The Day Before is now dead, its servers closed to players from today, January 22.
Servers for The Day Before, one of the most controversial and catastrophic games in recent memory, shut down just 45 days after the game launched in Early Access.
Publisher Mytona had signalled the end of The Day Before, with developer Fntastic allegedly closed down.
Last month, The Day Before became no longer purchasable. Now, while those with The Day Before still clinging on to their hard-drives can launch the game and create a character, IGN has verified that no servers appear upon search in any region.
Last month, Mytona said all Steam players would be refunded automatically. "We regret to inform you that the development company Fntastic has officially ceased operations, and as a result The Day Before will be retired and the servers will be turned off on January 22, 2024," the statement read.
"As previously communicated, Mytona, as the investor, has been working in collaboration with Steam to facilitate refunds for all game purchasers. For any players that have not already had their purchase refunded, Steam wil now proactively refund all remaining players."
The Day Before was once Steam's most wishlisted game before a strange series of events caused fans to grow more and more suspicious and concerned. Fntastic was accused of ripping off other games like The Division, Call of Duty, The Last of Us, Cyberpunk 2077, Grand Theft Auto 5, and more, on separate occasions, for example, and a trademark dispute complicated things too.
In November 2023, seven months after it promised no more delays, Fntastic delayed The Day Before again, this time indefinitely though its PC version would arrive in Early Access a month later. This launch did not go well, as players flagged that essentially nothing Fntastic promised was actually in the game.
And finally, just four days after launch, when the player count had dropped 90% and The Day Before entered Steam's worst 10 games of all time list, Fntastic announced it was closing down.
In a rare IGN 1/10 review, we said: "The Day Before is easily one of the worst games I’ve ever played, to the point where I’m afraid to continue running it on my PC — and if you didn’t manage to try it, you can count yourself as one of the lucky ones."
The Day Before goes down in history as a high-profile “scam” video game. It caused such a mistrust with Steam users that Palworld developer Pocketpair felt compelled to insist its new game wasn’t a scam.
Wesley is the UK News Editor for IGN. Find him on Twitter at @wyp100. You can reach Wesley at wesley_yinpoole@ign.com or confidentially at wyp100@proton.me.
