Everyone knew it would be a pump and dump
"The Day Before" makers Fntastic are shutting down.
Submitted 11 months ago by KISSmyOS@lemmy.world to games@lemmy.world
https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/f86d21a6-98d5-4339-ba1a-640b5cca9d86.png
Comments
dinckelman@lemmy.world 11 months ago
Vlyn@lemmy.zip 11 months ago
That was fast. Their claim of 5 years in development is histerical.
The city map is a bought asset for a few hundred bucks. The survival mechanics were a bought kit too.
If you cut out marketing you could build that type of asset flip in weeks to months.
Rose@lemmy.world 11 months ago
I’m not even sure they paid for those assets. Asset piracy is a thing.
simple@lemm.ee 11 months ago
Wow, that was fast. Usually you’d get an apology post and a promise things would get better before a studio admits it failed.
From the post it sounds like they could’ve been swimming in debt and can’t pay for any more development.
mateomaui@reddthat.com 11 months ago
slaacaa@lemmy.world 11 months ago
illi@lemm.ee 11 months ago
Funilly enough I had no idea DayZ is still around and also actually launched at one point?
towerful@programming.dev 11 months ago
Namalsk (modded map) is hugely popular.
It’s also on consoles…GrammatonCleric@lemmy.world 11 months ago
Standalone is still a bit janky, but provides a fun experience on console
mateomaui@reddthat.com 11 months ago
dead gamedamn that is brutal
Talaraine@kbin.social 11 months ago
you can say that again
Zellith@kbin.social 11 months ago
TIL Dayz isn't in early access any more.
TheEighthDoctor@lemmy.world 11 months ago
We have known for 2 years that it was going to be like this, the surprising part is that it was actually launched.
Uninformed_Tyler@lemmy.world 11 months ago
Under promise, over deliver. The other way around only works if you’re trying to capitalize on hype.
echo64@lemmy.world 11 months ago
Nah, just promote what you have. You don’t have to ‘over deliver’, for some reason hiding away the great stuff you made. Just don’t over hype.
Uninformed_Tyler@lemmy.world 11 months ago
This is not a story about a company failing because they hid product capabilities from their customers and were underappreciated because people didn’t realize how good their product was. This is a story of a company over promising in their marketing and failing to deliver.
I stand by what I said in the context of this story, which is what we are discussing. if you don’t know if you can deliver a feature don’t put it out there that you’re trying to make the feature. If customers know you’re working on something and then you can’t deliver they feel like they lost that thing. If they don’t know that you’re working on it and you pull it out of the hat before lunch or even in a post launch update everyone is excited because they feel like they got something extra for free. Obviously on launch you should explain the full capabilities of your product. But again that is not the context of this story.
slaacaa@lemmy.world 11 months ago
You do realize this was a scam?
With some different outcome scenarios for sure, but all of the included some dudes living on salaries payed by investors for a few years, then fucking off into the sunset with a variable amount of pocket change from the day 1 sales.
wildginger@lemmy.myserv.one 11 months ago
Is there a source for any of this? Speculation is one thing, but Ive seen people claiming this was made in both unity and unreal, and that some assets are bought, then all assets were bought, that they were only working for 2 years not 5, etc etc etc
Like I know it looks scammy, but whats the hard line people used to actually determine that?
And theres got to be some hard line, since the dayZ team mocked them for this. I dont expect another company to mock a fellow game maker shuttering unless there was harder evidence that they were scammers beyond internet guesswork.
Lanusensei87@lemmy.world 11 months ago
What a disaster.
Lunar@lemmy.wtf 11 months ago
That sucks, but the studio was very misleading about The Day Before.
Aielman15@lemmy.world 11 months ago
Sad to see another dev forced to close.
I admit I had never heard of them nor their games.
dinckelman@lemmy.world 11 months ago
Really not upset about it at all. They’ve lied to people, mislead everyone, gave false or incomplete descriptions of the product, and then released a horribly buggy asset dump, that doesn’t look anything like the pre-rendered clip they’ve shown forever ago
Aielman15@lemmy.world 11 months ago
Oh, I see. As I said, I had never heard of them or their games before today, so I was missing the context.
mateomaui@reddthat.com 11 months ago
The game blows but this review has a lot of replay value if you haven’t seen it already
Goronmon@lemmy.world 11 months ago
What’s crazy to me is that the game looks as good as it does on a surface level. It doesn’t immediately stand out as a “This is a garbage game that is going to lead to a studio closure”, at least until you see the person actually play the game.
cradac@feddit.de 11 months ago
I think we’re going to see a lot more of those types of games in the future. It’s pretty easy to make a decent looking game with UE 5 - still doesn’t give it any soul though.
Lmaydev@programming.dev 11 months ago
The city looks amazing! I’m guessing they spent all their time on the graphics and forgot the actual game.
Davel23@kbin.social 11 months ago
The game is completely made with bought assets.
Lanusensei87@lemmy.world 11 months ago
The city is an asset pack lmao.
GrammatonCleric@lemmy.world 11 months ago
Maybe they should’ve crowdfunded and did preorders
Neato@kbin.social 11 months ago
To be fair, it seems like they've made 5 games and 4/5 weren't very good.
Attachment: media.kbin.social ↗Zahille7@lemmy.world 11 months ago
Man who could have seen this coming.
ComputerSagtNein@lemm.ee 11 months ago
They are scammers and nobody should feel sorry for them.
I bet even this was planned from the beginning. Get some money out of the “game” and then just disappear.
slaacaa@lemmy.world 11 months ago
The amount of people who don’t understand how this is a scam is sad. It’s not about the pocket change from steam sales (which they may get or may not at all), it’s about living for a few years on investor money and doing nothing (or working your own business). And they did release a game at the end, so the investors cannot easily sue them for fraud, as they csn just put their hands up and say they tried, it just didn’t work out.
avater@lemmy.world 11 months ago
Is this even possible with the way steam handles the payment of developers? If I remember correctly you get the money at the end of the month and they are also saving a certain part for possible refunds.
KISSmyOS@lemmy.world 11 months ago
The few people at the top of the studio paid themselves a juicy salary from investors’ money for 5 years, then released a Unity asset pack they bought for a few hundred bucks as finished end product.