> It benefits the user AND the developer

Notably it benefits good faith developers. I.e., the developers we actually want making games. The developers that lose under this model are the ones that make poor quality games.

Though I admit it does not solve every dark pattern.

Kinda, but it also incentivizes bad-faith gamers, which in turn disincentivises good-faith developers. There are a lot of games out there with a <2hr play time that are perfectly fine games priced very reasonably, and a 2hr no-questions-asked policy is unfortunately often abused to return the games after completing them. The effect this has is that developers are incentivized to add filler content or just not produce a game at all.

Perhaps such a system could work if it were based on a percentage of time-to-complete, but I have no idea how one would objectively determine that, especially before sale.

Yeah short vignette games were a concern when this was first announced. I don't know which solution Steam has for those (if any).

Maybe they could not offer refunds after a significant percentage of the game has been played, regardless of time spent playing. Would be hard to determine how much of the game has been played though. The only way I could think of is to check achievements, but not all games have achievements.

Or maybe expected length could be part of the store metadata. If the developer estimates 1.5hr playtime Steam could use that when processing refunds.

Either way I'd consider this a corner case. To be solved sure, but not problem enough to disallow refund functionality for other games.

There is very little evidence for this. A number of developers have complained about refunds, but when looking into any of their actual cases, you see no real evidence of refund abuse, normal 2-5% refund rates, etc. In most of the cases I've seen developers complain there's been no evidence of refunds, but the games have sold poorly to begin with, and the attention from complaining in public about how mean all the refunders are seems to be a marketing technique more than anything. Meanwhile, there are enormous numbers of success stories amongst short games. And there's not really any incentive to add filler content, because adding filler content takes real development time, driving up the budget.

Probably the most famous overtly fraudulent example seems to be "Summer of '58", a game developed by a Russian developer who claimed 30-50% of their players refunded. Here's an in-depth investigation of this claim that finds absolutely no evidence to support it: https://newsletter.gamediscover.co/p/steam-refund-worries-ki... -- it doesn't positively prove that there's no refund abuse, but it makes refund abuse incredibly unlikely. Basically, it's possible to tell if someone who reviews the game refunded the game or not. So for there to be systematic refund abuse, it needs to be people who play the game to completion, then refund the game, but don't leave a review: but this pattern is not seen in any other games where developers report far lower refund rates.

Gamediscover has also had a number of developers share refund data directly for this article and other articles, including developers of short games (some as short as 20 minutes long), and none have had anything in the ballpark of the studios who have made press cause celebre pushes claiming incredibly high refund rates.

One thing to consider about this entire claim: if someone intends to proxy-pirate the video game by buying it, playing it, refunding, and cackling off into the sunset... why wouldn't they just pirate the game, something that is absolutely trivial to do? It's not really coherent to say a huge swath of gamers are manipulative enough to refund, have no moral compunction about doing so, but are too technically stupid to pull it off.

Finally, think about this from Valve's side -- if a huge % of <2 hour games were being refunded, why wouldn't Valve adopt the apparently easy proposal of allowing short game developers to set a flag that alters their refund %age? Doesn't Valve's choice not to do this suggest that they don't really view it as a common thing?

> And there's not really any incentive to add filler content, because adding filler content takes real development time, driving up the budget.

There are plenty of ways to pad game length with minimal additional development. Grind is very much a thing for games that benefit from longer time to completion or where a certain length is expected.

> a 2hr no-questions-asked policy is unfortunately often abused to return the games after completing them.

Is that really a big problem? Do you have actual numbers to that, and not just a hunch? I would actually guess that most people who can actually afford a game would pay for it. In my experience, most people who cheat in this way would not have bought the game anyway, so it’s not a lost sale.

I don't have numbers or links to hand, but i've seen this issue brought up by a number of indie devs.

> so it’s not a lost sale

Refunds probably count negatively to your rep. with a store.

Developers are responsible for all card fees related to refunds, fraud, and scams. Some indie devs are seeing Steam cuts of 46% due to fraud purchases and refunds. The Steam store is also set up so that “the customer wins” so heavily that most devs are afraid of clawing back fraud keys (since they’re going to turn into negative reviews, or the key fraudsters get revenge by targeting their game more heavily).

