Steam Adds Refund Option for Pre-Orders

[MarlaDesat]

Steam Adds Refund Option for Pre-Orders

Valve has added the ability to refund pre-orders for unreleased titles.

The next time the siren song of a pre-order bonus on Steam turns sour, you can get a refund for your pre-purchase and put that cash towards a different game. A recently added option now allows Steam users to cancel pre-orders of unreleased titles and receive a refund. Only purchased items that have not been released, gifted, or traded away can be refunded. The value of the refund is applied to your Steam wallet balance. The new feature was noticed by Steam user donham [http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=3219981] on January 23.

To refund a game, go to your does not offer any refunds [https://store.steampowered.com/login/?redir=account%2F] or exchanges on games, DLC, or in-game items.

Other online gaming retailers have also been adding refund options. In December, DRM-free games retailer GOG announced its new guaranteed refund policy [http://www.escapistmagazine.com/news/view/130338-GOG-Launches-New-Guaranteed-Refund-Policy]. Under the new policy, customers can return any game that doesn't work properly on their system for a full refund within 30 days of purchase. GOG also instituted a 14-day refund policy for any purchase. To take advantage of either policy, customers must contact GOG customer support.

However you feel about pre-orders, this new refund option seems like nothing but good news for gamers.

Source: Valvetime [http://www.valvetime.net/threads/steam-self-use-refunds-now-available-for-pre-orders.244258/]

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[hickwarrior]

This does sound good, but valve still has a long way to go before actually having a true refund. This is nothing.

Refund for a game your purchased that you can't play yet? AND it only goes to your steam wallet? Meh. Not even close to a good refund policy.

 

[JediMB]

A good start.

I'm sure it'll be useful to be able to instantly cancel a pre-order when the first reviews hit and the delayed European release for once gets to be useful.

 

[Sidmen]

This does sound good, but valve still has a long way to go before actually having a true refund. This is nothing.

Refund for a game your purchased that you can't play yet? AND it only goes to your steam wallet? Meh. Not even close to a good refund policy.

Could you imagine the games industry's reaction if we could actually get a decent refund policy? They might have to work to make sure a game lasts longer than 5 hours then - heck, a lot of games I play could've been returned within a day of release with how painfully short and boring they are.

 

[josemlopes]

Why would any one pre-order anything on Steam? Is it just because of the pre-load option? Even then how long does it take to download a game and how impatient can someone be?

 

[Barbas]

Better and better. This will help abate some anger.

 

[Yopaz]

Why would any one pre-order anything on Steam? Is it just because of the pre-load option? Even then how long does it take to download a game and how impatient can someone be?

There's pre-order deals such as price reductions, extra content and paying for a game when you know you have the money to afford it. If I pre-order a game in August I usually have twice the cash I got in any other month (barring January). If I get some extra weapons then that's fun and a 10% discount won't go amiss. Then there are those times you can actually get content worth as much as the game itself. Pre-order Bioshock Infinite and you got X-com Enemy Unknown (which here at least cost the same as Bioshock). So why not pre-order? Reviews or people on the internet can't really say if you're going to like a game or not.

 

[hickwarrior]

This does sound good, but valve still has a long way to go before actually having a true refund. This is nothing.

Refund for a game your purchased that you can't play yet? AND it only goes to your steam wallet? Meh. Not even close to a good refund policy.

Could you imagine the games industry's reaction if we could actually get a decent refund policy? They might have to work to make sure a game lasts longer than 5 hours then - heck, a lot of games I play could've been returned within a day of release with how painfully short and boring they are.

Yet, steam is the provider. I'm wondering what's holding them back when it comes to refunds... It could be AAA doing it, since they can revoke their agreement maybe, but steam has such weight in the market that they don't have that excuse.

I can't see valve having excuses at all to NOT allow refund policies on steam. And good ones, not ones that just benefit them.

 

[Boris Goodenough]

Why would any one pre-order anything on Steam? Is it just because of the pre-load option? Even then how long does it take to download a game and how impatient can someone be?

I got XCOM: Enemy Unknown when I preordered Bioshock: Infinite, I still think that was a good deal.

 

[BrotherRool]

This does sound good, but valve still has a long way to go before actually having a true refund. This is nothing.

Refund for a game your purchased that you can't play yet? AND it only goes to your steam wallet? Meh. Not even close to a good refund policy.

Could you imagine the games industry's reaction if we could actually get a decent refund policy? They might have to work to make sure a game lasts longer than 5 hours then - heck, a lot of games I play could've been returned within a day of release with how painfully short and boring they are.

