Welcome to the maw

What is little nightmares?

Little nightmares is a dark fantasy indie horror game created by tarsier studios and released on april 28th, 2017, with many sequels releasing after. While considered a relatively niche game in the indie horror sphere, a 78% on metacritic is nothing to scoff at....not only that, but it is also my favorite horror game series EVER!!! (also it made me ask my mom for a raincoat for christmas one year lol, which actually worked out considering the US state i live in is notorius for raining a lot)

Content warning: the games include topics such as child death/abuse, murder, cannibalism, suicide, possible fatphobic undertones in some enemies, starvation, references to WWII, body horror, taxidermy and eye imagery (which may trigger scopophobia in some people)

Plot synopses

the first game's story revolves around six, a 9-year-old girl trapped in a facility known as "the maw" where children are cooked and eaten by giant humanoid monsters called "the guests." As we, the player control six throughout the game, we're met with gruesome beings such as the janitor (AKA roger), a blind, long-armed man who presumably transfers children to the kitchen; the shoe monster, an unseen creature who lives in a room full of shoes (...this is the WWII reference i warned you about btw, there was a room just like this in auschwitz) and the lady, the one who runs the maw. There is also a spin-off DLC for this game, called "secrets of the maw" that focuses on another prisoner known only as "the runaway kid" and provides a bit of insight on the lady and her powers.

Very little nightmares is a mobile game spin-off released on may 30th, 2019. It follows the girl in the yellow raincoat (not to be confused with six) as she makes her way through a strange mansion known as "the nest" after the hot air balloon she was flying in snagged onto the roof and burst, causing it to crash. While there, she must steer clear of the nest's workers as well as the pretender, a spoiled little girl who lives alone at the nest and has a large collection of human children turned dolls. While i personally believe this installment in the series is forgettable as i never saw a proper gameplay video (nor have i played it myself) and thus can't recommend it in earnest, i'm sure you'll have a fun time with it!!

Little nightmares 2 is the first official sequel in the little nightmares franchise and was released on febuary 11th, 2021. It follows a young boy named mono (with six as his companion, although she's not a playable character in this game) as they make their way through the pale city and journey to the mysterious signal tower. There, they will meet foes such as the hunter, a bloodthirsty man who taxidermizes anything that breathes; the doctor, a strange gravity-defying being who's barely-human patients roam the hospital halls and the thin man, the ringleader of this whole circus, who lives within the signal tower.

the sounds of nightmares is an audio drama first released on august 22nd, 2023 shortly after the release of the first trailer for little nightmares 3. The story revolves around a young girl named noone and her many visits to the psychiatrist due to a nightmare disorder that she has. Notably, it takes place in another dimension from the one in the games, seemingly the real world with the game dimension now being referred to as "the nowhere." While, again, i have not listened to this series and thus can't recommend it in earnest, i've watched an analysis video on it (created by SuperHorrorBro, who actually wrote one of the episodes so i know he's likely not just pulling shit out of his ass) and it sounds pretty cool. (Also, i use coolors.co for my site's color palettes and according to coolors, the name of the purple i used for the title is called "veronica" which i felt was fitting considering there's a pretty well-known song in little nightmares that's about a girl named veronica)

There is a little nightmares 3 coming out soon, and will be the first game of the series to be published after tarsier studios stopped working under bandai namco (ln's publisher) and supermassive games took over the franchise. As of right now, there isn't much known of the plot. (also, it features our first black protagonist in the franchise, named low, which is cool)

What i like about little nightmares

honestly? In a time and age where everyone wants to be the next five nights at freddys or poppy playtime, little nightmares is just a breath of fresh air. Don't get me wrong, i was a FNAF kid back in the day and i still consider the first 4 games to be very nostalgic (to the point that i consider THOSE FOUR to be the only canon games because of how confusing the FNAF lore got from that point on), but to tell you the truth: i'm all mascot horror'd out!! As fun as some of the character designs can get sometimes (bunzo bunny my beloved) i'm sick of seeing nothing but games and just general horror media that's just like "WHAT IF WE MADE A FAMILY-FRIENDLY THING EVIL AND SCARY!??!?!?" So it's nice seeing a horror game that's actually horror all the way through; no fake-out, no cutesy visuals (although i do think a lot of the parts in ln2 where six and mono interact with each other are very cute), no cheap jumpscares, nothing. Instead, little nightmares moreso focuses on atmosphere and tries to let the scares come naturally. I don't know about you, but the visuals of...say, the scene where six enters the guest area, where you see a starving and, by the looks of it, underweight child trudging through an ornate dining area full of (and i say this literally) giant, gluttonous adults eating a ridiculous amount of food; with not a single one offering her any of it but instead trying to eat her alive. That's more effective than if you just plopped six into an oversized mcdonalds and had her read EASILY MISSABLE notes on tables that just EXPLAINED to you that the customers were eating child meat like many other popular indie horror games nowadays would....though, now that i think about it, a little nightmares parody fangame that removes everything unique about the game and just makes it follow a bunch of overused mascot horror tropes DOES sound like a really funny idea.

