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I have a lot of issues with this chapter. It throws you into promising gameplay and quality but it drops off almost immediately. Assets getting overused, some parts of the environment are drawn out far too long. The flashlight seemed to get incredibly dim shortly after getting it. Useless rooms. Severe lack of direction. Lots of glitching, key assets to puzzle solving clipping through floors. The repetition of puzzle functions to even complete them makes it unenjoyable and frustrating. Giblet is insufferable. The character design of this entire chapter feels out of place for the whole franchise. Chapter 4 was starting to lose me, but I feel like 5 has nothing to do with the rest of the storyline. We've entirely lost the plot and charm of chapters 1-3. For the price (that I was already hesitant to pay), I feel like Mob's money pig and I had my loyalty taken advantage of. The total allotted cost of the entire game so far is embarrassing for how this is going.

Edit: I started this review prior to actually finishing the chapter. I rage quit and had a lot of steam to blow off. Now that I've finished it (which neared 7 hours), I want to do a full spoilers break down of what went right and wrong in this chapter

What went right:
-The lore we learn through notes and environmental storytelling has pretty good delivery. You're given visuals that paint the story of how painful these lived experiences truly were for the toys. The memory machine putting you in Huggy's shoes forces you to see just how torturous the mental conditioning really was. It goes far beyond the video brainwashing seen in the catnap youtube video.
-The environments are much more fleshed out compared to the previous chapter. There's also significantly more ways to passively interact with the environment. I took a lot of rage out on cameras, exit signs, keypads and loudspeakers.
-VA's did a good job

Unfortunately my positives have to end there

What went wrong:
By character, my general consensus being way too many new designs that have no purpose and could've been existing overlooked characters.
-Huggy; His screeching goes way overboard every interaction we get with him. The puzzle with him in the projector room made little to no sense. While we get a lot of his background, we have nothing to showcase how he ended up sound enough to openly have on display as a security measure. Everything we see shows exactly why he should NEVER be outside containment. While a wild animal is scary to an extent, what's even more fear striking is an intelligent and calculated killer. The feral animal we get from him this chapter feels like it completely disregards how he obtained his position when we first entered the factory.
-Kissy; I love her as a character, but the misplaced strength didn't make any sense. They didn't give her much purpose outside being Poppy's legs
-Giblet; Way out of place. His character design felt like something ripped off from Ratchet and Clank or Crash Bandicoot. Was he staff? We have no history. He just suddenly existed for the sake of having somebody to tell you "hi I suck but keep following me I promise there's a plan" which is never explained. He's a tumor to look at, considering his toy design could've been very charming and on brand with the company. There's no reason why his eyes should look like that. It's only implied the prototype is the reason for his appearance, of which we still have no idea why he's flipping skins in the first place. Bonus point for his terrible lighting conflicts.
-Chum Chompkins; his entire purpose was a single "jump scare" cutscene and a reason to model the inside of a monster mouth. He's not even mentioned in the projector film he's actively being shown in. The prototype calls upon him and he magically vanishes for the rest of the game.
-Lily; she looks like her design belongs to an entirely different game. There was opportunity to model her as if released in tandem with Mommy. Instead every single asset of her sticks out like a sore thumb. Her hair's animation is way too stiff, the lighting is terrible. Her tea party could have all been established toys from previous chapters, but we got BLL and two random dolls. Her section of the chapter is scattered and directionless. Her chase scene is insanely short, the game relies on your retries as it immediately sets you up for failure. I launched myself into the void below the cloud platforms countless times, which has a save state in the attic, where the incline to the flower port is unreliable. The room for mistakes is little to none. The only interesting thing about her is her backstory, which is short. She's essentially a Miss Delight and Barb reskin at best.
-Outimals; They serve zero purpose outside of a penalty for standing in the dark. Keeping your flashlight on, which doesn't run out, is all it takes to scare them away. Again, just skin flipping victims of the prototype. Their entire presence could've been replaced with smiling critters.
-Bron; I would've liked a lot more backstory on his bigger body timeline. His eye's are also terribly done and low resolution. Bare minimum we could've at least put him out of his misery to invoke any amount of emotional response to his condition.
-The Prototype; holy let down. "He'll make me part of him" and it's an arm in a preexisting porthole. He's not an amalgamation like he could have been. Catnap's shrine entirely overhyped him. He's TOO clean. How is he able to hold his original voice SO LONG, and then we get like none afterwards. Did he ever need to collect voice lines if he has his own voice the whole time? I felt like learning more about him made his story make... less sense? Why did he kill us just to dunk us in the life juice?

The gameplay, points on both design and function
-while environments were much more fleshed out, they also frequently stretched way too long.
-I had to save state way too many times due to previously mentioned clipping and poor asset mobility.
-the plant pimples were a poor concept and the gourd faces???? why?
-tons of backtracking in this chapter. Previous chapters seamlessly looped you back to main areas. Chapter 4 lacked this too, but chapter 5 had a lot of "go back multiple rooms to get the thing to move forward."
-a lot of dead ends and red herrings. I do not recall having so many pointless rooms with nothing, not even a note
-glowby should've had a light type toggle, not two different buttons. the chimes were annoying and the blacklight markings were poorly placed and even blatantly lied at one point.
-puzzle design was awful most of the time
-not a lot of downtime, either constant puzzles or chases
-the hand functionality feels so much worse

I could go on but steam only allows so much text. Overall finishing the game didn't make anything better. I completed it to complete it. If there's another chapter I will not be buying it. I can just watch someone other than Markipler since he straight up refuses to play more, and save myself from this turning into a $85 game.

I've been playing this game for about 10 years now off and on. The art never fails to draw me back in. I think the simplicity of this game is exactly what's so endearing about it. I can pick it up whenever I want without feeling like starting over is a massive burden. I can also play it on any laptop I've ever had during the entirety of me owning this game. I'll never not love this game, the music brings me back to the day I got it. I still recommend it to friends even today. For a pixelated side scroller, it's all I need it to be.

infuriates me beyond comprehension, 10/10

I've had this game on my wishlist since it came out. Game Grumps playing it had me gnawing at the bars of my enclosure I needed it. I got it as a gift and MAN I love it. I rarely get sucked into games this fast, going about this game loan free is stressing me out but it's a fun challenge! I'm struggling with horizontal tears no matter what quality I set the game to, but it's an easy oversight since it's not making the game unplayable. The lack of details put into the peoples models cracks me up, discount Elon Musk visits are a grossly wonderful addition. The trash collision physics are worse than skyrim, I truly love accidentally sending a trash bag or table across the map. Overall a wonderful experience. Great gameplay and extremely entertaining glitches.

Loved it back in the day, every time it had major updates I felt like it was less and less fun to play. Just reopened it today after an apparent 1.0 "final" release and was severely disappointed. 30+ hours and now I'm uninstalling. Gameplay feels awful from what it used to be.

I get sucked in so easily with this game, I can't remember how many people I've recommended this game to in person. Great story line with so many layers to it, I've played hours without ever finishing a game because I get too wrapped up in enjoying the atmosphere and exploring. I think this game is great for anyone who enjoys deep sea, alien, reptilian or even prehistoric themes. It tickles thy fancy

The only downside to this game is how long it takes to gain xp and skill points, but this can be easily adjusted in settings before you start a server so really it just depends on who’s hosting. Easy to binge an entire night. This game can get very nerve racking if you’re playing alone. 10/10 just adjust your settings how you want them