to free Vanessa.
18:39 These games have always been about Vanessa and glitch trap.
18:42 I wouldn't expect 4 to deviate from that pattern.
18:44 Even my old buddy Candy Cadet's trying to tell us that this game is about finishing Vanessa's story.
18:49 Throughout Help Wanted 2, you collect coins that can then be traded to Candy Cadet for pieces of a story.
18:53 His second one tells about a young woman that's been lured in by a friendly voice,
18:57 only for it to have been a witch that tries to eat her.
18:59 "Now let me tell you a story about a young woman who, when she was little, was led into a dark forest by a witch and almost eaten."
19:08 She manages to escape, but she's permanently scarred in the process.
19:11 When she's older, she returns and is met by a young boy who offers to help.
19:14 "When she had grown, she sought revenge on the witch and entered the forest again willingly."
19:20 "She was greeted at the mouth of the forest by a young boy who offered to help guide her through the darkness."
19:27 "She welcomed the help and followed the young boy over the river, through the jacked trees, and toward a small house."
19:35 "She followed the boy into the house, the oven door closed, the witch would finally have her meal."
19:41 This right here, this is Vanessa's story, cut and dry.
19:43 She was lured in by what she thought was a friendly voice, Tape Girl, telling her to gather the tapes to stop Glitchtrap,
19:48 only for Glitchtrap to then take control.
19:50 She does escape, but is permanently scarred by this.
19:53 She has the Glitchtrap virus inside of her.
19:56 It's not in full control, but it's definitely there,
19:58 which is what we hear about in the emails from FNAF AR and the retro CDs from Security Breach.
20:03 "I compartmentalized him. He's locked away."
20:05 She had compartmentalized him. He wasn't in full control, at least not yet.
20:09 She then comes back to try to kill Glitchtrap herself, but runs into a young boy,
20:12 who seems like he's gonna help her, only to lure her deeper under Glitchtrap's control.
20:16 By the time she transfers to the Pizza Plex, Vanessa's tone has changed in her therapy tapes.
20:20 "I'm needed somewhere else now. Thank you."
20:23 We see the same thing in the FNAF AR emails.
20:25 She's no longer in control. Glitchtrap has completely taken over,
20:28 and it's all thanks to the only little boy that we know of, Gregory.
20:31 Thanks to his retro CDs, we know that he was meeting a person in a bunny costume.
20:35 "You're talking to someone, or something. It's hard to tell."
20:38 "What are those things? They almost look like rabbit ears."
20:41 Gregory is a villain. At the very least, he was at some point in the story. That is clear as day.
20:46 Between this Candy Cadet story, G.G.Y., and the fact that he was clearly working with Vanny
20:50 before the events of Security Breach, he is not on our side.
20:54 He was the one that helped Glitchtrap to take full control of Vanessa,
20:57 right up until the end of Security Breach.
20:59 Even cut lines of dialogue from Help Wanted 2 seem to support our conclusion here.
21:03 These voice lines come directly from Vanessa, and they tell us the following,
21:06 quote, "You need to listen to me carefully. Don't help it escape."
21:09 "It's using you to finish where she left off. Only a small piece of his code remains."
21:13 Vanessa is back to being more in control, but she knows that a small part of him remains,
21:17 the Glitchtrap plushie that started it all back in Help Wanted.
21:20 We also get lines like, "The memories are freed. Use the token. Bring him to me."
21:24 Referencing the memory plushies that we're collecting, the glitched Princess Quest token,
21:27 and then being told to bring the plushie to her so that she can crush it herself once and for all.
21:32 Destroying Glitchtrap inside of her mind allows that other persona, Vanny, to finally fade into darkness.
21:38 Vanessa is truly free.
21:40 And we know this to be true because after this ending, when you go back to the main hub screen,
21:43 Helpy's gone, replaced by a boy claiming that the Fazbear pizza tastes like real cheese.
21:47 Delicious for him, but even tastier is the fact that Helpy's been purged.
21:50 Glitchtrap is gone. At least he's gone from this version of the program.
21:54 And you see, this is what I meant about endings and beginnings.
21:57 This, to me, feels like a very specific end. The end of Vanessa's story.
22:01 And with it, the end of this current era of FNAF, from Help Wanted 1 to Help Wanted 2.
22:06 Let's call it the Vanessa arc.
22:07 She's no longer a part of this story. Her battle's over. We saved her completely.
22:11 But in closing out her story, the cycle also repeats.
22:14 Yet again, we have ourselves an innocent girl, this time named Cassie,
22:17 being lured in by a seemingly friendly voice, Gregory.
22:20 But in reality, it's all a trap.
22:21 Thanks to that occipital implant, she now has Helpy as a part of her mind,
22:25 just like Vanessa did with Glitchtrap.
22:27 And now she's wearing the mask more and more frequently, again like Vanny.
22:30 In short, it's been passed on. Cassie is just Vanessa 2.0.
22:34 Gone is the era of Vanessa and Glitchtrap, long live Cassie and the Mimic AI.
22:38 At this point, the only question is, what's it truly gonna take to break this cycle once and for all?
22:43 But hey, while I'm gonna continue digging for deeper lore and winning all these prizes,
22:47 "What do we got? El Chip? Head Chef Box. Great, just what I always wanted."
22:51 I wanted to make sure you guys had a chance to win some prizes of your very own.
22:55 In fact, there's actually a chance to win $10,000.
22:58 That's all thanks to our sponsor for today's episode, SoFi.
23:01 If you don't already know, SoFi is the all-in-one personal finance app
23:03 that allows you to bank, borrow, and invest all in one place.
23:07 And that couldn't be more useful as we wrap up the holiday season.
23:09 Buying presents for family and friends? Yeah, it adds up fast.
23:12 Especially when you consider that Amy's in charge of my Black Friday shopping.
23:15 Which is why it's so important that I'm able to stay on top of it all.
23:18 But SoFi doesn't just help by making everything easier to track,
23:21 it also offers incredible rates on your savings.
23:24 Most banks, they're only gonna be offering savings accounts with about like 0.46% interest.
23:28 Literally pennies. Money would be better off stored in your mattress.
23:31 Thankfully, SoFi offers up to a massive 4.6% APY with direct deposit.
23:37 That is up to 10 times the national savings average.
23:40 And the best part is, you don't even have to do anything.
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23:49 Plus, if you're new to SoFi, they'll even help kickstart your savings
23:52 by giving you up to 300 bucks when you sign up for direct deposit.
23:55 So, you don't even have to have savings when you start.
23:57 But if you really want to give those initial savings a boost,
24:00 then you'll want to get your hands on that juicy $10,000
24:03 that SoFi and I are giving away as a part of this deal.
24:05 All you have to do is use the link in the description,
24:07 SoFi.com/GameTheory, or scan the QR code that's on screen right now,
24:11 and sign up for a SoFi checkings and savings account.
24:14 I always love it when brands do stuff like this.
24:16 Gives us a chance to give back to the community.
24:18 You guys.
24:19 Not only does it make me feel like a mini Mr. Beast,
24:21 but just knowing that this is gonna help one of you loyal theorists out there save for college,
24:25 or buy a house, or kickstart your next dream project,
24:27 that right there just brings a big ol' smile to my face.
24:30 So, remember, link is in the description,
24:31 or you could always scan the QR code on screen right now
24:34 for a chance to win that insane amount of money.
24:36 Thanks again to SoFi for sponsoring this episode,
24:38 and as always, remember my friends, it's just a theory.
24:41 A Game Theory!
24:43 Thanks for watching.
24:44 [outro music]