A couple of modders are currently working on an offline mod for the troubled The Day Before, which would add an offline mode.
11.12.2023 - 19:55 / pcgamer.com
Just four days after the ugly launch of not-quite-a-survival-MMO The Day Before on Steam, developer Fntastic says it is closing its doors because the game flopped.
«The Day Before has failed financially, and we lack the funds to continue,» the studio said in a statement posted to Twitter. «All income received is being used to pay off debts to our partners.
»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 the work."
Fntastic said in the closure message that it has taken no money from the public during the development of The Day Before, adding that there were no crowdfunding or preorder campaigns prior to release.
After an extended period of hype, controversy, and deep skepticism surrounding The Day Before that saw it temporarily removed from Steam over a trademark dispute, it finally launched on Steam on December 7 and immediately ran into trouble. Server issues were widespread, but players were also surprised to discover that it wasn't quite the zombie-infested survival MMO they were expecting.
Instead, it bore a number of characteristics of an extraction shooter, similar to Escape From Tarkov except not very good. The reaction was immediate and intense. The Steam rating crashed to «mostly negative» and the official Day Before Discord was temporarily locked down as moderators struggled to keep a lid on the upset.
There was a presumption that patches would be forthcoming to smooth out at least some of the roughest bits, but that's apparently now off the table. Predictably, users on The Day Before Discord server are once again enthusiastically venting their frustrations, accusing Fntastic of perpetrating a scam right from the start, and this time there's no mod team to put a stop to it.
In the short time since Fntastic announced the studio's closure, most of The Day Before's official Discord server has evaporated. Every text and voice channel except the general chatroom has been deleted, and the server-news channel Fntastic used to keep communicate progress on the game has been scrubbed of every message. All content on Fntastic's YouTube channel has also been deleted. The final message to be posted in that channel was a goodbye from Discord moderator Levitate, but even that's gone now.
«A last goodbye and thank you from myself and the rest of your moderation team and volunteers,» Levitate wrote. «We appreciated all the fun we've had over the time we spent here. We had our community ups and downs! The kind words today were appreciated from the mods. [Fntastic] fumbled and tried to use us as
A couple of modders are currently working on an offline mod for the troubled The Day Before, which would add an offline mode.
The Day Before, one of the most controversial and catastrophic games in recent memory, will have its servers shut down in January 2024, just 45 days after the game launched in Early Access.
The Day Before will be officially retired, with servers taken offline next year on January 22.
Update — Publisher Mytona has posted an update on The Day Before situation, pledging to work with Steam to open up refunds to any players who choose to do so.
The Day Before's rise to infamy has been swift. Promised for an eventual PS5 release, it was released last week into Steams Early Access in an atrocious state, and players were quick to note it only vaguely resembled the product promised. The developer announced its dissolution days later, effective immediately, before the studio's owners, brothers named Gotovtsev, dropped a digital smoke bomb and disappeared entirely.
By Ash Parrish, a reporter who has covered the business, culture, and communities of video games for seven years. Previously, she worked at Kotaku.
The Day Before, once Steam's most wish-listed open-world survival MMO, has been delisted from Valve's platform. The game launched in early access to an almost immediate flood of negative reviews last week, with most players claiming that it wasn't really an MMO but an extraction shooter reminiscent of Escape from Tarkov, combined with the post-apocalyptic threats of The Last of Us. The misleading gameplay claims were made worse by several game-breaking glitches that caused characters to clip off from the map, an incomplete and sparse world devoid of action, and inconsistent online features. Merely five days after release, the game is no longer available to buy on Steam and Fntastic, the studio behind the game, has announced it is shutting down and working on refunds for customers who bought the game.
Update, 12/12/23:
Trainwrecks aren't exactly rare in the gaming industry, but it's rare that they're this spectacular. After a suspiciously-polished trailer, The Day Before quickly became one of Steam's most wishlisted games.
Editor’s Note: Faster than we could publish our early access review, the developer announced it was shutting down and The Day Before was removed from sale . The servers remain up for those who have bought it and not yet refunded, but since our reviewer went to the trouble of playing it, it seems only right that you should get to read what he thought of the experience while it lasted.
The Day Before publisher Mytona has announced that it is currently working with Steam to offer refunds to those upset after the game's absolutely disastrous launch.
Update: The Day Before is no longer available to purchase on Steam. It's currently unclear whether it was delisted by developer Fntastic or by Valve itself. We've reached out to Valve for further information and will provide additional updates as we learn more.