@Xolnyxia My problem with the Cooking Mama Cookstar video was that details were still breaking when the video was produced, making the video obsolete before it was even uploaded.
Fntastic invited us to take part in a test task of writing a soundtrack for their game. The task was formulated as poorly as possible and with contradictions, and they gave 2 references, each of which is different from the other and not similar to what was in the task text. As a result, we were not hired, and, of course, the task was not paid for; they chose a person who did not even try to somehow fulfill the points written in the task, but did something completely different: an ordinary trailer track.
Honestly, those two just looked like they didn't have any idea about games. Maybe they did, but who knows how active they were as devs in their 8 years at the company. They seemed more to have that starry-eyed, eternal optimists vibe that young and impressionable startup entrepreneurs have rather than devs with years of experience. It didn't matter what they didn't know, they had an opportunity, and they would learn the ropes once they became an outstanding success.
@@nessamillikan6247They weren't devs at all with any meaningful "optimistic" startup dreams or goals. They are scam artists, it has been proven already. Singaporean journalists visited their two "listed" offices in Singapore and found they were just virtual office spaces that Fntastic merely used as addresses to route their online traffic through. There were no staff from them there at all, and both brothers have disappeared from the face of the internet. This is basically a trademark ponzi-scheme where they thought they could get away with it. I highly recommend watching Skill Up's video on it that has tons of information on the behind the scenes, as well as exposing the literal ponzi scheme Fntastic and Mytona did around their "game" where he reveals Fntastic was working on a weird MS Teams work-from-home office ripoff app that they wanted to advertise but then it suddenly evaporated randomly... sounds familiar.
@@nessamillikan6247 Agreed. I had never heard of this game until all of the pushback started, and I'd never seen a picture of either of the brothers until watching this video, and the very first thing that popped into my head when I saw them was "venture capitalists with no clue".
Anyone who has ever worked in the industry knew it would be a scam. All of these stupid phrases like "haters will see the truth", "this game is our dream come true", "please don't call it a scam" made it obvious. I still don't know how it was the most wishlisted game, though. No idea if it's possible, but I wouldnt be surprised if they used bots for that.
Even a periphery interest in gaming should give you all the tools to sniff out a flop this blatant. Zombie, multiplayer, open world, looting and crafting game? Come the fuck on.
I remember someone commented that "Matt McMuscle will make a 'What happened' episode of this game", during the release night of Day Before. Well here it is, he got his wish.
The fact that they deployed a Doggo Of Distraction in one of their videos was a huge red flag. Reeks of the "your employer telling you *we're a family"* kinda stuff.
this was 9 months ago. dear god. there are now babies alive that were conceived as this entire saga was unfolding. that horrifies me. so it's your problem now too 😊 ❤❤❤
I remember a moderator was hosting a launch day stream (note: this mod had also never played the game prior to its launch) that he literally shut down after like an hour because it was so bad and the chat was blowing up 😂
I think there's vids on here of what all went on in the server. Ive seen youtubers who've investigated this mess show clips of the Day Before's Discord. So there's gotta be vids of what all happened.
There is an investigative video I watched that used admissions from former workers, and basically the last part from this video is key. The bros pretty much hired inexperienced developers and put them through hell. They would constantly demand new things inspired by popular games. It didn't even start as multiplayer - they just "suggested" (mandated) it later. Huge amounts of work would constantly get scrapped. Basically the brothers were some of the most incompetent, insane bosses imaginable, and they kept luring inexperienced people to work on their game with promises of working on an AAA product.
I only heard about it because multiple TH-camrs made videos about how it seemed like it was a scam before it launched. Seems like all the red flags were there in advance, I'm surprised so many people were surprised that it turned out this way.
Maybe those Kickstarter disasters like mighty number 9, drift stage racing, and Jack and Casie. Edit: update on Jack and Casie the developer of that game, Shoutscion unfortunately passed away from cancer this January.
The fact they start 'defending' using asking for Volunteers for their 'childhood dream' by giving a definition of the word Volunteer tells me what they REALLY thought of their audience. Thinking about it now, adding that to opening where they get financial assistance delayed repeatedly and had volunteers work on it, people were right to be cautious, it sounds like the plan from the start was to cut and run.
By saying all the negativity 'ruined the game' and 'didn't give the dev's time, they could have fixed it'. And I'm not kidding, I've seen comments along these lines on various videos about how badly this game failed, completely ignoring that even if the game could be fixed it still wouldn't have been the game that was advertised.
@@Tama_51 Primarily the typical critical youtubers trying to warn people, pointing out many red flags around this scam, being insulted repeatable or having their credibility questioned by 'fans'. The absurdity was simply how when evidence started piling up and these 'fans' doubled down. All for a game from a practically nobody studio with a history of abandoned projects.
@@ceres_lang I was mocking the delusional "gamers" that not only bought this game but defended it with all their teeth and nails proclaiming "another studio will pick it up and make the promised game". Wish I was joking but people are that stupid.
Pulling an engine switch the month before original release date is _insane._ That should have been the first and most immediate sign that this project was dead in the water.
