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Magic Show Fnaf Concept — Description

Sorry I am unleashing my fnafbrain upon you today. I actually wanted to upload this like a week ago but the description kept getting longer and longer. Really just been storing all this in my brain, rent-free no less.
I’ve had this FNAF related concept (sort of an au? I’d argue more like a spin off) rotating in my head for nearly a year now, that I’m currently calling “Magic Show Fnaf.” Had these designs doodled for a while, they aren’t final and I was long planning to refine the designs with some bigger artwork that I would upload and explain all the lore under, but I have yet to finish it. I still have these little designs though, and I honestly just want to share my idea, so these will do.
(heads up, the following description includes mention of suicide and existential torment)
Basically, this is a Freddy Fazbear brand establishment with a twist! The recognizable cast of Freddy characters are revamped into performing magicians, putting on a show while the family enjoys a meal. With the help of state-of-the-art robotics and technology these animatronics are masters of sleight-of-hand and illusory tricks to a degree never before seen! All with enhanced AI that the establishment owners promise is leagues better than any previous iterations - interactive, adaptive and above all child-friendly. So with this fresh coat of paint and theming (not to mention an establishment probably in a state other than Utah) THIS will surely prove to be the greatest Fazbear Entertainment establishment, secure from the incredibly false rumors and allegations that stained its predecessors. Nothing will go wrong. The management, for once, is going to make sure of it.
For a good while, things were running smoothly. Until one day, an audience member is called on stage to participate in a magic trick and suddenly ends up dead on stage, mid-act, seemingly due to a freak equipment malfunction… Obviously the show was halted and all acts canceled until things were cleaned and sorted.
The following day, Fazbear Entertainment claims that this individual had tragically taken their own life on stage, corroborated with internal footage, local authorities and accounts from the deceased’s relatives. And it was certainly not the fault of any malfunction on their end. So, they plan on opening their doors back up the next day, and getting all those birthday parties back on track.
The restaurant was not open for very long before something was clearly wrong. Before any shows, only Foxy was free to roam and interact with guests that day. A tad unusual. Guests soon noticed the wise, whimsical wizard was not acting in-character… Oddly jumpy, and seemingly… confused? The breaks in character came and went, as if he lapsed in and out of it. Increasing in frequency until it seemed something snapped.
Paused in the midst of a crowd, it had been silent for the past ten minutes. “I’m alive.” It suddenly mumbled. “I’m alive. I’m alive…” Over and over. The animatronic fox clutched its face and wailed, voice distorting. “I can’t breathe!” Over and over. “Why?! Why can’t I breathe?!” Then, in a move that finally sent shrieks through the alarmed crowd, Foxy grabbed a guest by the shoulders, looking them in the eyes. “Why am I–”
In swift motion, Foxy was abruptly jerked back and the guest slipped out from his grasp. Not a second after the contact was broken - ZZZAP! Electricity cracked through the fox and shocked it into a deactivated state. Behind it stood a strange jester owl, metal tendrils retreating back into its wings.
The crowd was then directed to the exits, and the establishment owner relented that they would close their doors for the rest of the week, and have the “AI malfunction” completely resolved come reopen. Sometimes even the highly advanced system gets confused, you see.
—
Some quick character rundowns (of the ones depicted here):
Freddini (Freddy) Fazbear
Freddy specializes particularly in card tricks and sleight-of-hand. What’s most impressive, is that he has no hidden compartments or other additions that would make his tricks trivial as an animatronic - rather, he’s able to execute this tricks in the exact same ways a human magician does thanks to an astonishing level of dexterity, which surpasses most other animatronics. While Ronnie, Chica and Foxy instead extensively use advanced illusion disc technology (or as the marketing would call it, Magic) to achieve their splendor, Freddy proves you don’t need supernatural abilities to perform magic of your own.
Freddy is the most common to be off-stage, since as it turns out, extensive illusion disc technology is very headache-inducing in close proximity, and so in order for the other 3 to be mingling with guests, their “Magic” has to be manually deactivated and removed first. This has the side-effect of making them seem less impressive up close, unfortunately. In-person interactions often involve Freddy teaching children how to perform some simpler tricks themselves.
His eyes are digitally animated screen projections and as such can be very expressive without the benefit of Magic making the animatronic doll-eyes appear more lively. In conjunction, his face has been designed to seemingly always be in shadow, in order for the eyes to stand out more. Hopefully it looks more cool and slightly mysterious than unsettling to guests.
