For those needing context, The Day Before is a survival style game. (shooters usually, limited supplies, always hostile zones with NPC enemies and player enemies (usually)
The genre is fair well established so there were many comparisons during development to existing games in the genre and some hiccups during development [0] and some ethical concerns [0].
Prior to the release, the Dev Team for the game released a statement preparing players that the game has issues, and trying to quash claims of the game being a scam [1]
I have not followed this game's development personally, but when I first read about it on another forum this is the context I wish I had.
Two additional specifics: it was the second-most wishlisted game on Steam prior to release and upon release customers discovered that it was essentially a different genre of game than was marketed, along with being buggy and much smaller in scope.
This led to mass negative reviews and refunds and calls of it being a scam, which the company denied.
> An asset flip is a type of shovelware in which a video game developer legally purchases pre-made assets and uses them to create numerous permutations of generic games and sell them at low prices.
In this case, maybe not "numerous permutations", but throwing together the (presumably purchased) assets with the bare minimum components of a video game.
Assets Flip is when you replace the assets in a game with other assets and sell it under a different name. Usually from a demo project or even from a complete game that was "stole".
This game simply used a bunch of assets that were bought on the unreal asset store which is different and tbh completely fair especially with a small dev team.
It's basically this - purchase a bunch of "assets" (3d models, plugins, etc) off unreal marketplace, cobble them together with duct tape and superglue, and release it , hoping to at least recover the cost of the assets you purchased + profit.
I've been following this train wreck for a while, as it was pretty clear where this was headed.
There was a supposedly leaked internal screenshot surfacing purporting that roughly 50% of the game's sales had been refunded. Hopefully Steam does the right thing and removes this product from the store immediately and refunds ALL customers.
For those out-of-the-loop this situation goes far behind over-promising and under-delivering. This "game" was largely just an Unreal Engine asset flip that appears to be hastily cobbled together with duct tape and fiddlesticks by amateurs, and didn't even deliver the same genre it advertised for years.
Is there a better article that explains what's going on here? What is (was) Fntastic? What is/was "The Day Before"? What makes this relevant to hacking/startups?
This brief paragraph leaves me with no idea whether this was a documentary, a crypto product, a timepiece, a React framework, or what.
> The Day Before arrived on the market and turned out to be very different from what everyone expected. The game is not only full of bugs and assorted problems, but also has a different gameplay structure than promised. The team was in fact talking about an MMO, or a massively multiplayer online game. In reality, it is more of a draw game.
> Players and streamers who are playing the game say it’s more of an extraction shooter, à la Tom Clancy’s The Division, without the balance or depth of similar shooters.
HackerNews is about sharing things that may be of interesting to software hackers and startups, not necessarily topics directly related to those two things.
I was 100% sure it was a game just from the headline even though I have never heard of Fntastic or "The Day Before" before this headline.
"The Day Before" is a really strong hint, the quotes indicate that it is a title; so book, movie, game, etc. You don't write "The React" or "The Bitcoin". So, could be a documentary.
But if this is people trying to make a living making games and not being very good at business, and maybe not even making great games, then cut them a break. Creating a financially successful company is hard - and when things break down it's pretty mean to attack.
- The Wild Eight (Metacritic: 63; Steam: "Mostly Positive" with 6,161 reviews)
- Dead Dozen (Metacritic: TBD; Steam: "Mostly Negative" with 579 reviews)
- Radiant One (Metacritic: 82; Steam: "Mostly Positive" with 166 reviews)
- Propnight (Metacritic: TBD; Steam: "Mixed" with >15,000 reviews)
- The Day Before (Metacritic: TBD; Steam: "Mostly Negative" with >19,000 reviews)
Scores don't look good, but they also don't look as bad as I expected them to be after the train wreck of The Day Before. I wonder how this would've played out if they hadn't overhyped the game as much as they did.
but like that quote about how you make shitty movies so you can make the artsy ones, The Day Before was going to be the artsy one funded by all of the slop.