@@Cronosonic Even for a relatively painless engine switch, doing it a month before the original release date is a terrible idea. At that point you should be finalizing everything, especially if you're deploying to console--IIRC the approval process for releasing a game on console can take weeks or even over a month. At that point, if you have a _finished_ game, you should be focused on making sure the launch goes smoothly, especially if players are depending on servers that you own. You should have declared 'feature lock' (i.e., no more new features) a while before that, too, so that your team can focus on fixing bugs without having to worry about new content being added while they test old content.
My god. When someone opens their counterargument to accusations of using volunteers to avoid paid labor with breaking down the etymology of the word "volunteer", you know Some Shit is up 😬
Oh gosh. It's like Aliens: Colonial Marines all over again. Showing a high end demo at reveal, and releasing a less than acceptable product. Unbelievable.
So these brothers behind the Fntastic studio basically scammed the Singapore government out of grant money that would've otherwise gone to a legit game development studio.
The best indication it was botted to hell and back. A game cannot get wishlisted that often without basically no one knowing about it. The fact that most people only learned of it because it became the most wishlisted game on steam says everything about it.
4:27 This moment in the video perfectly demonstrates the brothers' personality, two guys trying to appear friendly and sympathetic, when in fact they are nothing more than egocentric bosses who disrespect anyone they consider inferior, and do not accept that their work method is stupid and ineffective.
If you ever feel like doing a movie again, "The Emperor's New Groove" would be great for What Happened. It has it all: complete last minute redos, unreasonable fixed deadlines, tons of content left on the cutting room floor. And to top it all off, the final script was only sent for revisions 2 weeks after the movie released!
I've worked in the video game industry a few times - once I even worked for EA Games, my apologies to everyone. What I can tell you is that the notion of working on a development team as a "volunteer" is appalling. You're going to work for someone and not get paid, to help them put out a multi-million dollar project that is (theoretically) going to make them rich? Then why work for free?
Yeah, volunteering is for like, charity things. Stuff you feel like you have a moral obligation to do and that you'd feel guilty for actually making money off of. This is far from something you'd volunteer on, because the lead guys damn well do not need the extra money.
Good god. The "It comes from the *Latin*, y'see" moment is just. Other than that being something literally everyone needs to jam in their heads as a scam alert when it comes in response to a question, I took 2 fucking years of Latin, and everything I learned about the Romans points to someone getting a group nut stomping, high class and low, if they went "Well y'know, fish means thing from water, so that's why I'm giving you these sponges. Cuz you wanted fish- this is a fish, what"
I think it was referred to as an MMO purely because the CEOs didn't actually know that much about what an MMO is (or video games in general tbh) but they thought it sounded cool in the marketing.
I still feel that any video update where you see the owner petting a dog is a huge red flag (unless it's a dog food company or something related to animals). It's like saying, "hey look, we like dogs, so we're clearly good human beings".
When you question someone about some sketchy behavior and they respond with the "technical definition" of a word-- there's some serious bullshit afoot.
I don't remember the word but it's a type of fallacy where you claim that the oldest meaning of the word is the correct meaning in order to undermine an opponents argument
Id never heard of this game until after it launched and there were a spate of videos like this. Looking at the story of its development im shocked anyone bought it at all.
Update: Fntastic is back with a kickstarter campaign for a new game called Escape Factory but without myntona backing them this time. Turns out they have learned absolutely nothing. 😂
I'm not really into zombies or extraction-shooters (or many of the AAA release of the last few years), but I have genuinely no clue how those trailers and marketing material made over a million people add it to their wishlists. It's just grey ambience, post-apocalypse setting and occasional zombies
For real, don’t get why anyone got hyped for yet another generic-looking zombie apocalypse game set in modern day. Like, nothing about that idea is either innovative nor sound fun
I love how this game basically speed run in not only coming out of nowhere, not only did it become unplayable, but also destroying the company that distributed it, now that’s impressive.
The first time I had heard of the Day Before was when Steam sent me an email saying the game was on my wishlist, and was now for sale. I have no idea how that happened.
Oh trust me, as a wrestling fan The World Wildlife Fund sued the World Wrestling Federation for using the same initials and won, even though you couldn't confuse the two so when it comes to similar names thing it can go wrong so quick
Yeah, that has more to do with what judge you get than anything else, especially given how there's no enforceable ethics rules regarding 'gifts' from 'anonymous parties'.
@@emperormegaman3856 but the point I made was it was obvious that you couldn't confuse the two as one was essentially an international known sports company with every bit of merchandise constantly on tv and print
If you take in mind gacha games, which, unsurprisingly are incredibly notorious for having very short lifespans, with 2023 being no stranger to gachas shutting down in less than a year, Closers RT shut down in a record 2 days, and Wave Naminori Boys shut down in three days straight following a prolonged month-long maintenance.
Honestly the day before just proves that there is a huge market / want for a new proper open world zombie survival mmo. It just a shame how this one ended up but I hope it spurs actual legit devs to explore this type of game.
