What Happened To DNF Duel? - The Anime Fighter That Got Abandoned

Hey everyone! As many of you pointed out, one thing we neglected to talk about in this video was Nexon’s involvement as DnF Duel’s publisher, which is one of the reasons the devs took so long to put out any post-release content. With better preparation, it’s possible that 8ing would have been ready to announce content on release, rather than leaving fans with radio silence. We have adjusted the title and thumbnail to reflect this better. As for including UNI as an ArcSys title… that was a dumb mistake on our writer’s part. He says he’s very sorry. (We've cut this bit out) 🙏

Arc System Works did not make Under Night In Birth. The team French Bread did, Arc Sys was just the publisher.

Despite the game's failure, I still find it kind of endearing that they are still releasing DLC despite the extremely low playerbase rather than just stopping outright. Kind of matches with how older Guilty Gear games used to not really be successful sales wise but ArcSys still chose to make games out of passion. I don't really have much hope for the game but I still think it's kinda cool.

Fan of the channel's work, but this doesn't feel as well put together as other videos. A lot of the blame for issues in this video is put on 8ing, but I don't think that's fair. They were a contracted developer, and can only work on the game if the contract accounts for it. The silence and length of time between updates was absolutely the biggest factor for this game's drop in player base, but 8ing aren't responsible for that. ArcSys, as the publisher, and to a larger extent, Neople, should be held responsible. It's been stated that the Neople didn't pay ArcSys much for this project, and ArcSys was only able to work with what they were given. Same issue happened with Dragonball, but that game's IP was able to carry it.

Pinning blame on the devs rather than the IP holders who has more say & push on the matter. Screwing up that Under Night is made by French Bread NOT Arc Sys. Bare minimum research & no interviews. Barely 8 minutes. This was just a quickie filler video.

I think it's unfair to put the blame on 8ing, or even ArcSys. 8ing probably tried to make the best fighting game they could with their budget and ArcSys probably knew that they needed more support. NeoPle and Nexon (the actual publisher btw) did not think they needed to support this game long term for success, when people these days have the shortest attention spans for games now. So they waited to start a fund for DLC, but it was already too late. It wasn't anything 8ing or ArcSys could do. Also it's unfair to say that "the game not being balanced" is why it died because A. Most people don't care about balance unless they lose a lot, and B. 8ing made MvC3, one of the most broken Capcom fighters along side Jojo Heritage for the Future. I think balance should be a non-point here

Yeah dawg this had holes galore. Neople not only gave Arcsys little funding, but they also immediately had rights issues. It was hysterically long before they had a dlc character, not for lack of developer love or attention or whatever, but because their hands were tied by a brand who abandoned them when numbers faltered. They could'nt come out and point fingers, that's bad business and for a team that is making plenty of IP games, you're not gonna loudly tell everyone the dnf brand is being difficult

It's actually amazing how many fighting games ASW are attributed in making that they straight up didn't. "DNF Duel", "Under Night", "Chaos Code", "Arcana Heart", etc. At most, they maybe helped publish an entry or two (usually poorly with bad ports) but, otherwise, had nothing to do with. But i guess i shouldn't be surprised. Most of the smaller fighting game devs might as well not exist to the FGC so these kinds of mistakes are abundant. Certainly doesn't help with credibility, that's for sure.

ArcSys did not make DNF Duel, they only published and produced it. 8ing made it.

Wasnt 8ing the main dev behind the game and arcsys was just a codev

Aksys did not make uni, it was French bread DNF Duel was made by the developers of DFO and co developed by 8ing

I'm a long time player of Dungeon fighter online and put hundreds of hours into DNF duel. While nothing here is technically incorrect, I don't think it throws enough shade on Neople, which is a very slow to react Korean company that is very out of touch with what modern fighting game players want. Since they were the ones funding the project, a lot of this can be blamed on their slow reaction time. I would also like to say that the game became much much better with DLC and the added systems in the update. Even if you can still get two tapped and lose a round.

ArcSys only really did the visuals for DNF, 8ing did the gameplay. So it's not really fair to call it specifically "ArcSys' Failed Fighting Game". Also with these licensed games, the developer is usually powerless with what stuff they want to implement. They can try to echo the feedback of the players, but in the end, the publisher decides if or when the game gets updates. So, in my opinon, Nexon (DNF's publisher) just didn't care enough about the game initially, and didn't have a season 1 planned pre-planned at all (this is speculation), and that's why it took so long for actual new characters to arrive. Also ArcSys didn't develop Under Night, French Bread did. ArcSys is the publisher there.

Enough time has passed, DNF Duel just surpassed Kagura Bachi in sales, can we now all admit that DNF Duel is 1000% peak fiction?

"Whos your favorite character in DNF duel?" "Grappler." "Which one?" "Grappler."

Developers can’t promise anything without the publishers paying them and greenlighting the job.

This video was really light when it came to actually delving into the reasons behind the game's failure. There was basically just a single reason talked about at length and everything else was ignored. It also continued to use Maximilian Dood's channel as the sole representative of the fighting game community it was in fact a big deal that the game received heavy advertisement from several big names until they all suddenly stopped talking about the game when the promotional period ended.

I remember having so much fun with the game when it came out and kept playing for a good 3 weeks. After that I fell off of it and haven’t picked it up since. I did saw the recent new character and honestly it’s making me go back to the game when she comes out. NGL I forgot how to play the game so I’m going to have to refresh my memory of it. I know part of the reason why I dropped it was because my life gotten more busy and I do play other games, but this happens with almost every game out there especially fighting games.

I really thought they were gonna cook. They baked. Underbaked.

It’s not 8ing’s fault it’s the publisher lmao