Yet, steam is the provider. I'm wondering what's holding them back when it comes to refunds... It could be AAA doing it, since they can revoke their agreement maybe, but steam has such weight in the market that they don't have that excuse.

I can't see valve having excuses at all to NOT allow refund policies on steam. And good ones, not ones that just benefit them.

Origin has refunds right? So at least one of the big AAA companies isn't blocking it.

I think it's much more likely to be Valve dragging their feet. Refunding digital items is tricky*, because any sort of decent time period opens people up to 'renting' all their games. A lot of the reason the system works at retail is there's a lot of hassle involved in getting a refund, you've got to actually pack a physical thing up and travel some place... You'd need to invent some system that doesn't make it easy for people to ask for a refund w/e, but then that probably costs manpower.

But I agree with TotalBiscuit that Valve basically doesn't have an excuse now. If they didn't want to give out refunds. then they shouldn't have created a system where they can profit from incomplete games, given the jankyness and the fact it's impossible to get up to date information on early-access games, giving a refund for those is the absolute minimum.

Could you imagine the games industry's reaction if we could actually get a decent refund policy? They might have to work to make sure a game lasts longer than 5 hours then - heck, a lot of games I play could've been returned within a day of release with how painfully short and boring they are.

Urghh no that would suck. I don't have so much time that I want to throw it down the drain or dedicate my whole life to playing videogames. If companies were incentivised to pad out all their freaking games, regardless of whether it's better as a 5 hour game or a 30 hour one, everything would either become incredibly cruddy, or we'd lose all the game genres except for one type that certain people like. There'd be no Journey or Gone Home or Stanley Parable, or even Uncharted. It's fine if you're only into multiplayer games, or if you actually like having to spend a month playing before getting to the end of your RPG but otherwise you'd be screwed.

When we find a way to do proper digital refunds it's got to be designed to cut down on the abuse so people can make games whatever length is appropriate

 

[Zipa]

Well this is a step in the right direction Valve, now you just need to have a similar policy but for games a couple of weeks after purchase like Origin does.

 

[shintakie10]

This does sound good, but valve still has a long way to go before actually having a true refund. This is nothing.

Refund for a game your purchased that you can't play yet? AND it only goes to your steam wallet? Meh. Not even close to a good refund policy.

Could you imagine the games industry's reaction if we could actually get a decent refund policy? They might have to work to make sure a game lasts longer than 5 hours then - heck, a lot of games I play could've been returned within a day of release with how painfully short and boring they are.

Yet, steam is the provider. I'm wondering what's holding them back when it comes to refunds... It could be AAA doing it, since they can revoke their agreement maybe, but steam has such weight in the market that they don't have that excuse.

I can't see valve having excuses at all to NOT allow refund policies on steam. And good ones, not ones that just benefit them.

Besides the part where you could download a game, copy the games files to a USB. Get a refund, find a crack for the game, put the files back from your USB. And TADA. Instant Free Game.

When GOG announced they'd be allowing refunds they mentioned this in fact.

And so what? The fact that people can take advantage of a refund policy doesn't mean you scrap refunds completely. That kind of thinking is why we have garbage like highly restrictive DRM in the first place.

I've brought this up so many times before, but I'll say it again. There is no good reason for why Valve doesn't have a return policy. Every one of their competitors has one. Amazon has a return policy that basically amounts to "You want a refund? Sure! And here's 5 dollars credit towards something you might enjoy more." Yet the benevolent overlord that is Valve can't bother to offer refunds for broken games unless there's enough public outcry to force them to hand out refunds?

Its complete garbage.

Also

So...


This isn't a refund. It's called cancelling a pre-order. You can dress a pig up like a rather convincing cow, but it's still a pig despite the paint and mechanical udder.


A refund, is what gog.com does for it's games. If it has issues and its been less than 30 days, you get your money back. Nitpicky, I know, but still.

You make a very good point, which brings up a very interesting question. Does this mean that before now if you preordered a game on Steam you could not cancel the preorder? If so that's pretty f'ed.

 

[viranimus]

Cant help but wonder if this was drummed up in response to GoGs recent 30 day Money back guarantee. If so, completely missed the mark. If not, well uhhh, good? Should have always been in place.

 

[FogHornG36]

why are people so worked about refunds?, don't go throwing all your money at a game when it comes out and you won't get burned, and need a refund, why should steam be at fault for your irresponsibility? Please, Someone tell me the scenario that would require you to need a refund so i can understand.

 

[Pebkio]

why are people so worked about refunds?, don't go throwing all your money at a game when it comes out and you won't get burned, and need a refund, why should steam be at fault for your irresponsibility? Please, Someone tell me the scenario that would require you to need a refund so i can understand.