@@suedenim The problem is that the logistics of a zombie apocalypse game on that scale make it unfeasible. To be exciting, zombie games require a large number of undead, many more than enemies in a lot of games, and often need a large variety of models instead of like, four or five for a given faction rank. The main ways to make this sort of processing requirement not require the top 1% of uber-computers is to either severely limit the scope of the world itself (and thus remove the whole point of being an open world in the first place) or deliberately make the game's graphics and programming "retro", which would never fly in a game that was AAA (or masquerading as such). We're talking behavior, pathfinding, location information, spawning controls, and dozens of other variables for what could be millions of entities all at once, in real time. Most games that feature that level of entity control are things like FFXIV and WoW, which aren't open world and are further segmented into server shards. You just can't accomplish an open world zombie survival game while also having AAA levels of fidelity and polish in the industry as it stands today.
On one hand, I like to give people the benefit of the doubt... On the other hand, this was a scam. Plain and simple, they made off with money meant to go into the game and are now living on a beach somewhere.
This! Everything about this game was such obvious bullshit the actual game should have just been a screen saying "Ha-Ha-Ha Sucker! You just got scammed!" (which would have even been a more fun game!)
On the plus side, 200k units sold is very little in terms of profit even if they were all in USD and received in Taiwan. Yeah, they probably got the dev funds as well due to those grants, but the kinds of losers who would pull this kind of thing are also the kinds of losers who would blow through that money in less than a year. Even better, they made themselves exceptionally public, the faces of the game and the company. No one in the industry is going to be willing to work with them again, so the likelyhood is that they'll end up hugely in debt, being relieved all their expensive toys and property, and stuck begging what few fans they might still have for handouts.
The day before has gotta be one of the most interesting cases because of how fast things went when the game actually came out. One game that I'm interested in knowing more about it's development would be Indivisible by the late Lab Zero.
@@moonjelly5 Shouldn't Singapore have much tougher laws against financial scammers? Especially if they aren't hesitant on whipping you if you drop gum or giving you the death penalty for smuggling heroin?
I’ve always seen the day before on my TH-cam subscriptions and on news articles but I ever actually knew the full details of the fiasco. So I really appreciate you making this well-researched and concise video on the matter, thanks.
Oh my lord thank you for mentioning Abandoned. As the entire The Day Before dumpster fire was unfolding before my eyes, I could not help but be reminded of it.
I think the cute Doggo was the main culprit in this tumultuous string of lies, scams and BS'ery! Kinda like the Shiba Inu Doggo in Silent Hill 2, in the secret ending at least! Nice touch with the "Where in the World" segment that ultimately answered nothing and was made even greater with the big band Sonic Unleashed Werehog Music! I literally played that one minute part five times before completing the video, cause Matty McMuscles confused stuttering was so damned funny!!!!
I knew nothing of this game yet this is one of the most batshit and hilariously fascinating dumpster fires ive seen, and considering its the video game industry, thats saying something
This might be the most "What Happened?" story I've ever seen. It takes a special kind of failure for a game and the company that made it to cease to exist barely a month after the game's release.
Same I don't get it? I'm on Steam, I am on the internet. I never heard of this game one time until it actually came out. Sure I don't go to IGN anymore but I would have thought I saw it mentioned somewhere.
I remember keeping up with this mess back when they only had the scam trailers Like, there's no possible way they could've ever made something so competent with that much scope
People getting hyped for this type of game should leave Earth altogether. How did you not see the blatant signs of "Hmm this is suspicious, better wait than to buy in the hype"?
I'm 100% sure it was botted out the ass, but I blame IGN and Nvidia for helping this obvious scam, get some legit wishlistings along the way. Their discord and subreddit were barren, certainly nowhere near "most wishlisted game on Steam" vibes at all.
Their press release statements literally read like scam emails. Slightly broken English (although, that's not really fair to them, it just happens to be similar to scam emails) and WAY OVEREMOTIONAL wording.
_~I feel FNTASTIC!~_ _~And I never felt as good as how I do right now~_ _~Except for maybe when I think of how I felt that day~_ _~When I felt the way that I do right now, right now~_
@@inteligentidiot7233 No, it doesn't lol The definition of vaporware isn't software that took a long time to come out, it's software that straight up never did. If it comes out it's not vaporware.
The only milestone I've seen, from gameplay videos, is that it combines a zombie shooting multiplayer experience with an unintended Attack on Titan crossover.
I enjoyed your video, but I’m honestly surprised you hadn’t heard of the game before the trademark dispute. It’s been a big talk of a “fake game” ever since the original trailer. Devs and TH-camrs were saying it was just a “vertical slice” and not real gameplay. I have been waiting for it to crash and burn for a long time. And I was not disappointed.
I had no idea what was going on with this game and the controversies involved. I specifically avoided looking it up because I was waiting for this exact episode to come out, because let's face it, we all knew Matt was diving into this one, lol.
Should be noted that they never got any cash from the sales. Steam keep the money for a month before transfering it to the devs, since it all happen so fast, they never got a cent.
Is this the record for fastest 'What Happened' ever from the game's release to actual episode?
WWE 2K20 came close.
@Xolnyxia My problem with the Cooking Mama Cookstar video was that details were still breaking when the video was produced, making the video obsolete before it was even uploaded.
the wha happun equivalent of spawn camping
Yes I believe so
Have to imagine he was building this one as "development" time was ongoing.
