The Day Before: A Total Defeat

[@DJAngelcakes]

I feel calling Fntastic a "studio" is stretching the definition; studios have employees, not volunteers.

[@ashurad_fox5991]

Yeah, exactly a game development studio or game development company shouldn't be composed of volunteers... Since their goal is to make a game and profit off of it. I can maybe understand if it's a game development group having it's developers volunteers if they willingly wanted to, and they could leave anytime (I knew a few from games I've played, but most of them are nsfw and takes months or years to update their games... which aren't really there profit, as most are free) So it's just straight up baffling how Fantastic studios just hinge on volunteers, makes a trailer for AAA game, and just decision they chose. for this game.

[@thedarkemissary]

Exactly. What's the "development cost" look like for 4 dudes drinking beer and eating hotpockets on the weekend while copy and pasting The Division code?

[@Someone--Else]

Did they bring in volunteers? Yes, but I'm sure you, and others are making more of that info than was actually the case. If you were to poke around some, you can already find interviews with supposed staff members that worked on The Day Before, who would mention senior staff, and other developers. The main issue as I saw it is they got in way over their heads, with those early videos they made to represent the game they hoped to make, being something well beyond their capabilities, but they apparently went all in on that project, which is why they shut down. Even Bellular discussed that they likely won't have made a penny from this, so this wasn't the scam, or cash grab many have tried to claim, the devs were just inept. Over time they came to realize they were in over their heads, and they desperately needed more help, hence the call for unpaid volunteers, but I can't see volunteers being all they had. Although since most people aren't looking to see things reasonably, and go with whatever sounds funny, this post will likely just get down voted, and laughed at.

[@jimecherry]

@@Someone--Else it wasnt a scam it was a sham like when someone is trying to sell snake oil for reasonable prices they arent going to make alot of money if successful in their con but its still a con job regardless of if theyre successful.

[@ashurad_fox5991]

@@Someone--Else As a software dev, it is true that most AAA game titles release trailers first and make the game to try to look like that trailer... But that is also a bad practice, since: 1. what if hardware limitations? doesn't allo that game to exist yet 2. Will the game be optimized? enough to run on the target system 3. What if resources doesn't allow to complete that project? Those are the stuff that game development companies need to consider... But the issue is That, they made a AAA trailer... marketed the game as such for years... and they couldn't deliver... So it may not be a scam, but it is definitely false advertising. (and the state of the game and even using unoptimized multiplayer asset code didn't help either... If someone really tells me there are only uninterested volunteers working on the development team... I would believe them) Besides this isn't the only stuff the pulled before... So I doubt they actually used their all for this project. Since they cannot be trusted.

[@Lordwhizzkid]

If a company ends up creating what the game was supposed to be, they can do the absolute funniest thing in the world by calling it "Five Days After"

[@Spring_Forward_Fall_Back]

Someone needs to make a fast and dirty, satirical mini-game and give it that name. Then put it on youtube lol. I'd play that... :)

[@bofh139]

Steam will refund all sales if there is not a 90 days warning.

[@hop-skip-ouch8798]

If that actually works, it will be really funny. Considering they said all the money they received will go to debt settlement.

[@harryballz4260]

@@hop-skip-ouch8798 Yeah, they're lying. They were trying to pocket it all and run and it's not working out the way they wanted. LOL, LMAO even.

[@HM-sx6mg]

No

[@Pinsonneaultmotorsports]

@@harryballz4260they even changed the names on the game page to mytona fntastic. On twitter they even said fntastic doesn’t own the day before anymore

[@skywillfindyou]

@@hop-skip-ouch8798Nah, not everything goes though Steam. And every copy will be refunded.

[@dustins7259]

People always think money when the word "SCAM" is used. But that is not the only way to scam. False advertising is also a form of a scam, if your told this is what you get and then you don't get what was stated is a scam. The definition of scam is as follows "a dishonest scheme; a fraud". This definition doesn't even talk about money. This is why people call it a scam because it is a scam by definition.

