Overview

Fntastic Shutdown refers to the closure of the videogame company Fntastic studio four days after the release of the highly anticipated and controversial game The Day Before in December 2023. The company was flooded with bad reviews and the game was taken out of Steam five days after it premiered. The news became the subject of online debates calling the game developing company a scam and the game receiving the lowest-rated Steam games of all time.

Background

Fntastic studio was founded in 2015 by CEOs Eduard Gotovtsev and Aisen Gotovtsev. On January 27th, 2021, the studio announced the development^[1] of the open-world survival MMO game "The Day Before." Two days later, an announcement trailer was released on YouTube by IGN^[2] (shown below), which amassed more than 2.4 million views and 51,000 likes in two years.

Developments

The Day Before Delays

The Day Before was originally expected to be released in Q2 of 2021, but it was delayed^[3] many times over the course of two years since it was announced. On May 5th, 2023, IGN^[4] posted a video (shown below) explaining the reasons behind the delays, which garnered roughly 67,000 views and 1,400 likes in a year.

Fntastic Shutdown in 2023

The Day Before was launched in a rough, early access state on Steam on December 7th, 2023. According to IGN,^[5] immediately after the game was launched many players complained about bugs and other issues, "citing server and performance issues as among the biggest problems."

Four days after the game was available, on December 11th, 2023, Fntastic studio posted a statement on X^[6] revealing it was shutting down and The Day Before was removed from sales on Steam. The post (shown below) amassed over 24 million views and 16,000 likes in a day.

Today, we announce the closure of Fntastic studio. Unfortunately, The Day Before has failed financially, and we lack the funds to continue. All income received is being used to pay off debts to our partners. We invested all our efforts, resources, and man-hours into the development of The Day Before, which was our first huge game. We really wanted to release new patches to reveal the full potential of the game, but unfortunately, we don't have the funding to continue the work. It's important to note that we didn't take any money from the public during the development of The Day Before; there were no pre-orders or crowdfunding campaigns. We worked tirelessly for five years, pouring our blood, sweat, and tears into the game. At the moment, the future of The Day Before and Propnight is unknown, but the servers will remain operational. We apologize if we didn't meet your expectations. We did everything within our power, but unfortunately, we miscalculated our capabilities. Creating games is an incredibly challenging endeavor. We're grateful to everyone who supported us during these difficult years. It's been a fantastic journey over the past eight years: 2015: Opening of the studio 2017: Release of The Wild Eight 2018: Release of Dead Dozen 2018: Release of Radiant One 2021: Release of Propnight 2023: Release of The Day Before FNTASTIC

Online Reactions

Following the closure of the studio, people who had bought the early-access game posted reviews and comments on the state of The Day Before. For instance, on December 8th, 2023, Gameranx uploaded a review of the game on YouTube^[6] (shown below, left), which amassed over 950,000 views and 39,000 likes in four days. On the same day, YouTuber^[7] @penguinz0 posted a video commenting about the game (shown below, right), which received roughly 2.6 million views and 83,000 likes in four days.