I’ve had Desolate Hope on the backlog for a long time because it looked neat but has the shadow of “Oh, it’s by the FNAF guy” hanging over it, as you mention. I’ll bump it up the list, given your praise of it.

You can do it! Unity tends to have comically extensive tutorials that you can lean really heavily on if you need to, and there’s no shame in doing so. Based on what you said, your goal is along the lines of making something in your head real, not being a Big Deal Ingenuitive Game Coder™, so do what works the best for you reaching your goal as you define it. I look forward to whatever you may have to share