Mob Entertainment has cemented itself into the indie-horror game franchise with it’s title, Poppy Playtime. With each new chapter release, it’s popularity is growing exponentially, and rightfully so! I’ve been a fan of this franchise ever since the first chapter released back in 2021. Each new chapter unlocks more lore about the world of Poppy Playtime, creating a ever growing fanbase! The newest installment, Poppy Playtime Chapter 4: Safe Haven, is set to release on January 30, 2025.
- Where does Chapter 4 take place?
- Who are Chapter 4’s antagonists?
- Who is “The Doctor”?
- Who are the Nightmare Critters?
- Chapter 4 Icepick ARG?
(Via: Mob Entertainment)
Watch Poppy Playtime Chapter 4’s cinematic trailer featuring Dr. Harley Sawyer, “The Doctor”, as the true main antagonist!
Where does Chapter 4 take place?
At the end of Chapter 3: Deep Sleep, our player character and Poppy were lowered lower into the depths of the Playcare Factory, the toy factory where Poppy Playtime takes place, by Kissy Missy; however, Kissy Missy cries out from an unseen threat. Unable to go back up, our character player and Poppy must continue their descent deeper into the Playcare Factory. This is where Chapter 4 will start it’s story and game play!
Based off the photos released on the Poppy Playtime’s Steam page and in the trailer, it appears Chapter 4 will take place within a prison section of the factory. This is theorized to be where the toy experiments part of the Bigger Bodies Initiative were held in confinement.
In the first photo there appears to be a computer surveillance station, most likely to keep watch on the imprisoned toys. In the trailer we get a closer look at the monitors, and we catch a glimpse of an encroaching Yarnaby. It’s theorized that Yarnaby acts as a security guard within the Prison. The first photo also showcases a painted logo; a green square inside of a blue square, inside of a red square.
The second photo reveals several prison confinement cells. It’s theorized these cells are meant for the Bigger Body experiments.
The third photo shows a cave system that we have to navigate by leaping from platform to platform with the rocket hand, the purple hand feature that allows the Player character to launch themselves up into the air.
The fourth photo shows a dark room with a fan, perhaps a ventilation room.
Both trailers of Chapter 4, the first one being about Baba Chops and the second being Yarnaby, were both originally thought to the be the main antagonists. Both trailers do give us clues as to where Chapter 4 will be taking place and what we can expect.
Who are Chapter 4’s antagonists?
Yarnaby is one of Poppy Playtime’s antagonist for Chapter 4. Depicted as a colorful, yarn lion, with large black eyes and a cartoonish grin, don’t let Yarnaby’s cheerful expression deceive you. By splitting it’s face vertically in half, Yarnaby reveals a grotesque mouth with several sharp fangs and an inner mouth with tiny razor teeth just waiting to devour you!
Yarnaby is described as fast and agile, and based off the Chapter 4’s trailer, he seems capable of emitting music.
(Via: Mob Entertainment)
Watch Poppy Playtime’s Chapter 4 trailer featuring Yarnaby!
Quinn Navidson is an orphan child chosen to become Experiment 1166 better known as Yarnaby. He lived at the Playcare in 1990, an orphanage below the Playtime Co.’s factory that housed orphans – some of which would be used for experiments for the Bigger Bodies project, just like Quinn Navidson was.
Dr. Harley Sawyer, the head scientist in charge of the Bigger Bodies, took an interest in Quinn’s abnormal behavior and mediocre performances at the Game Station, a section underneath the Playtime Co.’s factory where kids play games – when in actuality, they are being observed and tested on by Playtime Co.’s employees.
Believing Quinn was holding back, Dr. Sawyer confronted Quinn and requested that he gave all his effort on the next tests that Dr. Sawyer himself would personally oversee. As a result, Quinn received top scores in the games/tests Wack-a-Wuggy and Statues.
Quinn Navidson was chosen to become the Bigger Bodies version of Yarnaby as Experiment 1166 in August 1990.
