Fans bewildered over strange video game delay

The Day Before has been raising eyebrows since it was first announced, but a strange new delay for the game has fans asking questions.

The Day Before, an upcoming game from Singapore-based developer Fntastic, has faced a last-minute delay, but some fans aren’t buying it.

Fntastic had originally planned to release The Day Before in early March, but the studio announced today that it would instead be moved to a November release. These kinds of delays aren’t uncommon in the games industry, but Fntastic’s reasoning for the delay is quite unusual.

Rather than delaying the game so that it can be polished or improved before launch, Fntastic says that The Day Before has been delayed due to a trademark dispute. The company said that a private individual applied for the US trademark before it did, and therefore the game couldn’t be released.

The explanation comes after the game was suddenly unlisted from Steam, where it was at one point the most wishlisted game on the platform. It’s not the explanation that Fntastic originally gave, however, with the studio saying initially that it was removed due to a bug.

“We are currently experiencing a minor technical difficulty with our game’s visibility on the Steam store page,” Fntastic said in a now-deleted Steam post, “This is a known bug that has affected multiple titles in the past. Please note that Steam regularly conducts maintenance on Tuesdays and this issue will likely be resolved during that time”.

Now, the company is claiming that Steam blocked the game page at the request of the trademark holder.

“Right before the release, Steam blocked our game page at the request of a private individual, because of the name The Day Before,” the studio said on Twitter, “As you know, our game was announced in January 2021. At the time of the announcement, The Day Before game trademark was available”.

It continued, “After the announcement of the game, the above mentioned individual filled out an application before us to register the game trademark The Day Before in the United States. Previously, we were not aware of the existence of the claims. We found out about this only on January 19, 2023, when we received a complaint from him and a request to contact him”.

pic.twitter.com/tlvk0ryNKo

— Fntastic (@FntasticHQ) January 25, 2023

Fntastic claims that it had planned to post “a lengthy gameplay video” in the next few days, but says it has to resolve the apparent trademark issue first. It did not explain why a trademark dispute would prevent the studio from releasing gameplay footage, nor why the release date was pushed so far back.

Replies to the explanation were not kind. Many accused the studio of lying, with some calling it a “scam”. Others chastised Fntastic for failing to do the due diligence before announcing the game. Some even suggested the game doesn’t exist at all, a sentiment seemingly shared by one of the studio’s Discord moderators.

As noticed by Skill Up, the game’s lead Discord moderator Wholf said in the official Discord server that they hadn’t seen any gameplay, saying “Those who wonder, if the game is real, I’m wondering the same right now. Nobody saw the gameplay”.

The Day Before is said to be an online multiplayer game. Picture: Fntastic

For now, it seems as if the studio is staying quiet. It has not replied to any of the comments on its Twitter post, and seems to be inactive in the game’s Steam forums too. It’s understood that Wholf is also one of the moderators for the game on Steam.

The Day Before isn’t the only game to get delayed lately. A strange trailer for Black Myth: Wukong revealed a huge delay for that game too, being pushed from 2023 into 2024.

Skull and Bones, a big Ubisoft game, was delayed a sixth time too. The game has been in development for many years, and was delayed alongside the announcement of three other Ubisoft games getting cancelled.

Written by Oliver Brandt on behalf of GLHF.