[@5MinuteFit]

Thank you! And the only reason they're giving out refunds is steam is making them. They won't give anything back they dont have to

[@snak3y3z50]

Exactly my thoughts. If this isnt considered a scam, what is

[@Bigflex26]

The rebranded themselves yesterday night from FNTASTIC to Eight Points. They are not shutting down they just swapped names trying to get away from the heat. Got screenshots of the change. They are going to do it again. 😂

[@karthiksubramanian2279]

And trust me, people will still buy their garbage 😂

[@CBRN-115]

​@@karthiksubramanian2279rinse and repeat Easy money for them hahah Also, they're russians. No one can or will sue them. They WILL get away with it

[@akaimizu1]

Sounds like Digi Hom. When they had multiple company names they went under, so if one got a reputation, they simply publish under other names.

[@micheljolicoeur6094]

It was also a spectator sport because they only had 150 servers limited to 32 players each, so only 4800 players could actually play the fame at any one time. The 38k+ concurrent "players" means almost 34,000 "players" were on the server page spamming refresh waiting for someone else to logout or their game to crash. The infrastructure was nowhere near capable of handling the expected traffic of a highly wishlisted game.

[@joshuacr]

This. This is when I began to suspect they were just outright lying not being just incompetent which they were through most of this in the first place because they didn't know what they were doing. They just came up with the ideas and then thought someone else would solve it for them.

[@miinyoo]

Funny how that works.@@joshuacr

[@uncleclaps44]

I suspect the player limit of 32 players per server was by design to get most players over that 2 hour refund time (it may be a lot less since no one was able to count all 32 in the one server)

[@samgoff5289]

​@@uncleclaps44dude you need to take off the tinfoil hat, you are giving them way to much credit for a doctor evil scheme...they are just garbage developers and the servers could barely handle 32 players with 10 zombies not some 2 hour wasting scheme to get around refunds....steam will easily refund way past 2 hours in certain situations like this

[@ashroskell]

That shot of the Lamborghini and the deer is a shot for shot copy from the Will Smith movie, I Am Legend. They seem to have copied a lot more than simple still photos from other games? I imagine they have lifted lots more from film and TV shows and have used a simple animation program (maybe ChatGPT?) to make it look computer generated?

[@AlertedDonkey42]

I don’t understand how they managed to sell so many copies… there had to be willful ignorance on the part of consumers to not see the signs and ignore all the negative coverage it got before release.

[@Furzkampfbomber]

My guess would be people with too much spare money at their hands and a morbid sense of curiosity. I mean, people spend five- to six-digit sums in online games, I guess spending 40 bucks on a game that can be expected to be a scam, just for shits and giggles, is as easy as breathing for people like this.

[@WarFoxThunder]

FR

[@BlissBatch]

I heard >50% refunded the game. Maybe a lot of people just wanted to try it for an hour or so, to see how terrible it was.

[@RazielTheUnborn]

Contrary to what many believe, most do not follow a game that closely beyond their initial interest into the topic. They keep up with the release date, but they usually do not dive any further from there for fear of having too much revealed that will kill their interest in the game. Makes it easier to avoid bad publicity.

[@Karn0010]

If most of those who bought into the hype are like most people, they had no idea because they didn't play close attention. They saw something on steam that checked all the boxes they like, wishlisted it, and move on. It came out, they bought it, and refunded it. Those who were following it closely, wanted to see the car crash on the highway. Morbid curiosity can generate a lot.

[@maxbjr]

The complete failure of The Day Before makes the troubled launches of FO76 and Cyberpunk look like some sort of gold standard companies should aspire to. The Day Before was that bad. 😮

[@joshuacr]

Comparing this game to the rest, it makes No man's Sky look like a "perfectly executed" early access game.

[@joshuacr]

@@DreamingVoid please no need to be rude and use words like idiotic. Perhaps they should have used the words "by comparison." But yes, it does make this cluster f look like the gold standard when we look at those others. But I am not saying those earlier standards are ever acceptable in the first place.

[@haruhirogrimgar6047]

​@@joshuacr If someone says something "stupid" (to avoid the "I" word) they should generally be called out on it :P

[@joshuacr]

@@haruhirogrimgar6047 calling people bad names is a bad practice. People can have a disagreeing opinion without using the idiot word.

[@RusticRonnie]

Well this is still a small team, so they sadly still technically out performed fallout 76

[@Snowshill]

it need to be known the people behind the game have not closed down the studio they are lying they have renamed to an older name they used in kickstater scams and other asset flip games they are trying to vanish deleting everything related to the stufios name and the rug pull of a game and then they will do a retrun and repeat the exact same scam again

[@charlesfuzak]

I keep seeing people saying that citing their old game Wild Eight's Steam page changed the developer name. How does that make sense? If they want to rename and resume business removed from their reputation, why in the world would they put that new name on a game they are known to be linked too. I guess they could be stupid but ehhhh. Normally you would change your name to something completely unrelated and just produce products under that new name. And didn't they also sell that game to their publisher years ago?

