You know the one: the one that's so good it's probably been delayed for eight months after suffering a bizarre copyright infringement: the second most popular game on Steam, The Day Before (opens in new tab). The trademark dispute came just before the release of a "raw gameplay footage" trailer (opens in new tab) that was promised for later this month. But now that trailer has been postponed indefinitely while Fntastic consults with its lawyers, and the game's March 1 release date has been pushed back to November 10.

In an update posted on Fntastic's Twitter this morning, the studio claimed that "Steam blocked the game page at the request of an individual." The studio stated that it first learned of this on January 19, 2023, when it "received a complaint" from the trademark owner. So while Fntastic tries to fulfill its commitment to "make sure everything gets sorted out," the game, trailer, and anything more that can be said about this still-mysterious survival MMO are all on hold.

Suspicious to say the least, The Day Before has already raised a number of red flags, from a feature list that is unclear as to what the game will include months before release to a heavily staged "gameplay trailer" that is (apparently) ready to come into its own The sudden disappearance just as it was getting ready to come into its own makes the whole thing seem even more fishy than ever.

To be fair, Fntastic has linked to the relevant documents on the US Patent and Trademark Office website (opens in new tab). In the studio's own view, however, it is utterly baffling to think that they could have released a flashy, glitzy game but not have all the relevant trademarks in place. And perhaps they developed the game for years without realizing that someone else owned the name of their game in the U.S. There is also a record (opens in new tab) of Fntastic filing a trademark application last January. Was this application filed without anyone knowing of the existence of the other applications?

It may have been the second wishlisted game on Steam before the page disappeared, but not many people seem willing to accept the studio's explanation for the delay: replies to the announcement on Twitter have been mostly gifs suggesting some degree of doubt. Patchwork. The general consensus seems to be that the game's subreddit (with only 46,000 registered users, not a lot for a highly anticipated game) is not ready to be released, let alone released to the public." I wonder if this actually had anything to do with the delay." Says deathbatdrummer (opens in new tab) in a top rated comment in the announcement thread, "The game was never going to be released in March, in any way, shape or form.