Another thing i like about this game is the art style and aesthetic. I'm usually not one for semi-realistic (or even FULLY realistic) art styles, as it almost always looks REALLY uncanny valley to me, but something about the art style is really charming to me. A little known fact about me i'm a SLUT for dark fantasy, y'know...stuff like tim burton movies and the original grim fairy tales before disney made them kid friendly (even disney creepypastas like Suicidemouse and abandoned by disney scratch this same itch for me) and honestly, part of the reason why i like little nightmares is because of it's sort of dark fairy tale-esque aesthetic!! The art style looks like it came straight out of a storybook, and as the creators stated in an interview: the first game was inspired by studio ghibi's spirited away, which i think really works in its favor.

The third thing i find interesting about little nightmares is it's themes of childhood trauma and fears, while obviously many of the official descriptions of the game on places like steam and the nintendo switch e-shop mention stuff about facing childhood fears (not to mention how common themes of child abuse are in the dark fantasy genre from what i've seen) i find it hard to describe the specifics, and thus i will provide videos made by people arguably way smarter than me in the resources section. But what i CAN say is that something about it really resonates with me as someone who's struggled with trauma and social anxiety since before i even knew how to read. Somehow the way six, mono and sometime soon, low and alone make their way through a horrible situation and overcome it (for better or for worse) feels vindicating to my younger self who'd run and hide whenever my family had guests over, who'd put up signs saying things like "go away" and "don't come back" on the front door, who wasn't even able to make friends until i was 15 and would always wonder why it was so easy for others to socialize but not for me. In a way, when i really think about it, the protagonists of little nightmares make me feel less alone.

Oh yeah also unpopular opinion but the hanging man in ln1 was 100% just added in for shock value and you guys are REALLY overanalysing him with your little theories, besides: none of them even make sense to me!! Like what do you MEAN he's actually the thin man? Or that the janitor staged his suicide?? Why the FUCK would he do that? The only theory i KIND OF get is him possibly being the pretender's father.....speaking of theories...

Theories i like

Quick warning: this is where i dive into spoiler territory so i advise skipping to the resource section if you want to or are currently playing the games (or any other medium the franchise is in).

In all honesty, i don't really follow a lot of theories. They require a lot of brainpower and i'd much rather use my brainpower to watch the same 5 drew gooden videos and draw anime girls in the same 4 poses. Jokes aside, here are a few theories i do like (hang on lemme go look for them, it's been a while since i really engaged with the fandom)

cici is the raincoat girl from vln

for those who are unaware: cici is otto (noone's psychiatrist)'s older sister in the sounds of nightmares. In the first episode, otto mentions that she used to travel to the nowhere multiple times as a child (though he describes it as her having similar nightmares as noone) before mysteriously disappearing one day; and in episode 6, he mentions cici wearing a yellow raincoat....and there's only two other girls in the franchise that are known for wearing such a garment and hanging around the nowhere. I like this theory because it gives a name to the otherwise unnamed heroine of very little nightmares (though i do like the fan-given name "reina") there is an alternate version of the theory that states that cici is actually six but i don't really like this theory as much because i just can't imagine six's real name being "cici" (as a nickname for "six" maybe, but not her actual name)

the glitching remains belong to the children from the ln2 comics

this is pretty much canon to me. Throughout little nightmares 2, there are these shadowy, glitching silhouettes known as "glitching remains" hidden around the game that the player can collect; collecting all 18 unlocks a secret after-credits cutscene that reveals that game was actually a prequel all along, with it implied that six goes on to go to the maw. In the comics, we are shown stories revolving around four unnamed children going through the different areas of the game, with it implied that they all died at the end of their respective episodes. While admittedly there ARE more than four glitching remains throughout little nightmares 2, and their appearences all seem to be based on the children in episode 6 of the comics, many of them are placed in very similar areas as the children in other episodes and honestly that's enough evidence for me.

the granny is the lady's grandmother/is a predecessor of the lady

Again, this is just canon to me. For those out of the loop: the granny (who kinda reminds me of the strider from minecraft) is an underwater enemy that the runaway kid runs into in the secrets of the maw dlc for the first little nightmares, she essentially functions the same as the shoe monster in base game; being mostly unseen, her presence mostly being made known via ripples in the water and the player constantly has to swim towards objects floating in the water's surface to avoid getting attacked. In the description for the level the granny appears in (known as a "chapter") the granny is described as "abandoned to decay and rage," and in the final chapter of the dlc, the lady is seen looking into a mirror and her reflection looks VERY similar to the granny. Some speculate that this is either her without her mask or a reflection of her own fear of being ugly (i personally lean towards the ladder, since the 3d modellers actually did sculpt the lady's face under her mask and she just looks like an average woman.) Anyway, while i could totally see this as just tarsier studios recycling assets, you can't deny how much it adds up. I like this theory because it gives an explanation as to why the granny was swimming around in what seems to be the maw's sewers, being that she was banished there after being overthrown.