> Some indie devs are seeing Steam cuts of 46% due to fraud purchases and refunds.

Which devs and are they selling enough copies for 46% to be a meaningful amount?

Which shows well (among other things), how if you release on Steam (or yet worse "platforms"), that you're not indie any more.

I don't have the numbers of course, but with the right design of the refund process, which Steam does have, I don't think enough people abuse the system to warrant that.

> a 2hr no-questions-asked policy is unfortunately often abused to return the games after completing them.

How often does it happen, though? I mean if you refund a game after finishing it, it's the same as saying 'I'd rather have pirated that game', not a good sign it's 'good-faith' game either

(even if it can still be abused by bad-faith players)

A worse issue is that this incentivizes DRM : because you can just run the game for any duration by not using Steam after installation, or just using Steam in offline mode, since (IIRC that way game time is not counted).

> On Steam if you don't like a game, or if it doesn't work for you, you can get a full refund no questions asked as long as it's within 14 days and with less than 2 hours playtime.

There's a hole here: that 14 days is from time of _purchase_ not _access_.

I preordered _Humankind_ a month or two before launch, because it was listed as supporting MacOS. At launch, it didn't. It didn't get Mac support until 3 weeks later, even though that functionality was barely alpha quality with huge graphics and playability bugs. (Even today, months later, Mac support is barely at beta quality. And if you're on M1 you've got to manually configure the app for being run on Rosetta.)

I waited 12 days after launch before giving up and requesting a refund. That refund was denied, because they had taken my money months before. Steam support was unmoved by my assertion that the developer was flat out lying about Mac playability, and that I literally had no way of playing the game as advertised.

Be careful with your preorders, y'all.

That doesn't sound right. I've pre-ordered a game via Steam and gotten it refunded after launch many months later. For pre-orders, the refund clock starts ticking at launch...unless the game includes early access.

It's been a few months, so I went back and checked my story. I definitely never did get the refund, but maybe I was misremembering things. There's one extra piece I had forgotten: the split "release" of the Mac version.

tl;dr: Steam didn't know anything about the devs releasing the Mac version late, so the "14 days from release" didn't line up with my expectation of "14 days from access".

Details for posterity:

The game was set to launch on Aug 17. On Aug 3, the team included a footnote at the bottom of a news announcement which said Mac would be delayed by "about a month":

https://steamcommunity.com/games/1124300/announcements/detai...

(There was also a pinned discussion topic about this at the time, which has since been de-pinned. It didn't have any more details than "see the announcement".)

A month later, on Sep 15, a beta for Mac was announced:

https://steamcommunity.com/games/1124300/announcements/detai...

Another month later, on Oct 21, Mac support was still in Beta, and M1 was still TBD:

https://steamcommunity.com/games/1124300/announcements/detai...

If you want to see the dumpster fire of poor communication and frustrated customers at the time:

https://steamcommunity.com/app/1124300/discussions/search/?q...

I asked for a refund on Sept 11, some 4 days before the beta announcement, and was denied the same day. I followed up via email for details, but was basically told the same "nope, it's been out too long" story in longer form. (At the time, there had been _zero_ word from the devs about Mac support, despite the initial "about a month" estimate, so I lost hope it would happen in anything like a timely manner.)

It looks like people were able to get refunds later that month specifically due to the lack of M1 support:

https://steamcommunity.com/app/1124300/discussions/0/2963922...

I guess I happened to fall right into that dead zone between everyone wanting to believe the devs were running just a little behind, and people at Steam realizing there was a legitimate problem. I was cranky about it at the time, but months later I get that there was probably not going to be any other outcome. I certainly don't ascribe any malice, nefarious plotting, or ill intent on the part of Steam or the devs ... but nor would I say that I think either responded in the interests of the customers.

If I could get Steam to improve from this I'd love for them to track platform-specific release dates, and be more strict about developers claiming support for platforms which don't actually run the game ... but I'm not going to hold my breath.