[@cmdr.jabozerstorer3968]

This isn't the case. The Wild Eight IP was sold awhile ago and the current IP owner just decided to change the name of the developer on Steam to Fntastic's previous one to distance themselves from Fntastic.

[@joshuacr]

Considering the incompetence of the "studio" on the stupid things they've done over the one and a half to two years, I don't know if they actually are trying to be scamming or just doing it in such an incompetent way that this is the way they're showing their closing in a bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad bad way. Doesn't matter anymore. They're not to be trusted. Anyone finds any connection to this old studio or heads, they're not going to be ever trusted again. Even if somehow they were new people.

[@RusticRonnie]

That comes from the fact the original game they made changed its developer name to avoid association. But it’s actually a completely unrelated game at this point, everyone who was on the team is gone

[@666Daheretic]

The Day Before is an example as to why people need to stop getting hyped up by vertical slices and developers shouldn't be allowed to advertise their games with vertical slices.

[@joshuacr]

This. 100% this!

[@gman7497]

Totally agree. This is what Cyberpunk stepped in with that presentation a couple years out from the games release. Features that were not fully implemented or playable that they had to walk back coz they didn't work with the full game or, time couldn't be put in to make them work.

[@ekki1993]

We can't control hype. Social media makes it impossible unless you implement dystopian levels of control. We can control developer advertising. And we should regulate it.

[@gman7497]

@ekki1993 at the very least, require them to make it abundantly clear that what they're showing is conceptual and not indicative of the final product.

[@L3vinesNL]

I think the way that wishlist gets written away is also misleading. For me and for a bunch of my friends its something you come across that you want to be notified about so that you can look back and see what the gameplay became. Most times its not even to buy it right away. (edit: and even with this game it was lets see what kind of shit show this is going to be)

[@cosmicxchaos]

They straight up released knowing full well they'd be shutting things down. It was a shameless cash grab and I hope someone can hold them accountable. I tried telling a friend not to get it, but they thought I was just being a skeptical. 😅 Glad I passed on this one.

[@PXAbstraction]

It wasn't a cash grab, it was 100% being used to launder money. The dev has ties to Russia and this was almost certainly being done for some oligarch to get money out of the country and around the SWIFT restrictions.

[@kdog3908]

I've dodged some pretty big bullets by being sceptical. Worth the wait. Starfield and Diablo IV are two of my most recent success stories with respect to not pulling the trigger on day one. Note, I literally never pre order anymore. I wish more people could develop the self discipline. The games industry would look different today.

[@wakkosick6525]

maybe its good to be skeptical. Conspiracy theories are more like spoiler alerts.

[@CLove511]

It started out as just a simple experiment, but they found the marshmallow experiment had far reaching implications through society in the lives of the participants. Patience is rewarded.

[@Someone--Else]

Valve/Steam does not send out the money as soon as a purchase is made, and given how things have gone, it wouldn't surprise me if Valve elects to just refund everyone, even without asking for a refund, meaning the devs may end up not have made a penny from it in the end.

[@karlgator]

Are we all just gonna pretend our boy didn't just say "Splintires" at least 3 times with a totally straight face? 😂

[@25xxfrostxx]

I heard it too. Each time. I don't think this is the first time.

[@ssj2_snake]

This is what I came to post

[@funkymunky7935]

Either he has a speech impediment, or he genuinely doesn't know the game he's referring to

[@DeadStawker]

Non-native speaker here. What's the issue here? Lol

[@25xxfrostxx]

@@DeadStawker The game is "Spin Tires" as in, when your tires are stuck in mud, they spin. Splin is not a word.

[@als1668]

Fntastic changed their name to eight points and removed their entire social media presence. So technically, they're not gone, more like looking for other "opportunities".

[@mist-valley-modz]

^ This. And so, the professional scammers look for more corporate victims.