Fntastic invited us to take part in a test task of writing a soundtrack for their game. The task was formulated as poorly as possible and with contradictions, and they gave 2 references, each of which is different from the other and not similar to what was in the task text. As a result, we were not hired, and, of course, the task was not paid for; they chose a person who did not even try to somehow fulfill the points written in the task, but did something completely different: an ordinary trailer track.
Good luck in your scoring endeavors!
Not surprising
So I guess it's a blessing in disguise that they didn't hire you guys?
@@onionheadguy7094 thanks
@@Greybell Yes, it seems so
The head devs giving an address while petting a dog should have been an obvious red flag for anyone who's seen any kind of apology video
Honestly, those two just looked like they didn't have any idea about games. Maybe they did, but who knows how active they were as devs in their 8 years at the company. They seemed more to have that starry-eyed, eternal optimists vibe that young and impressionable startup entrepreneurs have rather than devs with years of experience. It didn't matter what they didn't know, they had an opportunity, and they would learn the ropes once they became an outstanding success.
@@nessamillikan6247They weren't devs at all with any meaningful "optimistic" startup dreams or goals. They are scam artists, it has been proven already. Singaporean journalists visited their two "listed" offices in Singapore and found they were just virtual office spaces that Fntastic merely used as addresses to route their online traffic through. There were no staff from them there at all, and both brothers have disappeared from the face of the internet. This is basically a trademark ponzi-scheme where they thought they could get away with it.
I highly recommend watching Skill Up's video on it that has tons of information on the behind the scenes, as well as exposing the literal ponzi scheme Fntastic and Mytona did around their "game" where he reveals Fntastic was working on a weird MS Teams work-from-home office ripoff app that they wanted to advertise but then it suddenly evaporated randomly... sounds familiar.
@@nessamillikan6247 On today's Very Special Episode of Devil's Advocates...
_all it was missing was an Ukulele...._
@@nessamillikan6247 Agreed. I had never heard of this game until all of the pushback started, and I'd never seen a picture of either of the brothers until watching this video, and the very first thing that popped into my head when I saw them was "venture capitalists with no clue".
Me having a hangover: "the day before - what happened?"
What happened to “what happun” ?
Great comment 👍👍
Based dad joke
@@DigitalMorph07- It's not.
What happened the day before?
Anyone who has ever worked in the industry knew it would be a scam.
All of these stupid phrases like "haters will see the truth", "this game is our dream come true", "please don't call it a scam" made it obvious.
I still don't know how it was the most wishlisted game, though. No idea if it's possible, but I wouldnt be surprised if they used bots for that.
They had to have used bots. Most wishlisted game on steam yet hardly anybody actually seemed to know about it let alone care?
You'd be surprised how many people simply fall for this instead of seeing the signs.
They probably use volunteers.
This is literally those mobile game ads where the ads is much more interesting than the actual game, but times 1000 and with money involved
Even a periphery interest in gaming should give you all the tools to sniff out a flop this blatant. Zombie, multiplayer, open world, looting and crafting game? Come the fuck on.
I remember someone commented that "Matt McMuscle will make a 'What happened' episode of this game", during the release night of Day Before. Well here it is, he got his wish.
I saw that comment too lmaoo
@@@B-DShaheedsmol world, I saw it too!
The fact that they deployed a Doggo Of Distraction in one of their videos was a huge red flag. Reeks of the "your employer telling you *we're a family"* kinda stuff.
this was 9 months ago. dear god.
there are now babies alive that were conceived as this entire saga was unfolding.
that horrifies me. so it's your problem now too 😊 ❤❤❤
Their Discord server was also OBLITERATED by people that played the game. It got so bad, that they DELETED THE SERVER IN ITS ENTIRETY
Spicy stuff. Too bad Kira won't be able to extract more info from that former trash heap within a giant dumpster fire of a platform.
I remember a moderator was hosting a launch day stream (note: this mod had also never played the game prior to its launch) that he literally shut down after like an hour because it was so bad and the chat was blowing up 😂
i wish that discord got archived bc id love to see what happened there lol
I think there's vids on here of what all went on in the server. Ive seen youtubers who've investigated this mess show clips of the Day Before's Discord. So there's gotta be vids of what all happened.
There is an investigative video I watched that used admissions from former workers, and basically the last part from this video is key. The bros pretty much hired inexperienced developers and put them through hell. They would constantly demand new things inspired by popular games. It didn't even start as multiplayer - they just "suggested" (mandated) it later. Huge amounts of work would constantly get scrapped. Basically the brothers were some of the most incompetent, insane bosses imaginable, and they kept luring inexperienced people to work on their game with promises of working on an AAA product.
this is why people should be more wary of scammers in this age of information/misinformation.
Imagine finally getting hired for only to be scammed by your bosses. I hope they get sued to hell.
How did they make those fake trailers?
@@blunteastwood iirc those were outsourced or something. They were all "cinematic" anyway, as you said - fake.
@@Antroid Most trailers are outsourced, from what I understand. And this is hardly the only game to use 'fake' trailers.
For a game that was supposedly hyped to the moon, I never heard of it until after it came out.
Yea I heard about it once about a year ago and never again until it released
I heard a ton about it, but mostly bjust "its a shady scam"
I heard about it from friends and then immediately looked into and went “Nah that’s a scam.”
