Nightmare Fuel / Not for Broadcast

As a Nightmare Fuel page, all spoilers are unmarked as per wiki policy. You Have Been Warned!

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"I hope your mummy and daddy don't die in a fire. That would be bad."

"Alex, Boseman here. Letting you know that some of the content on this broadcast is gonna be quite terrifying. Perhaps enough to give viewers nightmares for weeks, perhaps months. Try to keep the viewers at home calm and not wetting their pants in fear. Boseman out."

Not for Broadcast certainly pulls no punches when it comes to horror, be it through shocking events, totalitarian realism, or a general uneasy atmosphere.

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Working Days

Day 8: The Fallout

• The day itself is not scary, but things can get slightly unnerving if you play the Mr. Snugglehugs ad in any of the three ad breaks.
  • For starters, there's a sticky note on the tape that reads "SHOULD WE PLAY? IS THIS TOY SAFE?". The fact that that sticky note exists should raise a few eyebrows.
  • If you choose to play the tape, the content isn't too bad, but the design of Mr. Snugglehugs certainly invokes a feeling of uncertainty, and those Real Action Eyes and the robotic voice do nothing in quelling fear. Although it makes sense when you think of their inspiration...
  • But what might be the most surprising thing about the ad is this line, "I hope you mummy and daddy don't die in a fire. That would be bad." That line certainly makes things startling, especially for a toy ad, but it gets worse if you know what the aftermath is.
    • Upon knowing of the consequences (which is the name of the achievement you get if you play the ad), that line almost sounds like Foreshadowing of the pick you made, and the game criticizing your choice to discard the stern warning and causing more children to become casualties.
  • Day 153: The Tempest reveals what happens if you played the ad. If you don't play the ad, there are only 7 casualties. But if you do, there are 8,000 casualties, and Channel One interviews one of the victims, who got a Real Action Eye stuck in his cheek from the explosion. And it laughed after it spontaneously combusts.

Day ???: The Lockdown

• You get the choice if you want the level to be darkly humourous or surreal. While the surreal headline has a Mrs. Snugglehug holding a gendered object, the dark headline has a bloody Snugglehug in front of a fire holding a needle with a eye attached to it, as pictured above. With the cutesy skyline and the presence of Mrs. Snugglehugs, this can be incredibly jarring.
  • In the second segment, shortly after Patrick admits he's in his bathroom. Several Mrs. Snugglehugs break in to kill him. While funny, it can still be quite scary with Patrick freaking out, not wanting to die. At the end, Patrick lets out one last scream as a Snugglehug covers the screen before it fades to static.

Day 296: The Heatwave

• The entire hostage situation. Jeremy finally snaps with Advance's corruption and trying to take away someone who was bad mouthing them, holding his hostages at gunpoint. The whole experience ends up realistically terrifying and extremely stressful, with Jeremy urging Alex to play the Disrupt tape. If you play the tape, he'll blow his brains out if you don't cut to the adverts in time. If you don't play the tape, he'll end up getting gunned down by security if you don't play the adverts in time.

Day 371: The 20 Week War

• Advance nuking four major foreign cities. At this point, Advance goes from a polarizing elected government to a full-blown nuclear dictatorship, complete with Julia demanding the foreign countries to surrender or Advance will take further action. If Jeremy's hostage situation didn't start Cerebus Syndrome, it's definitely this.
  • A bit of Fridge Horror gets thrown into the mix when you realize that the nukes caused a small earthquake in the Channel One studio, despite the nukes being detonated in foreign countries likely to be at least a hundred or so miles away. Just what kind of power were those bombs packing?!

