Upcoming open-world MMO survival game The Day Before has been delayed by roughly nine months, owing to an incident surrounding trademark claims.
The Day Before has had an interesting development and promotion. The MMO was previously set to release on March 1, 2023 on PC, PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S but no pre-orders had been made available and store pages for the console versions aren't live. Similarly, the game's Steam page has been removed.
Earlier today, developer Fntastic issued a statement via Twitter, informing that the game has been delayed until Nov. 10, 2023 and addressing the game's absense from Steam. "Right before the release, Steam blocked our game page at the request of a private individual, because of the name The Day Before."
The Day Before was announced back in January 2021 which, at the time, the trademark for the game's title was available, the studio claims.
"After the announcement of the game, the above mentioned individual filled out an application before us to register the game trademark The Day Before in the United States."
The studio claims that they were previously not aware of the existence of claims and that they only found out about is on Jan. 19, 2023 after receiving a complaint from the individual.
"We previously planned to post a lengthy gameplay video later this month, but we'll have to sort this issue out first," the statement continued. "We will post a video asap."
"As a result, we have made the difficult decision to postpone the launch to November 10, 2023. We understand this may disappoint many of our fans, however we want to ensure we release the best possible game."
Many have been left sceptical over the game's release, questioning whether or not the game will ever see the light of day. Some have compared it to Blue Box Studios' controversial game Abandoned and its troubled development.
This article was originally published on dbltap as The Day Before Delayed Over Trademark Claims.
