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The Day Before studio shutting down just four days after disastrous launch

By Tomas Franzese December 11, 2023

A player walks through an abandoned city in The Day Before. — Fntastic

Fntastic, the developer behind the controversial and much-derided postapocalyptic shooter The Day Before, announced it is shutting down just four days after the game’s launch.

“Today, we announce the closure of Fntastic Studio. Unfortunately, The Day Before has failed financially, and we lack the funds to continue. All income received is being used to pay off debts to our partners,” a message posted to Fntastic’s X account and website states. “We invested all our efforts, resources, and man-hours into the development of The Day Before, which was our first huge game. We really wanted to release new patches to reveal the full potential of the game, but unfortunately, we don’t have the funding to continue to work.”

The Day Before gained notice earlier this year with glitzy trailers and its temporary status as the most wish-listed game on Steam. Controversy followed, as Fntastic reportedly was using some unpaid volunteers to make the game, put out underwhelming new gameplay footage, and struggled to obtain the rights to the name The Day Before. After multiple delays, the game finally came out on December 7, peaking at 38,104 concurrent players, according to SteamDB. The reaction to the game has largely been negative, as it’s clear that Fntastic overpromised and underdelivered .

Official statement. #fntastic #thedaybefore #propnight pic.twitter.com/AKcRHeIaIW

— Fntastic (@FntasticHQ) December 11, 2023

The Day Before currently sits at a “mostly negative” user score average on Steam with over 18,500 reviews. Some have alleged that The Day Before was potentially scamming interested players. In reponse to that, Fntastic’s message states the studio “didn’t take any money from the public during the development of The Day Before; there were no pre-orders or crowdfunding campaigns.”

As for what’s next, The Day Before remains available for purchase on Steam, and Fntastic says that “servers will remain in operation” for it and the studio’s other game, Propnight, for now. It seems to have deleted its account on Medium and changed the status of all videos on its YouTube channel to private, though.

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Tomas Franzese is a Staff Writer at Digital Trends, where he reports on and reviews the latest releases and exciting…

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