Oh yeah, I'm just genuinely confused that people were hyped for a scam 🤔
I only heard about it because multiple TH-camrs made videos about how it seemed like it was a scam before it launched. Seems like all the red flags were there in advance, I'm surprised so many people were surprised that it turned out this way.
To be fair, making your game unavailable a few days after release is very innovative
Pretty sure EA, Activision and Ubisoft are taking notes now.
@@thientuongnguyen2564 Waiting for Ubisofts S&B to do the same vanishing act after selling at overprice for a month.
@@thientuongnguyen2564 Well, Ubisoft made that nightmare come true for owners of the Crew 2.
It's still nuts to see The Day Before become a literal non-entity within the span of a week.
Like, no other video game has genuinely come close.
Closest I've seen was Cliffy B's Radical Heights.
@@Drakith90 Oooo I forgot about that one
Maybe those Kickstarter disasters like mighty number 9, drift stage racing, and Jack and Casie. Edit: update on Jack and Casie the developer of that game, Shoutscion unfortunately passed away from cancer this January.
Brink
Not even forespoken mediocrity got Thanos snapped that fast
The fact they start 'defending' using asking for Volunteers for their 'childhood dream' by giving a definition of the word Volunteer tells me what they REALLY thought of their audience. Thinking about it now, adding that to opening where they get financial assistance delayed repeatedly and had volunteers work on it, people were right to be cautious, it sounds like the plan from the start was to cut and run.
Boy, I kind of wonder how all those people who kept insulting everybody who were sceptical about this scam are coping.
By saying all the negativity 'ruined the game' and 'didn't give the dev's time, they could have fixed it'. And I'm not kidding, I've seen comments along these lines on various videos about how badly this game failed, completely ignoring that even if the game could be fixed it still wouldn't have been the game that was advertised.
I literally never heard of this until they abandoned the game, was there drama relating to people calling it a scam and 'fans'?
Stop spreading FUD, I'm sure Fntastic are going to merge with Gamestop and Bed Bath And Beyond any day now and you'll see!
@@Tama_51 Primarily the typical critical youtubers trying to warn people, pointing out many red flags around this scam, being insulted repeatable or having their credibility questioned by 'fans'.
The absurdity was simply how when evidence started piling up and these 'fans' doubled down. All for a game from a practically nobody studio with a history of abandoned projects.
@@Tama_51 Oh my god, yes. Find old forum threads just for fun and enjoy 😛
The worst part about this whole thing is that the game they promised is absolutely possible to build if they really wanted to.
Oh really, then why no one has picked up this "game" to, I dunno, fix it?
@@thientuongnguyen2564 Probably something to do with "Input X, Output Y"
When X is larger than Y at start point, why would you bother?
@@thientuongnguyen2564...why ... Would they?
@@ceres_lang I was mocking the delusional "gamers" that not only bought this game but defended it with all their teeth and nails proclaiming "another studio will pick it up and make the promised game". Wish I was joking but people are that stupid.
The worst part? GAMERS who could not tell that it was all B.S. from the very beginning 🤣🤣
Pulling an engine switch the month before original release date is _insane._ That should have been the first and most immediate sign that this project was dead in the water.
The day before had many of these but the engine switch was a major one.
@@Cronosonic Even for a relatively painless engine switch, doing it a month before the original release date is a terrible idea. At that point you should be finalizing everything, especially if you're deploying to console--IIRC the approval process for releasing a game on console can take weeks or even over a month.
At that point, if you have a _finished_ game, you should be focused on making sure the launch goes smoothly, especially if players are depending on servers that you own. You should have declared 'feature lock' (i.e., no more new features) a while before that, too, so that your team can focus on fixing bugs without having to worry about new content being added while they test old content.
In terms of a total and absolute scam, what didn't happen with The Day Before?!
Well... Uh... I guess a kickstarter or crowdfunding would've made it hit 100% on the scam bingo card lmao
@@do3807 There's still plenty of bingos with what actually happened of course.
It didn't succeed
@@champs_idgaf Which is an ending that I'm fine with.
All its missing is the surprise inclusion of nfts
My god. When someone opens their counterargument to accusations of using volunteers to avoid paid labor with breaking down the etymology of the word "volunteer", you know Some Shit is up 😬
Oh gosh. It's like Aliens: Colonial Marines all over again. Showing a high end demo at reveal, and releasing a less than acceptable product. Unbelievable.
So these brothers behind the Fntastic studio basically scammed the Singapore government out of grant money that would've otherwise gone to a legit game development studio.
”Yeah, we struck it big with this!"
"Hey, according to this we actually have to put out a game."
"OH SHIT!!!"
Of all the countries to pull that shit on Singapore might be the worst choice. Their penal system does NOT fuck around.
@@ethanhayes7038 Yeah, even Ubisoft has to be stuck with Skulls and Bones because they made a deal with the Singaporean government :v
That's probably why they nuked their online profiles, they're most likely on the run. Probably in Taiwan or something.
Awww, Uwe Boll would be proud...