As for myself ... as much as I believe in the idea that preorders can be used to help fund games, and help keep devs employed by not reinforcing the cycle of crunch-then-layoff, I admit this experience (and other preorders-go-sideways experiences like Homeworld 3, FF7R) has kindof soured me on it. It's fine as an abstract concept, but it's at odds with the reality of date-driven releases (as opposed to quality-driven). These days I'm more likely to just add something to my wishlist and check back some time after release day to see if there are any dumpster fires.

>Refunds on Pre-Purchased Titles

>When you pre-purchase a title on Steam (and have paid for the title in advance), you can request a refund at any time prior to release of that title. The standard 14-day/two-hour refund period also applies, starting on the game’s release date.[1]

I'm not going to debate you on the importance of being careful with preorders, especially outside of Steam, but this is the case as it stands right now.

I do however remember reading something like your scenario a long while ago, perhaps even so far back as to the beginning of Steam Refunds.

[1] https://store.steampowered.com/steam_refunds/

> Consumers need to demand better refund systems from the big console makers.

Nope. Don't let them self-regulate. They had their chance, free market blah blah blah.

We need to demand legislators update consumer protection laws for all this "you don't own, you rent" crap, because it's become way more pervasive than just video games and movies.

Heated seats in BMWs are now a "service"; I wish I were joking. And Tesla full self driving and supercharging, even though they are purchased features, do not pass to a new owner if the car is sold.

That refund system for Steam only exists because the ACCC forced them to comply with Australian consumer law.

And Valve still punish Australia for that by refusing to sell hardware here directly. No Index or Steam Deck for us.

The only problem is that—ironically for a thread about the problems of DRM—this forces stores to implement some type of DRM scheme. GOG can't reasonably offer as generous a refund policy as Steam, because once you've downloaded a game, there's no way to give it back.

Ironically GOG has an even more generous refund policy.

>You may request a refund for a product up to 30 days after purchase, even if it was downloaded, launched, and played.

Yes, but reportedly if you do this more than a few times they'll get upset with you.

I would expect that there is a problem on your end if you have to refund everything you buy. I can't remember the last time I bought something refund worthy, thought I was tempted the last time I bought a game on steam that required uplay.

I suppose it depends on what the purpose of the refunds are. For example, many online clothing retailers will encourage you to buy more clothing than you need so you can try it on at home, and return whatever you don't like.

A lot of people definitely treat Steam's refund system this way, and Steam's automated refund process seems built to encourage it. You could also make a strong case that this is better for everyone, since consumers are more likely to take a chance on a game they're not sure about. On the other hand, it's a problem for games that are designed to be less than two hours—and it does basically require a DRM implementation.

When Rocket League, a game I never played, ditched support for macOS I asked for a refund. I described how I disliked that they removed support for macOS. I wouldn't play Rocket League on my MBP, mind you, but I do have Steam installed on it. I got a refund, no questions asked (though I did buy it on sale, judging by the amount I got refunded). Steam doesn't need DRM to figure out how long a game is being played, btw. Steam tracks that without DRM, too.

> Steam tracks that without DRM, too.

Yes and no. They can track play time when you launch a game through the Steam client, and they can use DRM to enforce launching games through the Steam client. If you launch one of the few DRM-Free Steam games without using Steam, your play time won’t increase.

GOG also tracks play time if you launch a game via GOG Galaxy. The difference is, every single-player game in their catalog can also be played without GOG Galaxy (and indeed, this is explicitly why I buy games from GOG—I don’t like clients, I just want an executable).

> the difference is, every single-player game in their catalog can also be played without GOG Galaxy

From my (admittedly limited) experience with GOG games and Galaxy, only games downloaded via the GOG website (with 'offline backup game installers') can be launched without Galaxy; games installed with Galaxy will force Galaxy to be running alongside it

I recently installed Galaxy and used it to install 4 games from my library, testing now they all load up without Galaxy running.

You're right (and the parent too); I was using the game shortcuts in my start menu, but I checked and those shortcuts point toward the Galaxy launcher (with additional information on which game to launch), so I was launching Galaxy at the same time as the game. When I used directly, the game executables don't start Galaxy.