[@LarryPigeon1]

0815 classuc scam i am glad i ddint bought that shit unlike others

[@Mesoz]

And they will succeed again lol. People are idiots, a lot are willfully ignorant and will continue to shell out money for what is obviously a steaming pile of shit on a plate, smile, and ask for more. I find it honestly kind of hilarious. It shows just how easy it really is to fool the masses.

[@watcherwatching5051]

And whilst that was happening the rights to the game went to the publisher.

[@mist-valley-modz]

@@watcherwatching5051 WHAT game? There Is No Game. Its just some assets and an unplayable mess. Never meant to be a game, nor will it ever be one.

[@nfc14g]

The biggest disappointment is this entertaining saga is at an end. It's been great content.

[@YoStabbaStabba]

fr. I've never even heard about this "game" until it released. Now I am fully addicted to the saga.

[@hop-skip-ouch8798]

It's also funny when you read their pre launch statement about how their game is for the believers, haters and all the _future_ players. And then a few days later they basically went, "yup, game making too hard, bye".

[@Hellfire918]

This company is known for flaking out on their games & The Day Before was their biggest scam yet.

[@thatHARVguy]

@@Hellfire918 They've been using The Day Before hype to sell [insert crap app] to the wish-listers. I'm pretty sure TDB was never intended to be released.

[@terrythegnome2408]

wait game that was clearly a cash grab scam turns out to be scam????

[@Disconnis]

Ikr?? I'm more surprised by the fact that people seem to be surprised 😂

[@terrythegnome2408]

haha yeah I've just been saying "uh yeah we knew this!"@@Disconnis

[@leonhart7306]

"Turns out this is a real game, kind of wish it wasn't." 0:03 Well, the good news is that they got their wish! At the very least, the dev isn't a real dev studio anymore.

[@KironX1]

unfortunately they just changed their name to Eight Points studios so they are very much still alive and ready to scam again...even closing their "studio" was a lie.

[@Shiirow]

vaporware that became shovelware, where the only difference was a change in their exit strategy.

[@funkymunky7935]

FNTASTIC has cut and run, then started working under the new name of Eight Point Digital

[@katietree4949]

How are people surprised by any of this!? The red flags were 50 foot wide and blocking the roads!

[@leana339]

Literally nobody is surprised except the games Discord Moderators who shilled it.

[@edwardhulse]

People are just incredibly stupid, dumb and ignorant. I feel like, to quote Mycroft from Sherlock here, “I’m living in a world of Goldfish.”

[@MrPrincepop]

I watched a KZbinr stream this 'game' out of curiosity. By the end of their stream, frustrated but confirmed their assumptions that this 'game' was long on promises, short on delivery. That's being kind to what they really stated.

[@ashroskell]

Somebody got seriously ripped off. Even if it wasn’t necessarily all the early access players. Somebody invested in this Russian company, which keeps changing their name to distance themselves from their previous disasters (or outright investment scams?) and lost a lot of cash. I mean, how can you assess an early access game as failed? Why suddenly shut down? Unless? . . . Unless you’ve peaked on all the investment you’ll get from firms and don’t want to spend any of that money on actual, “development,” right? Take the money and run?

[@sagitarriulus9773]

Sean Murray will always be the goat my man turned literal coal into diamonds and because of that he’ll always have my respect 1. As a programmer he held true to his promise and delivered. 2. As a gamer I really appreciate him owning the situation buckling up and not “bitching” out.

[@phsycotater3608]

They also made a joke about this using his name on Twitter a few days ago, and he replied, and played along.

[@seriade]

The only thing that seems good out of this is that Steam smelled something fishy and apparently was holding all the money stopping the dip basically in its tracks.

[@MrWesleyDP]

I feel like there is a fascinating documentary to make here along the lines of "Overnight".

[@Alientank]

Development started the day before release. Bankruptcy claimed the day after.

[@rainytuesdays999]

I hadn't seen that particular trailer before, but as someone who has played a ton of Spintires and its sequel, that's not just "reminiscent" of spintires gameplay. That's straight up ingame footage from it lol

[@Ein0r10]

Goes to show how out of the loop I am when it comes to gaming. I've never heard of the game, the drama, the developer or their previous games😅

[@haruhirogrimgar6047]

Yeah, same here. Idk if Bellular covered it at all. Skillup didn't, nor did any of my other KZbinrs. And I never got recommended a gaming news article about it by Google.