Yarnaby showed obedience and loyalty towards specific security officers and scientists, including Dr. Harley Sawyer. As a result, Dr. Sawyer isolated Yarnaby from contact with anyone except himself – this caused Yarnaby to form an exclusive attachment to Sawyer.
Sawyer had the intentions of using Yarnaby as a personal bodyguard until Sawyer was suddenly “removed” from Playcare. Following Sawyer’s mysterious “removal”, Yarnaby fell into an unresponsive, grief-stricken state that resulted in him being deemed a failure by design and his fate left in the hands of the higher-ups.
Pianosaurus is one of Poppy Playtime’s Chapter 4’s antagonists. Pianosaurus is another Bigger Body experiment. The discovery of Pianosaurus was after the photo scan 6 photo was decoded in the Chapter 4 Icepick ARG. It appears to be a green dinosaur with a piano for a mouth and rainbow-colored spikes along it’s spine. It was the first Bigger Body toy to be discovered in the Chapter 4 Icepick ARG.
-Pianosaurus’s jingle is heard in a teaser for Pianosaurus appearing in Poppy Playtime’s Chapter 4 on Mob Entertainment’s X page. A distorted version of it can be heard in Chapter 4’s Yarnaby trailer moments before Yarnaby appears before the Player character.
Pianosaurus, He plays just for us, We join the chorus, P-I-A-N-O-Saurus
-Pianosaurus Commercial Jingle
Playing his scales, From his teeth to his tail
Announcer: It would take an extinction-level event to stop this
late-Cretaceous composer!
Kids: YAY!
Who is “The Doctor”?
Dr. Harley Sawyer, now known as “The Doctor” is the true main antagonist of Poppy Playtime Chapter 4. He’ the head scientist in charge of the Bigger Bodies who mysteriously disappeared without a trace. We now know that he’s alive and has been watching us venture throughout Playcare the ENTIRE time in his new digital form.
This was confirmed in Mob Entertainment’s latest cinematic trailer they dropped on their Youtube channel on December 21. Watch the cinematic trailer down below now on Mob Entertainment’s Youtube channel!
(Via: Mob Entertainment)
This trailer revealed A LOT to Poppy Playtime fans. It confirmed that “The Doctor”, Dr. Harley Sawyer, is the true main villain of Chapter 4 as seen on Mob Entertainment’s Poppy Playtime Steam page, where Sawyer’s eye replaces Yarnaby’s image as Chapter 4’s banner. We also learned that “Safe Haven” is the title for Chapter 4 and 1/30/25 is the confirmed release date.
In the cinematic trailer, the screen shows Mob Entertainment’s logo but it glitches revealing the words “REBOOTING” and “WAKE UP“. Next the screen shows a dark room full of large industrial sized computers before switching to a security camera feed of a dark room with checkerboard flooring.
Dr. Harley Sawyer speaks, “Where am I…“, this is followed by the words “BIGGER BODIES” and then a series of multiple images of the Bigger Bodies experiments (Boxy Boo, The Prototype, Yarnaby, Huggy Wuggy, and Cat Nap) glitching on the screen, ending with the words “MY CREATIONS“.
The cinematic trailer continues with dialogue from Sawyer, with the screen showing random locations (relating to Sawyer and the Bigger Bodies experiments) along with screen flashes of words. It ends with a chilling visual of Sawyer being surrounded by numerous white screens, likely camera feeds, with him standing at the center with a digital eye staring menacingly back at us from a tv he has as a head.
What this tells us, is that Dr. Harley Sawyer is ALIVE and has been WATCHING us, (the player character) the ENTIRE time.
Cue the goosebumps!
Who are the Nightmare Critters?
The Nightmare Critters are a batch of new toys that will appear in the upcoming release of Chapter 4. Created by Playtime Co., they’re the direct opposite of the Smiling Critters, a group of cheerful and positive animal toys that appeared in Chapter 3: Deep Sleep, due to their negative traits each toy exhibits.
