The Day Before- The Calendar App

 The clock is ticking on FNTASTIC

My god, do I love talking about this absolute train wreck of a brand as often as I can, probably due to how unbelievable scuffed it's operation always seems to be no matter what the circumstance or whoever happens to be involved with running it. Because everytime someone manages to change my mind into giving this developers the benefit of the doubt, looking at them from another point of view and considering all that could be going on behind the scenes that we just don't know about, something else slips out from the woodworks to sufficiently embarrass the developer and all those who claim to be responsible for it. I think we're reaching that point of critical mass where The Day Before has finally shattered the faith of the last person who believed in it, and from here on the reputation of these developers over at FNTASTIC is just going to drain slowly out of the tub like the stopper's been pulled.

And the operate factor in all of this is, of course, the way that 'The Day Before' got itself pulled from the steam store thanks to a trademark dispute involving it's name that seemed to have popped up out of nowhere when the game was hardly a few months from it's supposed release. Of course, it was a circumstance that the team used to excuse the game being delayed for half a year, which in itself seemed very surprising given the fact that a simple trademark dispute shouldn't really take half a year to clear up- but of course it then came out that FNTASTIC were planning their to delay zombie survival MMO beforehand and merely used these issues as an smokescreen exucse. Of course, then the team came out and announced as such after that information had already done it's rounds about the Internet and everyone figured out the lie for what it was... just to show you the kind of consumer-developer transparency were dealing with here.

But with this premise of lies and half-truths that FNTASTIC has set itself, after a career of gaslighting and misdirecting it's audience, I think we can all be forgiven for raising the possibility that this trademark dispute was a total fabrication to begin with. I mean, the team went so far as to drag attention their way a few years ago by announcing a playable event, only for that event to turn out to be the surprise launch of their erstwhile developed game : 'Prop Nite', a limp Dead-by-Daylight clone. These guys are grifters at heart, why would anyone believe they would be so callous as to announce a game with a trailer under a trademark that they didn't own and never attempted to acquire in the several years since announcement and this year? It just defies belief. And yet...

Much to the surprise of I think everybody, it turns out that another The Day Before does in fact, exist; and it's not a video game. Yes, there's actually a Korean Calendar app called 'The Day Before' which covets the trademark which FNTASTIC wants so badly, and according to them they've actually held the rights since 2015 in several countries including where FNTASTIC would need it if they want to sell their game off Steam, The United States. You'd have thought that a decent developer would take the time to make themselves familiar with this conflict in branding before spending the money and effort constructing advertising and marketing around it- but then again the Logo is literally just a copy of The Last of Us's logo, so I guess FNTASTIC didn't dedicate much effort into the marketing process anyway.

What seems to be absolutely fascinating me about this is the fact that, despite an initially knee-jerk reaction of attempting to protect themselves by going quiet, FNTASTIC have since carried on to promote the game under the name they are apparently legally forbidden from using. We've seen the publishing of another controversial gameplay trailer under the Youtube channel featuring that name in it's heading, as well as a bafflingly tone-deaf video of several characters sitting in an in-game sauna- because that is definitely the vibe you want to dish out when the community around your game is a utter disarray of people who don't even believe the game was ever real to being with. Their twitter is still called The Day Before, and posts every now and then. What are we supposed to think? Has the trademark issue been resolved? 

Now I fully understand, I really do, why people have been imploring others to respect the difficulties that go into running an indie company, because we all want to see the best in those around us. They are a relatively small company that got a break beyond their wildest dreams when it came to The Day Before striking a cord in the hearts of so many people across the world. But given that the trailer in particular was a composite featuring a title far beyond the team's capabilities to create, and given the team have proceeded to put out similarly misleading trailers in the years since- I think we've passed a point where the bravado and 'out-of-ass' bragging has earned this company, no matter how green, the scrutiny they are met with today. I was suspicious from day one because of how I am, but the benefit of the doubt has rightly worn on everyone.

And none of that is even going into the troubling claims from some supposed employees (of questionable verifiability, mind you) that FNTASTIC is a truly horrible place to work whilst stuck under the thumb of two leaders who lord over the company like titans, driving development in bizarre and sudden tangents, shouting at anyone who dares raise a conflicting opionon and driving the team around the bend with backwards shifts of focus. I know I give Cloud Imperium a hard time for how Roberts runs his company, but at least that man has a track record for getting things done eventually; it's honestly a wonder that FNTASTIC have managed to publish any games beforehand given how ramshackle this company presents itself from the inside-out, all in the pursuit of the one thing in the modern world more valuable than money- clout and attention. (Although they do have a bunch of investor money too, which I bet is nice.)

I'm far past the point of hoping for some total gear shift in the story of FNTASTIC, because I'm not for typically believing in unicorns and fairies if I can help it. All I'm expecting now is for the company to slowly run out of excuses for fobbing off their producers and farting out a total, hardly functioning, trainwreck of a product that is the final death knell the world needs to feel vindicated in their disdain. Because of everything that a successful game needs, strong universally shared vision, creative talent, a company of people who aren't considered 'volunteers' by management- FNTASTIC are missing seemingly all of it. At least I hope the profile of this case manages to give the employees that have wasted their time under this pipedream the experience to move on towards real development studios in the future. Let's try and dig some nugget of goodness out of the refuse pile....