Despite being so wishlisted, I had no idea that this game even existed until it shambled into Early Access and unceremoniously died
The best indication it was botted to hell and back. A game cannot get wishlisted that often without basically no one knowing about it. The fact that most people only learned of it because it became the most wishlisted game on steam says everything about it.
4:27 This moment in the video perfectly demonstrates the brothers' personality, two guys trying to appear friendly and sympathetic, when in fact they are nothing more than egocentric bosses who disrespect anyone they consider inferior, and do not accept that their work method is stupid and ineffective.
If you ever feel like doing a movie again, "The Emperor's New Groove" would be great for What Happened. It has it all: complete last minute redos, unreasonable fixed deadlines, tons of content left on the cutting room floor. And to top it all off, the final script was only sent for revisions 2 weeks after the movie released!
And yet, it resulted in a good movie!
Isnt that most Hollywood stuff?
I've worked in the video game industry a few times - once I even worked for EA Games, my apologies to everyone. What I can tell you is that the notion of working on a development team as a "volunteer" is appalling. You're going to work for someone and not get paid, to help them put out a multi-million dollar project that is (theoretically) going to make them rich? Then why work for free?
You know - Earn much,pay less. This is capitalism
Yeah, volunteering is for like, charity things. Stuff you feel like you have a moral obligation to do and that you'd feel guilty for actually making money off of. This is far from something you'd volunteer on, because the lead guys damn well do not need the extra money.
Good god. The "It comes from the *Latin*, y'see" moment is just. Other than that being something literally everyone needs to jam in their heads as a scam alert when it comes in response to a question, I took 2 fucking years of Latin, and everything I learned about the Romans points to someone getting a group nut stomping, high class and low, if they went "Well y'know, fish means thing from water, so that's why I'm giving you these sponges. Cuz you wanted fish- this is a fish, what"
I think it was referred to as an MMO purely because the CEOs didn't actually know that much about what an MMO is (or video games in general tbh) but they thought it sounded cool in the marketing.
I still feel that any video update where you see the owner petting a dog is a huge red flag (unless it's a dog food company or something related to animals). It's like saying, "hey look, we like dogs, so we're clearly good human beings".
When you question someone about some sketchy behavior and they respond with the "technical definition" of a word-- there's some serious bullshit afoot.
I don't remember the word but it's a type of fallacy where you claim that the oldest meaning of the word is the correct meaning in order to undermine an opponents argument
@Xylophytae yes! I believe it's the etymological fallacy?
@@martineastman9855yes it is the etymological fallacy
"I already wish I could go back to The Day Before I played this game."
Id never heard of this game until after it launched and there were a spate of videos like this. Looking at the story of its development im shocked anyone bought it at all.
So The Day After.
Update: Fntastic is back with a kickstarter campaign for a new game called Escape Factory but without myntona backing them this time. Turns out they have learned absolutely nothing. 😂
That was unexpected 😳
Wow 24 days since the launch of this game to getting a What Happened. That might be a new record by McMuscles entertainment.
I'm not really into zombies or extraction-shooters (or many of the AAA release of the last few years), but I have genuinely no clue how those trailers and marketing material made over a million people add it to their wishlists. It's just grey ambience, post-apocalypse setting and occasional zombies
For real, don’t get why anyone got hyped for yet another generic-looking zombie apocalypse game set in modern day. Like, nothing about that idea is either innovative nor sound fun
@@Marksman3434 the actual USP of this game was that it was all a scam lol
I think people wanted dayz but with modern graphics
I’m so proud that Tommy Tallarico single-handedly created this amazing MMORPG.
You know who else is very proud? His mom.
he was actually the first american to work on a survival MMORPG!
Everything about these two guys screams "I've finished a get-rich-quick course, here's my certificate"
Oooh, boy. This is going to be Fntastic.
Fan4tastic
I think that's the fastest "What happened?" video after game release, just tells you everything about the quality of this game
I love how this game basically speed run in not only coming out of nowhere, not only did it become unplayable, but also destroying the company that distributed it, now that’s impressive.
Thats got to be some sort of new record right there.
It destroyed the developer, the distributer seems to still be in business.
For now.
2 words: Engine switch. If you hear these words you can say your prayers on said project
@@snil4 I can't think of any games that ever did well when an engine switch happened at such a crucial time in development.
@@DirgeTV watch some older episodes of "what happened?", you'll see how often this hapens.
They're baaaaack
The first time I had heard of the Day Before was when Steam sent me an email saying the game was on my wishlist, and was now for sale.
I have no idea how that happened.
Oh trust me, as a wrestling fan The World Wildlife Fund sued the World Wrestling Federation for using the same initials and won, even though you couldn't confuse the two so when it comes to similar names thing it can go wrong so quick
Yeah, that has more to do with what judge you get than anything else, especially given how there's no enforceable ethics rules regarding 'gifts' from 'anonymous parties'.
@@emperormegaman3856 but the point I made was it was obvious that you couldn't confuse the two as one was essentially an international known sports company with every bit of merchandise constantly on tv and print
If you take in mind gacha games, which, unsurprisingly are incredibly notorious for having very short lifespans, with 2023 being no stranger to gachas shutting down in less than a year, Closers RT shut down in a record 2 days, and Wave Naminori Boys shut down in three days straight following a prolonged month-long maintenance.