six gains the powers/memories of whatever she eats

now we're getting into some lesser known and slightly tougher to prove theories (i've only ever really seen these next two proposed by randos in the comment sections of youtube videos) but if you've played the first little nightmares, you'd know that hunger is a HUGE theme, what with it being established that six is starving to death for pretty much the whole game. And this theory suggests that whatever six manages to find and eat throughout the game gives her various abilities corresponding to it (kinda like the copy ability in the kirby games) and/or she gains their memories. While this admittedly doesn't really make too much sense in the prison chapter (or "level," whichever you prefer)....idk about you but i don't think bread has the ability to remember stuff...the beginning of the lair chapter starts to kinda turn this around. At the beginning, the janitor baits six into a cage with a hunk of mystery meat and brings her to this chapter's main setting; and the next chapter begins with her grabbing onto a meat hook and ending up in a meat storage room, while obviously meat hanging onto a hook isn't a "skill," it's very interesting how this happens after six eats a piece of meat...almost poetic, in a way. That said, in the beginning of the kitchen chapter: six eats a rat caught in a trap and a lot of that part of the game revolves around hiding from the twin chefs via going under shelves, crossing wooden beams, climbing through vents and moving around through small openings in the walls; all of which are things rats are known to do. In the guest area chapter, six eats a nome (who was originally the runaway kid before the lady turned him into this) and then she's able to make her way towards the lady's quarters and defeat her. Afterwards, six lastly eats the lady alive and absorbs her powers, as evident by how she absorbs the life out of the guests and kills them as she seemingly leaves the maw.

i find this theory very interesting, i think it's so cool how much these things correlate and i feel like it makes a lot of sense that six would be able to get abilities from the things she eats. Back when i still KINDA gave a shit about smash bros, i had this idea that six and kirby would be best friends and honestly this kinda reminds me of that lol

the pretender was meant to be an heiress to the lady

there isn't much to prove this theory, it's more of a commonly-held headcanon if anything, but i like it. From what i personally gathered from my own research: the pretender's home is filled with framed pictures of many different residents of the nowhere, a trait similar to the lady. She also has some very peculiar powers; such as, according to the wiki (because remember: i never played VLN myself), a shriek that can stun anyone who hears it as well as the ability to instantly make people disintegrate just by touching them, which seems to be a bit similar to the lady's life-absorption powers (though i'd take this with a grain of salt, since i don't think there's any real proof that the pretender has this ability and there's no citation for it on the wiki so this might just be a classic case of someone on fandom.com making shit up)

in all honesty, i find it very hard to prove this theory. I'm sure someone out there could do a better job but i just can't. I still like the theory though because i find the concept very interesting, i could totally imagine the pretender running the maw when she's older (that is, if she didn't fucking die at the end of the game)

my personal headcanons

here are a collection of headcanons i've gathered up throughout the years, all the ones listed here are also apart of my headcanon book on wattpad though as of writing this, i haven't gotten around to cleaning up that book to remove the headcanons i don't believe in anymore/fandoms i'm not apart of, so this will just list off the ones i don't think aged that badly/are THAT cringey (i was 15 when i started headcanoning most of these, okay?) That said, if you wanna see more of my stupid ass thoughts, go read the wattpad book (though in all honesty, there isn't much on there, most of it aged like milk and will probably be removed in the future)

i'm a very simple gal when it comes to headcanons surrounding this franchise, my headcanons are mostly things like "oh three of the protagonists are asian-coded and there's a heavy japanese theming to the franchise so they're all japanese!!" Or "lol the teacher's real name is edna giraffeneck!!!" Hell, by the time of writing this (before i've cleaned up by headcanon book) i just listed some random ass theory video that i don't even remember most of (and didn't even embed it into the book itself bc i was lazy) but only really liked it because the dude who made it very briefly brought up the idea of mono potentially having a crush on six (and i mean very briefly, he was talking about mono's feelings towards six and the sentence was something like "(...) mono's protectiveness or maybe even love for six (...)" and earlier on he brought up the idea of mono constantly protecting six throughout ln2 being a metaphor for gender roles) and i was self-proclaimed "monix trash" at the time (still kinda am but i'm more chill about it...yes i know i'm kinda weird for shipping two fictional children together, feel free to make fun of me as you wish.) So as such: here's a quick lightning round of the less complicated headcanons.