I'm sorry to hear it. The game didn't turn out as well as they'd hoped, and I imagine they might have been crossing their fingers for a miracle to happen on release, only to have it become a disaster. Many of us have been on failing projects, and know that it can be due to a hundred reasons unrelated to the talent and commitment of the people involved. I don't know what happened in this case, but I can sympathize with the people on the line, slogging for years on a doomed game they can't save.
Readit News
The genre is fair well established so there were many comparisons during development to existing games in the genre and some hiccups during development [0] and some ethical concerns [0].
Prior to the release, the Dev Team for the game released a statement preparing players that the game has issues, and trying to quash claims of the game being a scam [1]
I have not followed this game's development personally, but when I first read about it on another forum this is the context I wish I had.
0 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Day_Before_(video_game)#De...
1 - https://twitter.com/FntasticHQ/status/1731680871856369689#m
edit: fixed formatting on citations.
This led to mass negative reviews and refunds and calls of it being a scam, which the company denied.
> An asset flip is a type of shovelware in which a video game developer legally purchases pre-made assets and uses them to create numerous permutations of generic games and sell them at low prices.
In this case, maybe not "numerous permutations", but throwing together the (presumably purchased) assets with the bare minimum components of a video game.
This game simply used a bunch of assets that were bought on the unreal asset store which is different and tbh completely fair especially with a small dev team.
There was a supposedly leaked internal screenshot surfacing purporting that roughly 50% of the game's sales had been refunded. Hopefully Steam does the right thing and removes this product from the store immediately and refunds ALL customers.
For those out-of-the-loop this situation goes far behind over-promising and under-delivering. This "game" was largely just an Unreal Engine asset flip that appears to be hastily cobbled together with duct tape and fiddlesticks by amateurs, and didn't even deliver the same genre it advertised for years.
This brief paragraph leaves me with no idea whether this was a documentary, a crypto product, a timepiece, a React framework, or what.
https://www.aroged.com/2023/12/09/the-day-before-is-sold-as-...
> The Day Before arrived on the market and turned out to be very different from what everyone expected. The game is not only full of bugs and assorted problems, but also has a different gameplay structure than promised. The team was in fact talking about an MMO, or a massively multiplayer online game. In reality, it is more of a draw game.
https://www.polygon.com/23992623/the-day-before-steam-launch...
> Players and streamers who are playing the game say it’s more of an extraction shooter, à la Tom Clancy’s The Division, without the balance or depth of similar shooters.
HackerNews is about sharing things that may be of interesting to software hackers and startups, not necessarily topics directly related to those two things.
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
"The Day Before" is a really strong hint, the quotes indicate that it is a title; so book, movie, game, etc. You don't write "The React" or "The Bitcoin". So, could be a documentary.
Look, if its fraud of some sort, sure, get mad.
But if this is people trying to make a living making games and not being very good at business, and maybe not even making great games, then cut them a break. Creating a financially successful company is hard - and when things break down it's pretty mean to attack.
I mean, it has the smell of fraud to me. I’m not sure it is, but it seems like it should be investigated.
- The Wild Eight (Metacritic: 63; Steam: "Mostly Positive" with 6,161 reviews)
- Dead Dozen (Metacritic: TBD; Steam: "Mostly Negative" with 579 reviews)
- Radiant One (Metacritic: 82; Steam: "Mostly Positive" with 166 reviews)
- Propnight (Metacritic: TBD; Steam: "Mixed" with >15,000 reviews)
- The Day Before (Metacritic: TBD; Steam: "Mostly Negative" with >19,000 reviews)
Scores don't look good, but they also don't look as bad as I expected them to be after the train wreck of The Day Before. I wonder how this would've played out if they hadn't overhyped the game as much as they did.
but like that quote about how you make shitty movies so you can make the artsy ones, The Day Before was going to be the artsy one funded by all of the slop.
Except it was also slop.