Yeah, I would've liked a refund for Bioshock Infinite. It's the first and only game I've ever preordered. I like One and Two (especially Two) so much that a game like that but IN A FLOATING CITY (OMG, SQUEE!) seemed like it would be the best idea ever. And then the demo gameplay was entirely too awesome!

...

But then the gameplay wasn't much like what we saw in the demo, the story was based around "Multiuniverse = Magic", the complexity involving ammo and plasmids/vigor had been all but removed, and there was no opportunity to gain control of a battlefield except in the most temporary of senses. BI was nothing like what the previous games or even the demo had us think.

So, to fit in with your question, when you get a product that isn't at all what it was advertised to be... you should be able to get a full refund.

 

[Sidmen]

Could you imagine the games industry's reaction if we could actually get a decent refund policy? They might have to work to make sure a game lasts longer than 5 hours then - heck, a lot of games I play could've been returned within a day of release with how painfully short and boring they are.

Urghh no that would suck. I don't have so much time that I want to throw it down the drain or dedicate my whole life to playing videogames. If companies were incentivised to pad out all their freaking games, regardless of whether it's better as a 5 hour game or a 30 hour one, everything would either become incredibly cruddy, or we'd lose all the game genres except for one type that certain people like. There'd be no Journey or Gone Home or Stanley Parable, or even Uncharted. It's fine if you're only into games, or if you actually like having to spend a month playing before getting to the end of your RPG but otherwise you'd be screwed.

It's all about value for money, my friend. If you pay five or ten bucks for a game, 2-5 hours of entertainment is a good return. If I pay 60 bucks for a game and get five hours out of it - I feel ripped off. It's completely driven me out of the shooter market. Of course, I'm a special case, I understand that most shooters are now meant to be played online, something I don't do.

 

[Geo Da Sponge]

As others have said, that's not a refund, that's just cancelling a refund. Plus I've always felt weird about Steam giving you credit for their service, since it costs them virtually nothing.

why are people so worked about refunds?, don't go throwing all your money at a game when it comes out and you won't get burned, and need a refund, why should steam be at fault for your irresponsibility? Please, Someone tell me the scenario that would require you to need a refund so i can understand.

Well how about if you buy a game and then it doesn't run on your computer?

I mean, I know you're going to say that you should check in advance whether it will run on your computer, but sometimes stuff just doesn't. For instance, I once downloaded the free trial of Civ 5 that they had running over a weekend. It loaded up fine and everything, played alright, and so I decided to buy it. I then saw that there was a version that had a whole bunch of little bts of DLC bundled with it, and since it was on sale it basically made no difference to the price, so I went for that one.

Then it wouldn't run. Something in one of those bits of DLC stopped the game from working, and I still don't know how. I asked around on the Civ forums, didn't get anywhere, so I was basically stuck with a game that didn't work. Shouldn't I be allowed a refund then? A product is failing to work in a way that I had every reason to believe that it would and should?

 

[Twattycake_Fancypant]

Besides the part where you could download a game, copy the games files to a USB. Get a refund, find a crack for the game, put the files back from your USB. And TADA. Instant Free Game.

Or you could just torrent the game and not bother with the hassle. If you're gonna be a dick, you might as well do it efficiently.


That is to say, people who want to screw over game devs, or at least don't care about screwing them over, have easier ways to do that than buy a game, email someone, crack the game and then hope to get their money back in a less convenient form than they had before.

 

[FancyNick]

why are people so worked about refunds?, don't go throwing all your money at a game when it comes out and you won't get burned, and need a refund, why should steam be at fault for your irresponsibility? Please, Someone tell me the scenario that would require you to need a refund so i can understand.

Yeah, I would've liked a refund for Bioshock Infinite. It's the first and only game I've ever preordered. I like One and Two (especially Two) so much that a game like that but IN A FLOATING CITY (OMG, SQUEE!) seemed like it would be the best idea ever. And then the demo gameplay was entirely too awesome!

...

But then the gameplay wasn't much like what we saw in the demo, the story was based around "Multiuniverse = Magic", the complexity involving ammo and plasmids/vigor had been all but removed, and there was no opportunity to gain control of a battlefield except in the most temporary of senses. BI was nothing like what the previous games or even the demo had us think.

So, to fit in with your question, when you get a product that isn't at all what it was advertised to be... you should be able to get a full refund.

Well, that's not really fair. If you buy a dvd for a movie you wanted to see and the movie isn't as good as you thought would you be able to get a full refund because you didn't like it? No, no one does that. I can see a refund being needed if it's a tech issue but that's a different story. There is such a thing as consumer responsibility, you can't just take back a ham because it didn't taste as good as you thought it would.