mono is wasian, specifically japanese-british.
six and the runaway kid are fully japanese
the teacher is scottish
mono had a slight crush on six throughout the events of ln2
even if mono didn't become the thin man (and thus a fucking giant), he'd still be pretty tall as an adult
the lady doesn't actually have feet, her legs just end in points (yes i am aware her 3d model in-game does actually have feet, i just think it'd be cool if she had stalactites for legs)
mono has freckles, but they're very light and hard to see
six is generally very quiet; even if the characters did speak full sentences and not just say "hey" to each other at most in-game, she wouldn't talk much.
both six and mono have ptsd (you would too if you lived in this universe)
mono hates swear words

alright, let's get into the juicy stuff now :3

the game's time period

if you've played little nightmares, you'd would notice that it's heavily implied that the story takes place in a time period that's not ours. there's old technology everywhere, the characters dress in older fashion styles....and most of all: none of the child characters mention skibidi toilet or explain the garten of banban lore at any point!!! /j. But in all seriousness: we know that the games take place in the past, but just how far back?

let's start off with the TVs in the games; while not unheard of in the early days, color television didn't become widely used until around the late 60's, and as we all know: all the tvs in the games are in black and white. Notably, one of the screens (shown below) that could be seen on the tvs bears a striking resemblance to the indian-head test pattern that was a prominent tv image first created and used in 1939 and deemed obsolete in the 60's.

on top of that, the simple outfits of characters such as the ones seen in the enemies in the school chapter and the viewers resemble those worn during the 1940's; where it was heavily encouraged to conserve resources and prioritize practicality over style in regards to clothing (not to mention the aforementioned wwii reference in the shoe monster). Among other things that i'm too lazy to research, this leads me to believe that the little nightmares games take place somewhere in the early to mid 1950's, i used to think it could've possibly also been the late 40's, but after browsing through various wikipedia articles (and the Ln fandom wiki) that doesn't seem likely.

six's powers

as we know, at the end of little nightmares: six eats the lady and absorbs her powers, giving her the ability the absorb the life force of any poor soul who comes her way (hence why i chose that blinkie on the sidebar that says "yes, i will suck the life out of you") but what if we took it a step further? I like to imagine that six's absorption abilities aren't just limited to living beings, but inanimate objects as well; like for example: if she were to get her flu shots, her body would just absorb the needle. I feel like this would also effect her medically as well, making her immune to certain ailments, ie things such as tumors or blisters would just be broken down and turned into energy for her. I dunno...it just kinda makes sense to me.

the 2017 comics' canonicity

i didn't mention this earlier, but before the little nightmares comics app released around the time of ln2; there was a 2-issue comic series published in 2017 following the events of the first game. It introduces many new characters, including some unnamed children and a few new monsters such as the ferryman and the north wind. It is heavily debated in the little nightmares fandom whether or not these comics are canon to the full story, aside from the ferryman being heavily referenced in the sounds of nightmares, not a lot of things from the comics are really hinted at in the grand scheme of things. Maybe once little nightmares 3 (...and maybe the 2025 comic series) is released, i'll be proven wrong, but in all honesty: i personally don't believe these comics are canon.

what happened to the third chef?

for some reason, this headcanon wasn't listed on my wattpad even though i could've SWORN it was there....that's odd. Anyway, for those out of the loop: in little nightmares, there's two twin chef enemies, but in the early betas of the game, there were originally three chefs although the third one was removed sometime during development. While no real signs of him existing are shown in-game, a photo of him could be seen in the background of the janitor's lair. Personally, i headcanon that he actually DID exist at one point, but something happened to him; i'm thinking maybe he died after tripping and falling in the meat grinder lol.

resources

this video by youtube channel TheSterninator where he designs little nightmares characters as pokemon - to be honest, i'm just listing this here because it was uploaded while i was making this shrine and it kinda feels like i manifested it into existence.

little nightmares: a retrospective - a comprehensive video by sagan hawkes analysing the franchise up to ln2 (because this was before ln3)

The little nightmares wiki - a fan encyclopedia where i did all my research and got all the official art/screenshots (including the nomes used in the dividers)

the complete little nightmares analysis - a video by connor mcgrath analysing almost the entire franchise thus far (that said though, i would take his analysis of six with a grain of salt since from what i've watched of the video: he heavily villifies her and acts as though all the bad things she does are intentionally malicious when she's a more nuanced character than that)

link to a tumblr post by freindsssssss (with additional commentary by queenofmonsterz) analysing six and her motives - with this, i would also highly recommend queenofmonsterz (aka caroles)'s tumblr page as a whole as she does a lot of really eye-opening analysis and theory-type stuff on little nightmares (they're also the biggest lady fan i know)