VGTimes Interview with The Day Before Devs

The Day Before is the greatest product we've ever created at Fntastic. Almost 16,800 hours have passed since the first line of code was written, and we are truly happy that we spent this part of our lives creating the game of our dreams — one that we ourselves would play in the evenings over warm tea. We did not dare to take bold steps, we just do our job to the maximum and intend to give players the best product

The creation of such a large game was made possible thanks to our partnership with the publisher MyTona. We do not plan to collect pre-orders or go to Kickstarter

We chose America because we believe that it has its own unique atmosphere, which was created by Hollywood. Imagine that you survive and run from hordes of hungry dead among abandoned skyscrapers, explore huge shopping malls and cozy shops. Can you imagine zombies in post-apocalyptic frosty Yakutsk? Even if they were wearing earflaps (laughs), it would still come down to surviving in the cold

Let's imagine that a zombie apocalypse has come to your city. Who will you see? A proudly walking three-meter zombie in a cloak or an ordinary person with pale skin and crazy eyes who runs headlong to tear you apart? For us, the second option sounds more plausible, so we divided the infected into realistic varieties, for example, by body type. Zombies react to sounds and rely on sight, and by the way, if you are overloaded, you will make more noise, and the chance of being heard will increase. Each encounter with the infected may be the last. It is important for us to convey the same sensations from meeting a zombie, as if it happened in real life

We approached this differently than in other games. It is important for us to give the player freedom of choice and maximum immersion in the world of the post-apocalypse, not limited to classes and character parameters. We will tell you more about this in our future videos

There are two parameters that affect detection: hearing and vision. If you run headlong and knock down all the doors in the house, the noise level will rise, and you will definitely be noticed. At the same time, if the wind is howling outside at this time, it will already drown out some of your sounds

Dynamic weather and time of day changes, the appearance of a storm — all this is only a small part of the details that make the world of The Day Before realistic and unpredictable. Wake up in the morning and make yourself a cup of coffee over a fire, and at night, if you are lucky and it starts snowing, the wind will muffle all sounds, and you will be able to easily sneak into any place, even the most dangerous ones, unnoticed. The main thing is not to get caught in a storm, because even the best-equipped players will not last more than five minutes outside

You can drink tea from your thermos to quench your thirst, and if you suddenly get hungry, you can always roast your companion (laughs). The game has many impressive mechanics that make the survival process truly interesting and fun. Hunger, thirst, and temperature are necessary for real immersion in the game world. We made the frequency of replenishment as comfortable as possible, but ultimately it all depends on the player: how often he takes damage, what terrain he is in, what weather, what food he eats, and so on. It is important to monitor your indicators, for example, if the hero is exhausted, he will receive periodic damage until he eats

You are unlikely to be able to create a spaceship, but you will definitely be able to make basic things for survival. We are for ease of learning and do not want to burden the player with thousands of crafted items. When creating the craft, we were guided primarily by realism and the degree of importance of the item and left only those that any person could make in real life if the apocalypse happened

As for comics, watches and other items, they are things for sale. But there are also things that instead of selling you can use inside, so to speak, for a fun pastime

The game will not only have regular cars, but also armored vehicles. Just imagine: we are walking along the lifeless streets of the city, and skyscrapers that were once teeming with people hang over us, we have assault rifles of the latest class... and suddenly we see a humming armored vehicle, the crew of which also notices us! To fight such an enemy, a completely different approach will be needed

This has already been in The Simpsons! Indeed, many people from all over the world note the similarities between The Day Before and The Division, as well as The Last of Us. It's great to hear that, because The Division's New York City is one of the most beautiful and atmospheric locations ever created in a video game, and the animations in The Last of Us are an undisputed benchmark for quality. So, of course, we're inspired by their strengths, but we're not trying to copy anyone. We are moving towards creating the best version of The Day Before that we could have

You can meet anyone and anywhere, there are no dark or white zones in the game, the whole world is completely open to you

We intend to raise the MMO survival genre to a whole new level! We are constantly improving the game, including graphics and animations, every week our team makes new breakthroughs to give players the highest quality game

We are racing at full speed to give players the opportunity to start playing The Day Before this year