The Nightmare Critters like the Smiling Critters are small, scented anthropomorphic plush animal toys with gaping smiles, individualized pendants and black eyes. The difference is that the Nightmare Critters have a darker, tertiary color palette, their black eyes are furrowed and they have teeth (expect Icky Licky and Poe).
The logo of Nightmare Critters is stylized so each letter of Critters references each Nightmare Critter toy:
C – Simon Smoke
R – Icky Licky
I – Baba Chops
T – Allister Gator
T – Touille
E – Maggie Mako
R – Poe
S – Rabie Baby
Nightmare Critters and their scents:
Baba Chops – Anise,
Allister Gator – Sandalwood
Touille – Petrichor
Icky Licky – Coffee
Simon Smoke – Wood Smoke
Maggie Mako – Chocolate
Rabie Baby – Bubblegum
Poe – Cinnamon
Chapter 4’s Teaser Trailer
Baba Chops appeared in Poppy Playtime’s Chapter 4’s Teaser Trailer. Watch the teaser featuring Baba Chops down below!
The trailer showcases a DogDay plush walking past dead Smiling Critters toys littered on the ground towards a decapitated Bobby BearHug plush toy on the ground. Preparing to devour the toy, Baba Chops suddenly emerges from the ground and lunges at the DogDay plush, swiftly killing the plush before consuming it.
Baba Chops was formerly believed to be Chapter 4’s antagonist, until Mob Entertainment released their latest trailer showing “The Doctor” as the true antagonist of Chapter 4.
Chapter 4 Icepick ARG
If you’re new to gaming, you might be asking yourself, “What is an ARG?”
An ARG stands for alternate reality game, it’s a form of interactive storytelling in which people must work together to solve puzzles and other tasks in order to progress through the story arc.
ARGs can be played in a virtual setting or a real-world environment, they are made up of an assortment of media such as audio recordings, text, images, and videos as well as puzzles, story elements, clues, and interactive experiences. All of these elements combined create a unique narrative.
Mob Entertainment has used ARGs in the past. The first one was held to tease the release of Project: Playtime; it was called Project: Playtime ARG or Rowan Stroll’s Computer Database. The second one was held to tease the release of Chapter 3; it was called The Chapter 3 Interactable ARG or Leith Pierre’s Computer Search.
Now with the anticipation of the up-in-coming Chapter 4 release, Mob Entertainment once again is holding an ARG called the Chapter 4 Icepick ARG or Bruno White’s Central Domain.
Chapter 4’s ARG began during the video release of The Story So Far. A set of videos that recounts the events that the Player character encountered during Chapters 1-3. Halfway through the first video, that was recounting the events of Chapter 1: “A Tight Squeeze”, the footage glitched briefly and displayed a message: “IV ARG. Let the game begin.”.
According to poppy-playtime.fandom.com, “It can be assumed that [Yarnaby] has the ability to sew together and fix damaged toys and experiments using his own body’s threats, as seen in Chapter 4 Icepick ARG with a Huggy plush sewn together by his threads.
Watch Youtuber Sheeprampage’s Youtube video, “The ENTIRE Chapter 4 ARG SOLVED”, to learn about Chapter 4’s Icepick ARG.
Chapter 4’s Icepick ARG is now officially ended.
With December coming to a close, Poppy Playtime’s Chapter 4 will be releasing next month! I’m eager to see what SECRETS and LORE will be discovered!
Closing Thoughts…
I’ve been a huge fan of Poppy Playtime ever since the first game released. It’s amazing to see how far it’s come and how much it’s grown from it’s first game. Each installment dives us deeper and deeper not only into the lore of this series but also into the depths of the factory itself. I can’t wait to see the story unfold and see what secrets appear in the depths of Playtime Co’s factory in Chapter 4. Until then, remember…
Survival isn’t guaranteed. Fear is.
Thanks as always for reading my blog,
Jessica Mohan
WORKS CITED
https://poppy-playtime.fandom.com/wiki/Chapter_4
https://store.steampowered.com/app/3008670/Poppy_Playtime__Chapter_4/
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