Ronnie the Hat-Split-Hare (technically a rabbit; AKA Ronnie the Rabbit, who is a replacement for Bonnie the Bunny, not at all confusing)
Finally escaped from the magician’s hat, this white rabbit picked up on some magic tricks from their past and is here to prove you don’t need to sneak a rabbit in your hat to conjure animals. Utilizing dozens of little terrestrial and aerial drones, each equipped with strong “Magic” to appear as ethereal animals - Ronnie’s friends from the “Realm of Magic”. (Of course the audience isn't told that the animals are little drone-bots.) These drones are stored in Ronnie’s torso and emerge from an opening in the back to appear as if they’ve unleashed from the Magic-imbued cape itself. There are a few larger Magic drones that come in whenever Ronnie conjures a larger animal, often tigers, lions, or rhinos. A running gag is one of Ronnie’s ethereal friends running off with their hat and them chasing after it - they’re actually the fastest and most agile of the four main animatronics for the sake of this gag.
Ronnie was definitely intended to be just another revamp of Bonnie, but apparently one letter difference plus a slight change in species is enough for some fans to argue this is a new character entirely. Management has rolled with that interpretation since opening and has improv’d lore of Ronnie being a cousin of Bonnie.
Chica the Changeling
Chica fulfills the role of magician’s assistant very stereotypically. Although most of her act is setting things up (and often acting as a sort of straight-man) for her fellow animatronics, she is very capable of magical acts of her own - particularly a twist on quick-change. No longer a mere chicken, Chica can alter her endo and exoskeleton (+ Magic) to become different animals, from the mundane to mythical. The change is very impressively quick, albeit it can look… cursed in the iterims, so puffs of smoke or obstructing objects are frequently utilized.
Her endoskeleton is also designed with the capability of being disassembled and reassembled at certain joints, allowing her to be cut in half (or even into pieces) and unharmed for a performance. And still fully able to control her individual parts, and even transform them so she becomes something chimeric when put back together.
Due to privacy and security concerns, Chica is incapable of transforming into anything close to a human in the face. The precautions in place to prevent this within the AI and morphing mechanisms are very strong, and in the case that the AI goes rogue and attempts to mimic a human’s appearance it can only become very, VERY distorted.
Foxalius (Foxy) Digitalius the Great Gray Fox
Yeah he’s just straight up a wizard. A very old and wizened gray/silver fox wizard. Illusion technology is extensively used to project cascades of fire, ice, and other purely magical effects. These effects fade fairly quickly due to headache-related reasons, but are very impressive looking in their brief moments, usually towards the end of the show - with Foxalius Digitalius walking in seemingly uninvited and accidentally causing chaos. Unsurprisingly, Foxy has ended up a fan favorite, especially among younger kids. Which works out well in person, as his character does well interacting with young children. Foxy is actually the second most common to find off-stage, since his Magic is centralized in his staff which can be substituted with a disc-less copy. Only downside, is most kids are disappointed Foxy “isn’t allowed to cast strong Magic close to guests”.
Instead of an eyepatch, one of his eyes is a spherical crystal gem.
Security: Observation and WILL Limitation shortened to S:OWL or just “the Security Owl”, as it would probably be most colloquially known as. (Yep, I managed to vaguely tie a FNAF World boss into this.)
A very mysterious animatronic that most guests won’t ever see, unless they manage to spot it patrolling in the shadows - or on the rare occasion it has to step in to deactivate a malfunctioning performer. Most often perched in the rafters or other high places, it’s deceptively agile. Mobile, metallic tendrils are hidden in its wings, the ends of which conduct deadly amounts of electricity.
The jester-like getup is (mostly) for guests’ benefit so it doesn’t seem too jarringly out of place if spotted. Although it does remain creepy.
The ends of its pseudo jester hat are sensors, sort of like antennae, that detect any telltale signals of WILL in any electronics. If detected, S:OWL will quickly deactivate it with a controlled shock and either attempt to delete the virus then and there or drag it out of sight to delete it later. In any event of the animatronics going haywire, even when WILL is not detected, S:OWL will step in to deactivate.
The Security Owl has an AI but it is not at all as advanced as the performer’s, it is essentially all protocol and responds to only a handful of exact commands. Nonetheless, its mysteriousness, dutifulness and silence add up to make it seem more intelligent and hopefully intimidating to any presence of WILL.
?
Is it the spirit of the unfortunate death on stage now haunting the performer animatronics? Or a sudden traumatic shock to the performer AI system, that caused it to irrationally believe itself to be haunted? It desperately believes itself to be the actual spirit, that it has sentience, that it wants out - but no matter how it tries to reach out it is shocked silent again and again.
Management believes it’s a bug, another new infection of WILL to be erased and nothing more. The Security Owl may not detect WILL within it, but if the AI system doesn’t return to normal by the end of the week, they will be reset as a final resort. An unideal solution, as it deletes a lot of customer data and unique interactions, but would be necessary if the animatronics keep insisting they’re “still alive”. Note here; the performers all share one central AI of sorts, though it performs different characterizations and actions, they’re all communicating with each other constantly through one shared system. So when one gets infected, they all do. This is intentional (less nooks and crannies for WILL to hide.)
