(Cleaned minigame images from fnaflore.com)
The minigames mostly present themselves as literal arcade games, only revealing their full nature when we go out of bounds. Presumably, they are the games playable from the arcade machines we see in Fazbear's Fright. FNaF3 puts some emphasis on these arcades, showing them off in the trailer. Mangle's Quest is accessed in gameplay by interacting with one of them through the cameras. They even appear in the safe room, where the spirits of the children were last seen before fading away.
(I am aware this doesn't technically work timeline-wise, as the arcades are already in the attraction on night 1 despite the safe room not having been explored yet. But it feels to me like this was the intent regardless. It is not hard for me to believe that Scott simply made a timeline error, or couldn't be bothered to make unique camera renders for the first night.)
They obviously aren't just arcade games- they are haunted by memory, echoes of the past. The conceit of Fazbear's Fright is that all of the memories of Fazbear's history have been scavenged and brought together in one place. With the introduction of Springtrap, the decades-dead corpse of Freddy's is suddenly revived. The attraction comes to life.
“I mean, not ghosts, but... memories. I think they linger, whether there's someone there or not.” The house, her old house, was imbued with memory, with loss, with longing. It hung in the air like humidity; the walls were saturated, like the wood had soaked in it. It had been there before she came, and it was there now; it would be there forever. It had to be."
- The Silver Eyes (2015)
"Thirty years after Freddy Fazbear's Pizza closed it's doors, the events that took place there have become nothing more than a rumor and a childhood memory, but the owners of "Fazbear's Fright: The Horror Attraction" are determined to revive the legend and make the experience as authentic as possible for patrons, going to great lengths to find anything that might have survived decades of neglect and ruin.
At first there were only empty shells, a hand, a hook, an old paper-plate doll, but then a remarkable discovery was made...
The attraction now has one animatronic."
- FNaF3 description
FNaF4 tied all the memories back to a single point of origin: the bite victim, the character who embodies the tragic legacy of Freddy's. I've elaborated on the connections to the FNaF4 bite victim here, and specifically Happiest Day here. I've also discussed Fazbear's Fright and memory further in a previous post on the shadow animatronics, in my timeline, and in this post about the theme of repetition. There's also, of course, network theory. In case you couldn't tell, these minigames and concepts have left a strong impression on me.
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Beneath the minigames is "the Sunken Place", with its distorted backgrounds and impressionistic imagery."THE SUNKEN PLACE: This is where the Shadow Balloon Boys live—black silhouettes of BB with a stream of gray tears falling from their eyes. You don't have to avoid them—you can just walk straight past them on your way to the hidden game area where the eighth balloon is."
- Five Nights at Freddy's Character Encyclopedia
The Sunken Place is often overlooked in analysis of the game, as its imagery may seem random and meaningless. (3 Balloon Boys and a tree? The Afton family?? The tree of 87???) However, considering the role of the minigames in general, I think there is a straightforward interpretation. You may already understand it on an emotional level, but I rarely see it put to words.
Though the minigames have a cheery cartoonish facade, the music is nostalgic and melancholy. There is always an error, a glitch- something is wrong, subtly. Using this, we can escape the outwardly happy minigames and plunge into their dark underside, the Sunken Place. This is the unconscious, the shadowy repressed suffering of Freddy's which lingers beneath the surface.
The Shadow BBs, Puppet, and cupcakes are the dreamlike imagery of the unconscious, the lingering misery taking concrete form. Comparisons may be made to the Jungian concept of the shadow- the imagery certainly supports this. I think this was meant to explain the concept of the shadows in general, RXQ in particular.
Is there a specific meaning to the imagery? Much like in dreams, the literal details don't really matter- the point is the emotions behind it. The BB minigame has dark crying BB's. It's, y'know, BB, but sad. The Chica cupcake minigame has dark crying cupcakes. Mangle's Quest has the Puppet, sure. They are manifestations/representations of the lingering trauma around Freddy's, not any particular characters or events other than perhaps the ones which happen to be relevant to the particular minigames.
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FNaF's paranormal is generally about trauma and repression. This is painted most clearly in the final line of FNaF4:"Perhaps some things are best left forgotten, for now."
The concept of lingering memories and emotions, manifesting and causing more suffering, the spirits being trapped and needing to move on, the themes of nostalgia and the past repeating itself... All of it clearly ties back to the central theme of trauma, of the pain of past events festering in the background long after it should've been forgotten, and the melancholic catharsis of finally putting it to rest.
This can all be understood purely emotionally, regardless of the particular lore context, which is why it's so effective. You don't really need to know about the timeline, about whether FNaF4 is in '87 or '83, or why the tiny toy Chica is missing its beak... that stuff is interesting, but it isn't really the point. Chances are, if you've played these minigames, you already get it on some level.
(Source)
These mechanics would be elaborated and codified over time, particular in the Fazbear Frights series with Phineas Taggart's explanations. There is a temptation across the fanbase to assume this is a retroactive explanation for something which was nebulous in the early games, or even a retcon, but I'm nearly certain it's been the intention since 2015.
It's funny how well Markiplier was able to understand the story on an emotional level during his playthroughs, despite getting some details wrong.
Secret link for genius FNaF lore analysts only :o