This game is what would happen if Ed Edd N Eddy decided to be game developers.
😂 Good one!
You know The Day Before is royally screwed up when it gets its own What Happened episode less than a month after its release!
Not even the Saints Row Reboot saw this fast of a fall.
@@DirgeTV Even Gollum had time to be talked about. The day before was such a dud this episode was created in a record time.
Honestly the day before just proves that there is a huge market / want for a new proper open world zombie survival mmo. It just a shame how this one ended up but I hope it spurs actual legit devs to explore this type of game.
I just kind of assumed such a thing would have already existed and been released ages ago.
@@suedenim There is, but I don't think there are any zombie survival shooters in big cities like New York.
@@lumirairazbyte9697 fortnite was originally a PvE tower defense game, never an MMO
@@suedenim The problem is that the logistics of a zombie apocalypse game on that scale make it unfeasible. To be exciting, zombie games require a large number of undead, many more than enemies in a lot of games, and often need a large variety of models instead of like, four or five for a given faction rank. The main ways to make this sort of processing requirement not require the top 1% of uber-computers is to either severely limit the scope of the world itself (and thus remove the whole point of being an open world in the first place) or deliberately make the game's graphics and programming "retro", which would never fly in a game that was AAA (or masquerading as such).
We're talking behavior, pathfinding, location information, spawning controls, and dozens of other variables for what could be millions of entities all at once, in real time. Most games that feature that level of entity control are things like FFXIV and WoW, which aren't open world and are further segmented into server shards. You just can't accomplish an open world zombie survival game while also having AAA levels of fidelity and polish in the industry as it stands today.
@@ranonadg I would take a open world zombie game with retro elements, then. Gameplay trumps all.
On one hand, I like to give people the benefit of the doubt...
On the other hand, this was a scam. Plain and simple, they made off with money meant to go into the game and are now living on a beach somewhere.
This! Everything about this game was such obvious bullshit the actual game should have just been a screen saying "Ha-Ha-Ha Sucker! You just got scammed!" (which would have even been a more fun game!)
On the plus side, 200k units sold is very little in terms of profit even if they were all in USD and received in Taiwan. Yeah, they probably got the dev funds as well due to those grants, but the kinds of losers who would pull this kind of thing are also the kinds of losers who would blow through that money in less than a year.
Even better, they made themselves exceptionally public, the faces of the game and the company. No one in the industry is going to be willing to work with them again, so the likelyhood is that they'll end up hugely in debt, being relieved all their expensive toys and property, and stuck begging what few fans they might still have for handouts.
Their faces scream "well-practiced liars"
The day before has gotta be one of the most interesting cases because of how fast things went when the game actually came out. One game that I'm interested in knowing more about it's development would be Indivisible by the late Lab Zero.
Must be a new record to have a game shut down in a mere 4 days.
When developers get lazy, this is the result of a game
There was a game called The Culling II that shutdown after about a week, so, yes, I guess this is the new speedrun any% shutdown game champion
Literally the Fyre Festival in video game form. All that's missing is a famous rapper like Ja Rule backing it the entire time
At least the studio didn't try to set up shop in the Bahamas.
@@AeonPhoenixThey picked a different island nation (Singapore).
@@moonjelly5 Shouldn't Singapore have much tougher laws against financial scammers? Especially if they aren't hesitant on whipping you if you drop gum or giving you the death penalty for smuggling heroin?
UPDATE: Their Twitter is active asking for a second chance! XD That's honestly hilarious.
7:36 Their definition of "volunteer" seems to be 'anybody who works for us who isn't a literal slave'.
I’ve always seen the day before on my TH-cam subscriptions and on news articles but I ever actually knew the full details of the fiasco. So I really appreciate you making this well-researched and concise video on the matter, thanks.
Thank you Matt McMuscles, who has muscles despite being a skeleton. Thank you. Keep fighting. I don’t care what Grunkle Derrick says.
Ummm you are a skeleton with muscles. Most living skeletons are...
@@GiggaGMikeE Most don't have a bare skull for a head, though.
If you think well about it, your body is a skeleton riding a flesh mecha
Skeletor is a skeleton with muscles and he's one of my favorite villains of all time, so I mean...
Oh my lord thank you for mentioning Abandoned. As the entire The Day Before dumpster fire was unfolding before my eyes, I could not help but be reminded of it.
The voice work on that Lionel Hutz gag was
just 😙🤌
I've been waiting for this! Glad you could make it before the end of the year.
I really didn't think we'd get a Day Before episode so soon. Bravo!
woke up in the middle of the night and i can’t sleep this video is exactly what i needed thank you ❤
STEAM's role in this was awesome. They even issued refunds to players who didn't even request them just to affect Fntastic.
I think the cute Doggo was the main culprit in this tumultuous string of lies, scams and BS'ery! Kinda like the Shiba Inu Doggo in Silent Hill 2, in the secret ending at least! Nice touch with the "Where in the World" segment that ultimately answered nothing and was made even greater with the big band Sonic Unleashed Werehog Music! I literally played that one minute part five times before completing the video, cause Matty McMuscles confused stuttering was so damned funny!!!!