I believe Rocket League was a special case, in that they offered refunds for everybody who bought it to play on Linux/Mac, no matter how many hours of it they have played.

"Steam tracks that without DRM"

Steam is DRM

Some games sold via Steam don't integrate with the Steam APIs, so once it's installed, if launched directly with the executable, it won't force Steam to be running alongside it. So in _some_ cases, Steam isn't the DRM.

I would hope so. It's easy to finish a game in 30 days, so the system is ripe for abuse.

Assuming that the games have progression achievements, GOG can easily see (a) how much time you spent in game, and (b) how far you got. If you choose to abuse the system, you're going to lose the privilege.

if you play using one of their offline game installer and not via their Galaxy launched, GOG won't see the achievements and so can't track the game time. But I'd think GOG would be tracking abuse of their system (though if one really want to get GOG games for free, since they don't have any DRMs a lot of them are available for free on the web).

Used to be the case for Steam with their official "no refunds" policy, but unofficial "you get one refund" policy..?

But is it just a rumour ? How many times is too many ?

I think that's reasonable. If you abuse the refund system you should get banned.

But I don't think that it will happen a lot because piracy is already incredibly easy with GOG. If you want a free game why bother with buying it at all?

It's legally mandated in the EU.

https://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/consumers/shopping/gua...

Except not for software or digital content once you've started downloading it. From the FAQ on the site you linked:

"If you purchase digital content - such as music or a video online - you cannot withdraw once downloading or streaming has started, if you previously agreed that you would lose your right of withdrawal by starting the performance."

That's how Nintendo of EU gets away with not refunding. You started downloading it so no returns.

You can't return it "no questions asked", but if the product doesn't work you can request them to make it work or refund if they're unable to.

If they don't want there is small claims court which is cheap and simple. I have used it in cases where some manufacturers would void warranty due to "water damage" after the product stopped working. In the end they paid: cost of purchase, cost to file, cost of my legal consultation, cost of expertise showing that there was no sign of water damage. Country - Poland.

Annoyingly, they were also unwilling to refund me when I wasn’t able to even start to download a game I’d bought for over a week, due to a faulty console update patch. After over a week of back and forth emails (pointing out that I hadn’t yet lost my right of refund), they fixed the issue.

>That's how Nintendo of EU gets away with not refunding. You started downloading it so no returns.

Sony too.

https://www.playstation.com/en-ie/support/store/ps-store-ref...

Ah thanks, I forgot that it was the bare legal minimum... (Which they only first did after being threatened being kicked off the Australian market, I guess that the extension to 14 days happened later for the same reason for the EU market ?)

Do you think that Steam is even failing that, with the extra requirement of maximum 2 hours of online play ?

(Compare with GoG, where there are no online play requirements, since you can just play and even install all games offline.)

Honestly all of the refunds I’ve done on Xbox have been completely painless.

That's great to hear. From their website[0] it seems they have a very similar policy to Steam, except their playtime criteria is a bit more vague. But still good to see.

Sony on the other hand void any refund once you _begin downloading the game_[1], which is ridiculous.

[0] https://support.xbox.com/en-GB/help/subscriptions-billing/bu...

[1] https://www.playstation.com/en-ie/support/store/ps-store-ref...

On the other end of the spectrum is Sony. Of the several times I've called in seeking a refund due to a game's (lack of) performance, only twice have I reached a live person within the 60-minutes I allotted to wait in the phone queue. Their chat support is also terrible, responding with generic "We don't offer refunds"-type messages regardless of the issue.

While that is only one datapoint, this only reinforces my absolute motivation to not give Sony another €, ever, again...

They've done themselves in, imho starting with their CD rootkit fiasco and, since then, they've time and again proven that Sony is a company that is not sincere, to say the least.

Sony TV? nope.. Sony camera? not for me... Sony whatever? yeah, no...

I heard it was pretty easy to get refunded for Diablo 2 Resurrected by Microsoft on Xbox at least.