[@karthiksubramanian2279]

Me too..i heard about this game only after i heard the news of studio closure days after release...😂..then watched lots of vids on what this game is

[@dmas7749]

same this just popped in my feed, i'm a milennial/boomer when it comes to games

[@MrXMysteriousX]

I think they tried to scam in some capacity, or at least that was the plan. They basically didn't need to pay wages due to the volunteer thing and probably figured they'd get something for the asset flip of a mess that is their game but grossly underestimated the backlash and were perhaps unaware to the full extent Steam would fight in the consumers corner. Maybe we are looking at the top brass cashing out in some capacity, such as you suggested. I just can't see how they'd launch this if were genuine.If they were customer focused they wouldn't have bothered with all of this in the first place and would have just cancelled. I simply do not trust them.

[@jlstruyde]

I would love to see a studio make a game like this which fntastic could not/would not promise us...

[@IrisCorven]

Ubisoft already has the base for it with Division, Battlestate has the Loot/Inventory/Extraction mechanics with Tarkov, Bohemia has the survival and tension with DayZ, and Days Gone already has the Zombie hordes. It's nuts to me that no AAA developer has tried to just cram those elements of each into something at this point, with how clearly profitable the idea is.

[@Pc_98_Fan]

You're in luck, some people have been remaking The Day Before out of spite but better, and even adding features that weren't in the game we got, like a proper melee and a much better experience.

[@AlisterEmyka]

It exists already and its called SCUM even in early access its better than most full games.

[@TrickyJebus]

Dead Frontier on Steam.

[@KironX1]

which is weird because they could literally just play anything else and not waste their time.@@Pc_98_Fan

[@hmmdoh7835]

Imo No Man’s Sky dev is a freaking legend that didn’t do this move but continue to support the game up to this day

[@solothkaroftrinsic3852]

One thing that is a strong point in Star Citizen is (if there is not too much desync) is that every client sees what all the players are doing. And they really had to struggle to make it work.

[@janrautenstrauch4729]

I gotta say, i am a bit impressed at Fantastic. They used the exctraction-mechanics in real life. They went into the market (Map), got (looted) as much as they could and then gtfo (extracted). So in a way it is kinda fitting that their game was an extraction-shooter in the end. And all those few zombies on the maps are symbolic for all the gamers who defended them until the end. The only thing that's left to make this whole story uber-meta would be some random camper ambushing at the extraction point and stealing all their hard-scammed stuff.

[@TheLexikitty]

“Yoga pants and Lamborghinis” is a great song title.

[@KironX1]

The game has already been proven to be an asset flip. The entire city map can be bought from the unreal store for $399. all of the items and weapons are from the survival kit pack from the store as well, including the aiming and shooting pack for games. The vehicle simulations were also bought. Not a single thing was developed. These people should be in jail for Fraud, now you know why they live in Russia. It's like one giant social engineering scam lol.

[@livefree6455]

I have not seen this on Steam very often, if ever, "All Reviews: Overwhelmingly Negative." Fascinating. I've never seen even the thumbs up went and got their money back. What fun to read.

[@TrickyJebus]

Dead Frontier is what the Day Before is expected to be. And what that game is ITS GODDAMN FREE

[@Asghaad]

the multiple times lambasted "lamborghini scene" seems to me like a refference to simmilar scene in movie "i Am Legend" where Will Smith drives a "lambo" around just like this.

[@desertdude540]

I was always wondering if the constant hype wasn't just a way to scam a larger advance out of their publisher, and it's really looking like that's the case.

[@adawg3032]

It’s literally cartoon level of comedic humor, but it’s not a cartoon. It’s actually something that happened in the real world

[@coregod109]

What i feel like is the weirdest thing is that they were most wishlisted game at some point and then they dropped the ball on marketing more and more and interviews talking about volunteers came out. It's just weird to me they were unable to convert this hype into investments and use the money to start up actual development by hiring devs and artists etc. From what i've gathered they did acquire some venture capital money but they didn't put it towards development and then after all the delays and hype turning into ridicule online they were feeling the pressure and they shat out this extraction shooter game as an exit strategy so they could make money off the people dumb enough to buy it and use the money to save their own ass. But they might even have fumbled that because i dont think steam will be paying out anything.