Day 912: The Uprising

• In the middle of Peter Clement's memorial, the countdown for revealing the garden gets interrupted by a bombing by Disrupt. What has this steer into nightmare fuel is how darkly realistic it's portrayed, with panicking innocents and several people being severely injured or dead, as well as Disrupt members getting shot to death by security. Just like Advance's nukes, Disrupt's act of terrorism cements them as Right-Wing Militia Fanatics.
  • The reason for the funeral in the first place is revealed if you watch the leaked tapes. It's heavily suggested that Peter didn't die from his drinking habits as it was reported, but that Julia had him assassinated for showing sympathy to Disrupt's cause. In truth he wasn't supporting Disrupt as much as he was furious she attacked four foreign cities with nuclear weapons thereby implicating the both of them in acts of nuclear terrorism and mass murder. Regardless, it seems at this point Julia has completed her slide into total dictatorship and is going so far as to boldly lie to the nation at the man's own funeral.
  • There is also the fact, that during the broadcast Patrick, having accidentally launched in to a rant against Julia while not realizing that he is being broadcasted, can just be replaced by completely different person and everyone will just pretend that nothing happened. In fact, Francis is forced to assume Patrick's identity and is still calling themselves Patrick after over four years have gone by, with only Jeremy commenting on it near the end.

Day 2602: The Finale

Path A's Segment 3 is nothing but pure propaganda and cheese, Path B's horror is only the tension brewing during Jeremy's visit to the Nightly Show, and Path D's tension deflates when Jeremy reveals himself to the public and his insistence on "no deaths" is agreed upon. But Path C. Oh, good, good Path C... That 3rd Segment is pure horror at its finest.

• Before the final segment, you receive one final call from Boseman, and Disrupt's raid is given Five-Second Foreshadowing via Boseman being assassinated.

  Boseman: "Okay, before we suffer through the last- (furious knocking) hmm? What's that? (furious knocking continues) There seems to be a bit of a kerfuffle in the corridor, one moment-" (What sounds like a crowd of roars before communication stops abruptly)

• The Nightly Show segment is interrupted by the report that Disrupt is barging its way into the studio.

  Julia: "Well I am delighted to announce that starting next week I will be the new- (furious knocking off-screen) What the hell?"

  Sarah: "Miss Salisbury, could you get ready to accompany me please?"

• Then Disrupt arrives...

  Sarah: "ARMED LAW ENFORCEMENT! LOWER YOUR WEAPONS OR-" (*BANG!*)

• While Alan did display an assertive and firm tone of voice during The Uprising, that was because he was leading a rebellion. But here? His anger seems to be pure malice instead of being the driving force of an end goal.

  Alan (to Colin): "Is it working?"

  Colin: "I just need to check the-"

  Alan (shouting): "IS IT WORKING!?"

  Colin: "Yes it's working!"

  Alan: "Good. Over there. On your knees."

• Alan then reveals that Julia nor a person is being targeted, but instead;

  Alan: "We're not here to take out a person."

  *Alan unzips his jacket to reveal a bomb vest.

  Alan: "We're cancelling the whole fucking show."