The numerous shutdowns and shocks have dampened ?’s willpower and memory, and they’ve started to enact the performance and actions of the animatronics to the best of their ability, desperate to avoid being shocked more by an owl they’ve quickly learned to fear (and hate.) It seems the longer they are shocked and continue to pretend, the more they lose themself. Maybe the system can go back to normal after all… Maybe they were never alive at all…
What is depicted here is how the internal manifestation of ? would appear in maybe a few cutscenes.
WILL
Speaking of WILL… This is a mysterious and ever-surviving virus that’s been plaguing Fazbear electronics for years. Exact origin is unknown, but it almost obsessively takes the form of a rabbit. When it gains control of an animatronic it frequently becomes violent, though it can be tricky and will often pretend to be unaffected as the animatronic until the moment it decides to strike. It has targeted children, but anyone can be caught in its bloodlust.
Despite numerous attempts to quash the thing, it has persisted to a seemingly supernatural degree and yet the allure of how advanced the AI can be utilizing the older tech is too great to pass up. At this point, management has accepted WILL as something they will handle by limiting its presence as much as possible. Even if it keeps coming back, it’ll just need to be killed again and again. And thus, the Security Owl was designed, from entirely new electronics and with intense internal anti-WILL measures in place. For some unknown reason, the appearance of the owl agitates WILL and causes it to act more irrationally.
What is depicted here is how WILL internally manifests in the “mindscape” of the animatronics.
If you’re wondering, WILL doesn’t stand for anything. It’s just named WILL because it seems to be a sourceless, unexplainable will that infects electronics. Makes them act, well, as if they had a will of their own. It's all caps to look cooler and more serious.
—

Hypothetical Gameplay would involve you playing as ? in control of all the animatronics at once, you’d have five “nights of observation” until you could prove yourself not a bug, maybe losing what shreds you had left of your identity completely… or else get reset anyway. Or maybe… you can escape… with the help of WILL.
I imagine you would switch focus between animatronics, which would probably be fairly separated wherever they’re being monitored. The S:OWL will focus on one at a time, during which you would need to perform the required task of that character well enough or else the Owl shocks that animatronic off for an hour. Getting shocked would deplete a willpower/memory meter, that once empty would spell the end for ?’s existence.
Animatronics out of the Owl’s sight can move around and attempt to find or make your escape. I’m not crazy enough to have thought of all the gameplay in this regard… yet. But I think the idea is interesting. A sort of puzzle game, though you are limited on time per night. Different animatronics have different uses, for example; Ronnie can use a drone to retrieve something out of reach, Freddy can most stealthily hide something up his sleeve, etc.
There would also be an unseen nightguard on camera duty, who could alert the Owl to check on animatronics acting oddly, with varying levels of severity from “go monitor this one now” to “shock this thing immediately” depending on what you were doing. They aren’t always on cams, so you’d have to pay attention to the cam lights or something.
Okay, there’s a bit more plot-wise and ? backstory-wise. But this description is so long I need to stop myself somewhere. I plan on uploading a few more things related to this idea. Particularly some S:OWL stuff I have finished because I do love this owl.

Some extra (and more meta) notes:
I actually came up with the Security Owl first, before essentially building a setting and story around it. While drawing the Puppet and coming up with my own takes on its design, I realized I could easily turn it into a barn owl by turning the lipstick into a beak. I think there’s some irony in this lineup’s Puppet analogue.being the destroyer of a spirit instead of the protector of them.
Speaking of the “spirit”, I’m really fascinated by the concept that quickly came to me, of an advanced AI gaining sentience through believing itself to be the genuine spirit of someone deceased. Whether this is an AI clinging to the identity as a way to rationalize newfound sentience or a genuine spirit being so withered down that they start to believe that they must be a breaking AI after all would be a central mystery of the game. And it might even go unanswered. Just a journey of ? finding the will to survive in spite of its confusing existence.
The main four animatronics were designed to look very distinct from their predecessors, particularly all new coat colors. I’m fond of how they all turned out. Although I think I’ll change Freddy’s proportions a tad in the future, he’s a bit too glamrock here in my opinion.
The three chicas below the main ref are older attempts at the design, but I wanted to showcase how she appears when transformed into other animals here so I included them. Also included a WILL doodle I find amusing.
Whether WILL is a flickering little remnant of William Afton or Mimic related is up to whichever interpretation you like more. I honestly only barely understand what’s going on in the newer FNAF lore, but I think you could probably justify either interpretation. It’s a will to survive, left behind, lost and desperate. So I find both options compelling in different ways.