[@Dracas42]

I can absolutely call this game a scam even if they didn't directly siphon money from interested consumers, because they did use this game (which was the #1 wishlisted game on Steam for a while) to draw attention to their other projects like Propnight. The fact that they're scrubbing the old videos that promised the game as something other than what it is means they've got something to hide, probably from law enforcement since I'd expect a false advertising suit if I was them.

[@SporianSummit]

the fact they were even able to trick people into buying it early says alot about the modern gaming community

[@louissamson4609]

Same thing happened with Return to Moria. It advertised as a game that you could go anywhere by mining but what it really is, is a game that is procedural created with walls between rooms. There's an element of exploration but nowhere near what we had hope for.

[@michaelthomas5433]

All I know is that I now want and expect Star Citizen to have yoga pants deformation physics. I don't care how long it adds to the dev cycle.

[@ADMNtek]

Are there any yoga pants in SC yet. but if anyone is able and willing it's those maniacs and that is why i love them. and keep throwing money at them.

[@ColinTimmins]

The last time I remember a true MMO where you could build a house, furnished it, insight your friends, fight over the land and the house you owned was in Ultima Online. Buying and selling of houses with in game trading or real world cash was a thing. How long ago was this? I’m old. Games could and should do so much more. It’s disappointing.

[@neveridle]

Hey, a tip for your site: You yearly pay sometimes scares it off. Add the monthly pay so people can quickly notice that the price per month is not that high.

[@mdb45424]

Give samples, say a month free and if they don't cancel offer packages

[@Rawbful]

I don't know why we are assuming they have been working on this game for 5 years or even have a team. I think this game must have been made by just a couple people and a bunch of AI. I can't explain what the outcome was in any other way that seems reasonable.

[@edwardhulse]

You’d be absolutely right. All the dialogue was AI generated with AI voices and all assets were stolen and only cobbled together about a year ago resulting in a messy scam.

[@mdb45424]

They bought a ton of unity assets.

[@GrechStudios]

I feel like the Bellular news team went easy on Fntastic. Which isn’t a bad thing, it’s good to keep an open mind about what’s going on. But man, Fntastic has been ripped to shreds by everyone, and I think they deserve it.

[@joseonwalking8666]

Mytona should as a PR move announce they are building DEV team to continue the game and build it out to what it should have been. Would be interesting.

[@lesslighter]

Turns out as Kira was "newscasting" what was going on behind the scenes despite knowing it was a "scammy" game to begin with he kinda expected that it was going to flop then again the company behind it was already sus.... like starforge sus.... wait the developers of homestead sus

[@goblin3810]

Dude idk why I am not subbed anymore but that changes now. Yall have always kicked ass of I say so myself

[@myownhome2959]

FInancial problems don't come suddenly , that has been building up so their excuse right after launch is something people should take with a pound of salt!

[@grantwallace1882]

Finally, an informative video about The Day Before. 🎉

[@77Friction]

Too bad he doesn’t say its a scam but, it quite literally is the definition of a scam

[@uncleclaps44]

"dont call us scammers, we didn't take money from anyone" few days later "we are broke and can't pay back our investors"... so they did take money from someone... "This is not an asset flip" one day later a reddit post detailing a few thousand dollars of asset packs used in the game...

[@j-swag7438]

the fact that a literal scam became a top 2 seller on steam really shows how informed people are when they buy games

[@mrcodez]

Tech tip of the day: don't do that. 😂😂😂 Great video, love when you guys dig in and share your insight with these behind the curtain stories .

[@damianpoole2933]

A lot of things with this simply don't add up. 109k sales after refunds is $4.3 million, you have made an assumption that there has been a well paid large team working on this for 5 years, I strongly do not believe this given what has been released, it is likely a few contractors here and there and their "volunteers", most of the game was assets which yeah could come easily to a few thousand if not over 10k but that isn't going bankrupt money is it. Linkedin seems to suggest the company size is between 51 - 200 employees, at a very minimal wage with offices that would be a run rate on staff and premises of $2.5 million per year, that would give credence to the idea that they don't have any money and investors have bank rolled their 51 staff members. The problem there is they released this with what 150 servers, supporting 32 players per server. So how many sales where the expecting? 10k sales would only return $400k, exactly how is that going to pay off the investors? I'm not sure that level of incompetence is actually possible without is being malicious.

[@wesleymiller6674]

Also just thought: all those buildings look in pretty good shape (clean, intact windows, etc) for the aftermath of an apocalypse.

