| “ | Follow me. | „ |
| ~ Shadow Freddy's only quote. |
Shadow Freddy, also known as Purple Freddy or Dark Freddy, is a supporting antagonist in the Five Nights at Freddy's franchise.
He appears as an Easter egg in Five Nights at Freddy's 2, a (possibly anti-villainous) major antagonist of Five Nights at Freddy's 3, and a minor antagonist in both Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria Simulator and Five Nights at Freddy's VR: Help Wanted.
In Five Nights at Freddy's 3, he is the secondary antagonist of the minigames and an Easter egg in the nights.
He is also a supporting protagonist in the non-canon RPG spinoff FNAF World.
He is an enigmatic character in the second game whose intentions are unclear, whereas in the third game, he appears to be helping William Afton destroy the animatronics, although it is possible that he was only doing so to help set their souls free.
Appearance
Shadow Freddy has exactly the same appearance as Withered Golden Freddy's appearance, albeit being recolored dark purple. Like other withered animatronics, He is in disrepair. He completely lacks a left ear and has many tears over his body. Unlike Golden Freddy, he has large glowing bright eyes. Furthermore, his teeth are glowing white. In Five Nights at Freddy's 3, Shadow Freddy lacks the glowing white effects for the eyes and teeth, and covered with green levels that appears to be lighting from the Office itself.
In the VR game Five Nights at Freddy's VR: Help Wanted, he shares the exact appearance as the original Freddy Fazbear. Although he has glowing white eyes and teeth, his overall color is completely black rather than purple.
In the minigames of FNaF 3, he is a recolored sprite of Freddy.
Biography
Five Nights at Freddy's 2
In Five Nights at Freddy's 2, the player may rarely encounter what seems to be a shadow or a dark model of Freddy Fazbear. It appears in Parts/Service, sitting in the location Old Bonnie normally sits in. Shadow Freddy's appearance doesn't affect the game anyhow.
It appears to be in a slumped position, similar to that of Golden Freddy's. It also uses Golden Freddy's model. Brightening up this image reveals that this hallucination is purple in color as with several other key items/characters in the franchise, bearing comparisons to the purple figure from the secret mini-games, the Puppet's "tears", Fredbear's hat and bow tie among other things.
Five Nights at Freddy's 3
Shadow Freddy's role in Five Nights at Freddy's 3 is more significant. In this game, he appears in the Office very rarely, and all end-of-night minigames (except after beating Night 5). Shadow Freddy lures each of the animatronics to the secret room where they are attacked by Afton.
Rarely, the player may see Shadow Freddy slumped in the leftmost end of the Office. This Freddy assumes the same position that Golden Freddy does in the previous games. However unlike from the second game, he doesn't cause the game to crash. This is also true for the mobile version. He also does not attack or jumpscare the player.
Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria Simulator
Shadow Freddy makes a brief appearance in Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria Simulator, only in the beginning minigame.
In the beginning minigame, Shadow Freddy first appears in the fourth level and began duplicating, causing the game to glitch, until a wall of shadow variants block the child off completely. As soon it happens, the entire minigame cuts to black, later revealing Scrap Baby's salvage scene.
Interestingly, in the game files, he is called Dark Freddy.
Five Nights at Freddy's VR: Help Wanted
Shadow Freddy serves as Freddy Fazbear's replacement during the Parts and Service mode in hard mode.
Theories about Shadow Freddy's identity
Shadow Freddy is known for being one of the more mysterious parts of the franchise.
The original theory was that he's simply Golden Freddy in the shadows. However, it was later debunked.
The most popular theory is that he is a victim of a springlock failure. However, there's not much proof for this.
Another theory is that he's the Crying Child from Five Nights at Freddy's 4. It's arguably one of the more possible theories about the child's identity, having less holes than the others.
A recent theory is that he's agony of something taking physical form, most likely of the Crying Child mentioned above.
He's clearly related to Nightmare, which may help with solving his identity.
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Trivia
- Fans have made theories that Shadow Freddy is actually Golden Freddy.
- Shadow Freddy is also theorized to be the apparition of one of the employees whom wore the spring-lock Fredbear suit, which malfunctioned and killed the employee. Thus the suit itself was put in storage.
- Shadow Freddy bears comparisons to Nightmare in overall appearance and behavior, suggesting they may be one in the same.
- Unlike Shadow Bonnie, who is a hero in Five Nights at Freddy's 3, Shadow Freddy is implied to be an antagonist in the end of nights (save for Night 5) minigames of said game.
- Unlike popular beliefs, he doesn't crash the game like Shadow Bonnie in the second game, or Golden Freddy in the first game.
