How do you lose your main fanbase? Through greed or poor decision making and treating your primary fanbase as horribly as possible that is how. First, Fantasy Life 3DS was a beloved and popular game for 3DS and people wanted a follow-up which sort of happened when a mobile game, Fantasy Life Online, was released. That eventually shut down and eventually a sequel was announced, Fantasy Life i: The Girl Who Steals Time. The concerns come after multiple delays citing cross platform issues, something that I don’t think anyone cared about. The original game was only available on 3DS and was good enough to carry on a fanbase on its own never really needing additional platforms. So even after the delays people waited if a game needs more time so be it, but what shocked most players was that Nintendo players were paying for the ports to other platforms. The game went up in price for all platforms, now you would think someone at Level 5 would say this is a bad idea our core fanbase for this game are Nintendo players and the ability to go cross platform will eventually pay for itself. Added to this you would think they have the money Professor Layton, another Level 5 property has most of his games previously on Nintendo DS available on mobile where they have a price and have been doing well. Next was an even worse decision for the west at least and quite possibly places like the U.K and other areas, but no one is able to prove a physical version of this game exists. This is detrimental to the game as well most players like physical copies of games rather than relying on internet for their games. Further, every system besides switch has an early access scheduled prior to the games release. I highly recommend a video by Miss Bubbles who covers most of this and explains further.

Miss Bubbles. “Controversy behind Fantasy Life i: Fans Are FURIOUS about this…..” YouTube video, Feb 16, 2025. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-bBbM8JzJeo