[@KironX1]

the entire city was an asset you can download from the unreal store for about $399 i believe

[@PlanetTrendy]

Tying this game to Chris was a hilarious thought train. Who was their man in the pickle suit?

[@verbatims6423]

KiraTV? 😂

[@NikolaBulj]

I don't understand how was this most wish listed game of all times. Who didn't know this will be fake/bad game?

[@edwardhulse]

It’s the idiocy of the gaming journalists and media that caused the mass wishlisting of this game. Some people did call it out for what it was. A SCAM. But a lot of people didn’t listen and some even tried to make out those telling the truth to be a villain. All I can say is that I have NO sympathy for the people who fell for this scam. Plain and simple. They got what was coming to them and they deserved it.

[@osc-oldschoolclips5204]

There’s no way people thought this game would be good. I remember the initial trailer and being all hands on deck. However what made me completely leave the bandwagon was when they released the trailer of a sports car riding through an abandoned city .. when they’re marketing a post apocalyptic game ….. ? It just didn’t make a bit of sense! I still want to know whose idea it was to put that together. They don’t deserve a job. That’s top tier stupidity.

[@lunaangeleclipse9745]

Its simple, wish-listing is free. There's literally no downside to wish listing a game so of course people will wish list any random game they see that seems even slightly interesting.

[@RusticRonnie]

Wish listing could just be people watching the shit show

[@adawg3032]

Bruh this doesn’t even feel like real life. Everything is wild these days. The fact this happens is cartoon status

[@TheLastRhapsody]

I find the whole situation darkly funny. I don’t know how but I never heard of this game before the studio closed down. Not a peep until then, and now I’m hearing that this was one of the most anticipated games ever and also embroiled in controversies for years.

[@Voltaic_Fire]

No money. No talent. Now no game. Fntastic.

[@leana339]

Thank you for mentioning that the Wild eight got sold years ago. Some dumb reddit mod from TDB and a few others started a witchhunt "thinking" they have brains and that The wild eight is Fntastic when its been sold 2017

[@akumaking1]

I literally never heard of this game until now.

[@movingtarget12321]

The first ime I heard about it was a video about how it didn't even have the rights for it's name when they announced it, so they had to change names mid development. If that didn't immediately raise red flags in someone following it then I don't fucking know.

[@beku8726]

Same. Never heard of it before

[@mrnoble15]

So I heard on social media that they apparently rebranded and put the studio under one of their old aliases to scam gamers again in the future.

[@Furzkampfbomber]

Mom, can we get The Division 2? No son, we have The Division 2 at home...

[@tazgecko]

The consumer is learning to wait until a release and some play streaming before buying. I'm in the habit of waiting a month before I buy anything, unless it's a developer I know who will bring out a good product. Did get burnt this year though, which just reinforce the time to wait, thanks a lot Bethesda ...

[@Disconnis]

Doesn't matter who the developer is - everyone should ALWAYS wait before purchasing; even if it's a developer with a proven track record (like FromSoft). Hype makes us stupid.

[@terrythegnome2408]

are they? They make the same mistake every time! This is going to keep happening. No matter what comes.

[@DrakkarCalethiel]

A month ain't enough anymore. 6 months at minimum.

[@1987killertofu]

If a larger studio, or particularly industrious smaller studio, didn't immediately start development on an actual version of his game, it'd be insane.

[@peterclarke7006]

I'm guessing most devs took one look and came to the same conclusion as Bellular: too much going on, too many moving parts, too many things to go wrong and kill your studio stone dead.

[@rayfox1984]

That's the most adequate thoughts on the situation I've seen on the internet.

[@UaintaSpider]

if they'd have been honest about it not being an MMO, but actualy being a "refund simulator", i think less people would have been angry about it.

[@travellingslim]

This video was great because so many content creators are just defaulting to "cash grab" and "ran with the money" without understanding the whole picture. One thing Fntastic said that is probably true is that they likely won't see much money if any at all from this game. Since it was on Steam and so many refunded and Steam is allowing refunds for any amount of hours played, the net profit will be near zero in relative terms. In most cases I would just chalk this up to gross incompetence and biting off more than they can chew as a small studio with no experience in MMOs, but the marketing and communications certainly throws a wrench in the equation of how much of it was intentional malice. That's the part we will probably ponder forever unless some insider leaks more info.