I and the other 10 people who still remember D4: Dark Dreams Don't Die appreciate the heavy usage of its soundtrack on this episode
There have been so many videos on this topic but I was really looking forward to this one.
I knew nothing of this game yet this is one of the most batshit and hilariously fascinating dumpster fires ive seen, and considering its the video game industry, thats saying something
22:28
I liked that new segment, hope to see again in future episodes.
Even if the mistery last 15 seconds, lol!. 😂
Ahhh, "volunteer.". From the Latin "volunteer," which means to volunteer.
This might be the most "What Happened?" story I've ever seen. It takes a special kind of failure for a game and the company that made it to cease to exist barely a month after the game's release.
For a game that supposedly hype up so much. I've never heard a damn thing about this game untill release.
Same I don't get it? I'm on Steam, I am on the internet. I never heard of this game one time until it actually came out. Sure I don't go to IGN anymore but I would have thought I saw it mentioned somewhere.
@@notyoursavior78 same, its not scam its just trash game :D
I was litterally waiting for this topic to be covered by you in the last couple of days.
Can't imagine a better video to finish the year. Thanks a lot!
Great coverage as always, and Happy New Year!
Thanks for the Heart! Please take care of yourself, you have a lot, a whole lot to look forward especially in the New Year!
Reading comments like this idk man just warms my heart a little @@mekman4
I remember keeping up with this mess back when they only had the scam trailers
Like, there's no possible way they could've ever made something so competent with that much scope
This has to be a record for the quickest amount of time from a game's release to a What Happened episode
I love how they respond to accusations of asking for unpaid labor to work on their game by stating the definition of the word "volunteer."
Like always, awesome video. I've been hooked on this channel for a couple of months, I can't believe I hadn't subscribed until today.
People getting hyped for this type of game should leave Earth altogether. How did you not see the blatant signs of "Hmm this is suspicious, better wait than to buy in the hype"?
Well of course.
Any news when Bisontopia will be released?
I never heard about this before launch either. Hard to believe it actually garnered so much attention
The fact 70% of costs were covered and they STILL asked for volunteers is so incredibly slimy
I want that Harry Potter Sonic Obama backpack.
"What happened to the brothers?" When/if found, jail. If not found, potentially at the bottom of a lake.
You’re the only skeleton I don’t want to stop from fighting, for the fight you fight is necessary.
The "Fake it till you make it" brothers didn't realize their game can get refunded and basically went off the grid
0:32 "I did nothing wrong. I did everything correct." - Gotosvev brothers
I already knew the story to this game but I was so excited to see a What Happened? video from Matt too!
Out of curiosity: did that de-listing nuke all the wishlisting? Because that'd be really useful if that wishlisting number was a fraud.
I'm 100% sure it was botted out the ass, but I blame IGN and Nvidia for helping this obvious scam, get some legit wishlistings along the way.
Their discord and subreddit were barren, certainly nowhere near "most wishlisted game on Steam" vibes at all.
The game doesn't usually get removed from wishlists even after delisting, I believe. I think I still have some delisted games on mine...
No better way to end the year with a Wha Happun about a scam
Their press release statements literally read like scam emails. Slightly broken English (although, that's not really fair to them, it just happens to be similar to scam emails) and WAY OVEREMOTIONAL wording.
Been looking forward to this the minute I learned anything about this topic
Knowing (most of) the ending in advance, this was like watching a train build steam as it runs toward an oil tanker.
very meaningful and curated content
_~I feel FNTASTIC!~_
_~And I never felt as good as how I do right now~_
_~Except for maybe when I think of how I felt that day~_
_~When I felt the way that I do right now, right now~_
Concord: "who's ready for round 2?*
I would like to congratulate The Day Before on unseating Duke Nukem Forever on becoming the greatest vaporware ever.
But Duke Nukem Forever eventually came out, it's not really vaporware...
@@Cosmic-Bear. I was in middle school when it was announced and going through a second divorce when it was released. It counts.
@@inteligentidiot7233 No, it doesn't lol
The definition of vaporware isn't software that took a long time to come out, it's software that straight up never did. If it comes out it's not vaporware.
The only milestone I've seen, from gameplay videos, is that it combines a zombie shooting multiplayer experience with an unintended Attack on Titan crossover.
I enjoyed your video, but I’m honestly surprised you hadn’t heard of the game before the trademark dispute. It’s been a big talk of a “fake game” ever since the original trailer. Devs and TH-camrs were saying it was just a “vertical slice” and not real gameplay. I have been waiting for it to crash and burn for a long time. And I was not disappointed.
That soundtrack in the end is from FFX - to Zanarkand, matched with the Devs that disappeared in the face of the earth.
I had no idea what was going on with this game and the controversies involved. I specifically avoided looking it up because I was waiting for this exact episode to come out, because let's face it, we all knew Matt was diving into this one, lol.
The Skill Up video is more in depth...
I know you know all about meaningful curated-style content! :D
Love these sneak disses.
I really like The Day Before.
I didn't play it, mind, but I've really enjoyed the news circuit on it.
Should be noted that they never got any cash from the sales.
Steam keep the money for a month before transfering it to the devs, since it all happen so fast, they never got a cent.