Main Story

To Be Added

Endings

• A Better Jeremy:
  • If Jeremy's tape is not played and public favour is for Advance, Jeremy returns to NNN, to the delight of Megan, but something seems off about him. He no longer hesitates to report the cat football story, even joking with, "Our headlines tonight... They think it's all over. It is meow!". As the others laugh, the camera focuses on Jeremy for a little bit before the feed cuts off. While not as horrific as some other endings, this one has unsettling implications.
    • Jeremy was either thoroughly brainwashed into being more accepting towards Advance culture during his time in Betterment (think of something like Room 101), or he realizes that under this totalitarian regime, there will never be change nor hope, so he'll have to put up a facade to keep himself alive. Neither implications carry positive outcomes.
• Jeremy's Injustice
  • If Jeremy's tape is not played and public opinion is against Advance, Julia reports that, tragically, Jeremy died in Betterment during his treatment. Fridge Horror abounds when one realizes that Advance is not above sending enemies of the state to Betterment for an extrajudicial execution, including Alex's son. The sudden Mood Whiplash as Julia gleefully reports birth rates on the rise does not help, nor does Megan's somber demeanor throughout the segment: is it possible she knows exactly what befell Jeremy in Betterment? And if so, is she just keeping up a facade so she doesn't suffer a similar fate?
• Wacky Fun:
  • If Julia's tape isn't played, Alan detonates the bombs, killing everyone present (possibly even you), and destroying Channel One.
  • Hearing Frankie Fun's laughter as he bonks Doofnut's head with an inflatable hammer. It's normal at first, but as the song continues, its tempo increases and Frankie's laughter goes from whooping and chuckling to full-blown insane laughter.
  • What starts as a Gainax Ending devolves into an ending of Fridge Horror when one thinks about it.
    • Wacky Fun House of Whacks is meant to be mindless entertainment, and since the possibility of Disrupt controlling the airwaves is there, who isn't to say they'll use this format to distract the people from the truth and make them more open to being easily manipulated like a puppet?
• In the finale, if Jeremy is dead and Alan is alive, Alan James will raid the studio in the final segment with other Disrupt members. He then reveals he's wearing a bomb vest and ready to take down the whole show with him, killing Colin and, no matter what, Julia. If Alex doesn't play the tape, Jenny will die and Alan will take Megan hostage, then finally set the bomb off, killing everyone in the studio and, given the shaking, possibly even Alex Winston as well.
  • If Alex does play the tape, this doesn't guarantee Alan's hostages are kept safe: he will still assassinate Julia before he, himself, is shot and killed by security, his bomb vest having been sabotaged. Both possible epilogues show that the country is in dire straits in the aftermath of Julia's death: if public opinion favors Disrupt, the government will be taken over by a military junta that promises to stay in power only temporarily until order is restored. On the other hand, if public opinion favors Advance, the country spirals into complete anarchy, with the epilogue showing Megan forced to hide as she reports on the country's death spiral.

Additional Content

• Live And Spooky: What starts out as an acted out romp through a "haunted" studio turns out to be an actual haunting. Marie Murphy, having been emotionally abused by Graham Bannon, her work sabotaged with the low-quality material for the harness that led to the stunt double's injury, her original script and credit ruined due to the fires, and her death being tampered with, has been reborn as a banshee who threatens the lives of the crew, and if Alex fails to find out the truth, she kills everyone up to Sadako-style leaning out of the screens to kill Alex too.

Misc.

• The Eye of the Beholder Inc. While Neil's Deals Limited has zany advertising, Pleasure Corp offers subscriptions and luxury tours, Rymmington-Svist handles revolutionary tech, this cosmetics company screams "we know our products are harming you, but we're selling it anyway."
  • Their logo can invoke a feeling of uncertainty. It's a triangle with an eye inside of it, essentially a minimalist "All-Seeing Eye".
  • The names of their products are in French, but knowing their translations, that's a much different story. "Jus de Cochon" (trans. Pig Juice), "Acide Gastrique" (trans. Gastric Acid), "Eau de Babouin" (trans. Baboon Water), and "La Douleur" (trans. The Pain).
  • The ads. All of them have some degree of scare that leads you to believe that advertising them was a bad idea. From the whispering echoing throughout the ads to Helena's worsening conditions to the nihilistic undertones, call it Crossing the Line Twice, Black Comedy, but there's no doubt that EoB knows their products and services are harmful but don't even care.
  • Helena Canterbury-Boatshoe's worsening conditions throughout the ads.
    • In the Acide Gastrique ads, her face looks pale and flaky. The "Pig Juice" did that through its formula removing the chemicals in the skin such as "dihydrogen monoxide" (in other words, water), rendering it brittle.
    • In the Eau de Babouin ad, all her hair is gone and she looks much more like Frankenstein's monster. The "Acide Gastrique" certainly did what its name implies to her hair, and it's unclear if she applied more Jus de Cochon or if one application was enough to render skin that fragile.
    • The La Douleur ad is worthy of being a horrific finale to their saga in the main game. While the nail polish portion isn't weird (until the mentions of death come into play), it's the fact that Helena died and the stuff is being painted on her nails by another employee. And her corpse changes in pose to act like she's still alive.
  • Another horrific thing about them is that Helena's ending is determined based on your actions with EoB. But while Pleasure Corp and Crazy Neil's endings are determined by their stocks and influence, Eye of the Beholder doesn't get an ending like that. Instead, if you endorse EoB in any way, at any point in the game, she will die.