[@666Daheretic]

Ah yes the Streisand effect in full swing. You gotta love it lol.

[@jernaugurgeh451]

How is this the Streisand Effect?

[@acid_rain_bow_xd9312]

Thank you for the accurate and critical review of the situation

[@Thexal]

The game is obviously an asset flip. The studio closed THREE days after launch. Im honestly not sure why this is a discussion that sounds like it's on the verge of understanding their position

[@leoSaunders]

25:10 levitate is a backstabber

[@PowerUpT]

0:00 Does this means we're 4 days after The Day?

[@TrickyJebus]

Now can you make a video comparison of this game to Dead Frontier MMO?

[@BenWyldeZX]

Didn't players even find, that most assets are from the Unreal Engine Store? At least it's apparently found to be the case on the game's Reddit 👀

[@bzs187]

I like how DayZ made their own version of the twitter statement, then Rust from the DayZ version. 😅

[@tamaskarsai2072]

12:55 yeah people think that, because almost every friking game launches as early access nowdays, and stays early access sometimes for years and sometimes INDEFINITELLY.

[@NightWolfXVI]

Fantastic Studios isn’t being closed there rebranding back to there old name Eight Points.

[@l-l]

As you said, it’s a dumpster fire and I can’t look away.

[@VioletElite4]

As someone who thought this was a Last of Us ripoff, some sort of Steam shovelware that Moist Critikal would play on his channel as a joke video, I really didn't understand how this was the most wishlisted game on Steam when Baldur's Gate 3 existed in early access for a while as well. Just glad I didn't fall for this like a lot of people did. I hope everyone got a damn refund and the company can cease to exist for the better...

[@Digitalcanvas77]

‘We have no money’ So we decided to take yours by selling you nothing.

[@DerDudelino]

Still don't really understand this happened. Given the amount of pre-orders they could've done a revenue share deal with a much bigger studio to develop the game. Maybe not to the point that the trailers were at - which is a 50M US-Dollar game easily. But at least something playable, without a completely empty open world that stutters when a single zombie runs towards you. The revenue from release could've been used for further development like a mud physics engine which is actually quite complex to develop. Or even partner with the developers from Spintires MudRunner. I still believe the concept itself has legs - The Division with vehicles, tanks, police cars and so on is a great idea

[@spiritofzen7022]

This was a good example of how social experiments can be implemented, to highlight how gullible the public can be and the blind faith we have in companies like this

[@niklasky5040]

Great coverage and insight into the Steam back end. Thanks !

[@FissionCube]

easily the most charitable view ive seen anyone give this game and developer (outside of diehard fans saying they did nothing wrong) and even then its... dire

[@theorcosaurus]

Only Bellular News manages to bring up Chris Chan in a discussion about The Day Before. But yes, the Lolcow analogy was pretty warranted. I had good time watching this sh*t show go down.

[@randomhodgepodge8902]

Fine example of take the money and run for those who weren't able to refund in time.

[@Qardo]

Who would have thought. Just a "Day Before" things would go so poorly the "Day After". I mean the "Division" between everyone. Would not think this would end up as a "Biohazard" in this "Resident Evil". If you excuse me. I am going to dunk myself for these bad punks.

[@pirtatejoe]

It's such a vaporware scam, Elon Musk must be part of FNTASTIC Studio.

[@igorgiuseppe1862]

"we are now five days after the day before" ...

[@cyphi474]

Not Spintires, but Snowrunner. Its...complicated story of the franchise on its own.

[@zer0_cool]

You know if this game hadn't had gotten so much attention it would have just be another forever early access asset flip type game (I don't know if they actually bought assets or not but the game looked and played like one of those). At least people will be getting refunds this way, rather then scammed waiting for the game to be finished.

[@jayfortesque]

They did someone has a pastebin where the assets are linked and referenced

[@THE16THPHANTOM]

car pack asset... its funny looking back at the trailer and now knowing and recognizing which of the objects are store bought asset.

[@LordHollow]

Everything went according to plan.

[@Regden1000]

Which game do you think was the worst this year ? Forspoken, Gollum or The Day Before ? Personally I think The Day Before topped Gollum at the very least in the quick cash grab categorie.

[@LordHollow]

Once Human is the game we're looking for, people.

[@vectorr6651]

Once human is really good and hits most of these points.