The story of the failure of The Day Before and its developer Fntastic is one that’s going to be told for years among those in and around the gaming industry. Watching a game with so much pre-release hype and turmoil only to then launch, shut down, and see its studio close within a week is something that seems like the plot of a Netflix mini series.
Now, days after the servers for The Day Before were officially taken offline, Fntastic has taken to social media to defend itself once again while adding an extra twist. The studio now claims that it was the target of a “hate campaign” by a group of “bloggers” and others.
In a post on Twitter, the studio says that there is nothing true about the various claims about the studio or the game being any sort of scam. It then specifically called out bloggers for The Day Before’s failure.
“Certain bloggers made huge money by creating false content with huge titles from the very beginning to gain views and followers, exploiting the lack of information about the game’s development,” Fntastic said. “Their actions triggered a gold rush among content creators due to the game’s pre-release popularity.”
They continued: “The negative bias instilled by certain bloggers making money on hate affected perceptions of the game. Look at unbiased gameplay like Dr. Disrespect’s stream at release. Despite the initial bugs and server issues, he liked the game, which we fixed later, and the game received improved reviews over the weekend. Unfortunately, the hate campaign had already inflicted significant damage.”
Fntastic adds that after sales of the game were stopped, it had received messages from “many people” who said that they were deceived by bloggers and actually liked the game and wanted to keep access to it.
“We also heard that petitions were created to continue development, and on the black market, the game’s price exceeded $200, and some even began to make their own mods,” they said.
The studio says that everyone at the company worked hard on the game while not making any money from pre-orders or crowdfunding.
“Even after the game was closed, we, together with the publisher, returned money to all players, including forcibly issuing refunds to those who did not request them,” they said. “How many companies return money like that?”
The studio also addressed claims from former employees about what The Day Before was and wasn’t. Fntastic says that they don’t know if the people making the claims were “real or not” but is adamant that it had “excellent relationships” with its staff.
“Despite being a small indie company with a limited budget, we assisted employees with relocation and healthcare and helped some of them to buy equipment and with their mortgages and other personal matters,” they said. “Our low churn rate and the fact that half of those who left returned to the company demonstrate our positive work environment.”
The long statement closed by thanking those who supported Fntastic while requesting them “not to give up and continue to work”. They also said to keep an eye out for “what will happen next”, despite the studio already publicly announcing it’s closure.
