The announcement of FAUG—Fearless and United Guards—took place on September 4, 2020. Akshay Kumar, a well-known Bollywood actor, revealed the game two days after India's favorite Battle Royale game, PUBG Mobile, was banned. Self-reliant India served as the game's marketing slogan. With almost seven lakh reviews and a current rating of 2.3 out of 5, FAUG has only one remaining unanswered question: What went wrong?
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FAUG Game: Early Response
The Indian gaming community's response to FAUG when it was revealed was conflicted. One thing that all of them had in common was that they were interested in the game. Some people were pleased that the game is under development and that 20% of the net profits would be donated to the Veer Trust of India. On the other hand, there were those who believed that PUBG Mobile had been banned from India because of this game. The announcement poster for this game, according to some game developers, was also not created by the studio; rather, a little editing was done with stock video, and the branding was done as the Indian Battle Royale game. Additionally, it is claimed that the game's production had not even begun at the time of its announcement. The fact that the developers believed PUBG had been banned and that it was a good opportunity to capitalize on the game's absence is one of the key causes of the hasty announcement.
FAUG Game: Development and Developer
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Ncore Games was the developer of FAUG. Dayanidhi MG started the Bangalore-based mobile gaming and interactive entertainment company Ncore Games in 2018. Vishal Gondal joined Ncore Games in 2020 as a strategic advisor and investor, however at the time of FAUG's announcement, Vishal was named as the organization's founder and chairman. By way of background, Vishal Gondal started Indiagames in 1999, earning him the title "father of Indian gaming." Indiagames was a developer and publisher of video games whose majority share was purchased by UTV in 2007 and whose remaining stakes were purchased by Disney for $100,000,000 in 2011. Indiagames had revenue of eleven million dollars at the time of acquisition and an annual profit that was somewhat over $400,000. After that, from 2012 to 2013, Vishal served as the MD of Walt Disney India. The expectations of gamers from the Ncore games grew significantly when Vishal returned to the video game development industry in 2020 for obvious reasons. For this game, people had very high expectations.
FAUG Game: A marketing gimmick
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Although they succeeded in getting attention, did they actually deliver? The most common misunderstanding regarding FAUG was that it was an Indian version of PUBG. Now, the announcement was made only two days after the ban, and FAUG sounds remarkably similar to the video game PUBG. Ncore Games had to tell the media a few days after the announcement that they are not the PUBG replacement, but it was a bit too late because the rumors had already started to circulate. The FAUG launch banner was yet another terrible marketing oversight. At the time of the announcement, there was only one poster going around. The posters were of three soldiers and all three had guns in their hands, but when the game was released, there was no sign of guns in it. Also, the game was portrayed as a battle royale game but only campaign mode was released in the game which had a single-player mode. Earlier the game didn't have any weapons, not like the guns were not available but any weapons weren't available in the game at the time of launch. The campaign mode was designed to have melee weapons and focussed mainly on fist fights as it was inspired by the Galwan Valley clash. In conclusion, the marketing of the game was a total disaster for which the game has already paid the price.
FAUG Game: The good things.!!
The only good thing about FAUG was its anthem, it was very good, the cinematic trailer released in Jan 2021 was literally a feast for the eyes. The music was very catchy and the lyrics were well-written and because of that, the hype of the game increased manifold. The trailer consisted of very peak elements in it which also had gun fights along with fist fights. The TDM trailer of the game was released in April 2021 and the game was not anywhere near the released trailers. In conclusion, FAUG is a very good example of fake marketing with average products.
FAUG Game: After release and reviews
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FAUG was released on 26th January 2021 and within 24 hours of launch, this game had five million downloads on the Play Store. FAUG game became the number one free game on the google play store and after that gamers started giving reviews against the game, TechRadar in his review rated 2 stars out of 5 and stated that the game is basic and need not require any attention. They also said that this game has no storyline and that the enemies in the game are just demos. India Today and Indian Express also rated the game at 2 out of 5. Not only the media but gamers all around the country started giving negative reviews of the game as the game was literally not anywhere near to PUBG.
FAUG Game: Impact on the Indian Developers
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At present the gaming community has become very cautious about Indian games. If a new Indian game is announced and that game is looking like it has high potential, is looking promising, and will be better than the basic game, yet people still think that this game will turn out like FAUG. Being adaptive to change is really important in any field. Gamers are very disheartened by the quality of that game and don't want to have the same feeling for any other Indian game. But the community must understand that Indian Gaming Developers are still trying to make a game that will somehow be appreciated by the users. Now think for yourself if you don't give a chance to other games because of one game then the Indian game development company will be shut down. One thing I can assure you is that in the next four to five years major games will be released from India which will be globally accepted. So, it's important to have patience and the Indian gaming community will likely be dominating shortly.
FAUG Game: The Future ??
The multiplayer version of FAUG is live in early access. The graphics of the game are better than the previous versions but again the game was last updated in September 2022 and since then Encore Games also haven't given any information related to FAUG. It is believed that the work on FAUG's multiplayer will continue but by a different studio and who knows down the line, they deliver a good game. At last, one thing you and I can definitely do is we can try the upcoming Indian game and support them by giving constructive feedback to the developers and hope to make the Indian gaming community a face in the world of gaming.
