Life of Black Tiger [PS4] and other shit games that show a lack of QA on PSN

If it happens it will have to be across all consoles. There must be some dramatic meetings with major publishers right now. Because I don't see MS or Sony paying for everyone cancelling the next mass effect or something.

It's a major change of policies which will cause the worst publishers to lose a lot of money when they launch a buggy game. Which is awesome. :devilish:
 
It's good practice that MS offer refunds. I don't know their policy, but something like: full refund available if requested within the first 30 minutes of booting it up for the first time.

That said, in the day and age of YouTube proliferation, I have limited sympathy for people who make uninformed game purchases. The console has YouTube; if you're buying via your PC or smartphone, they both have YouTube too. 5 minutes of footage, maybe with a spoken review, should be enough to tell you whether or not it's for you. At least to the extent that it warrants purchase - I've bought quite a few games that I've disliked after a few hours with them.

Especially that fucking spike pillar of supreme twattery in the first God of War.

Not everyone watches YouTube regularly. On top of that some YouTube streamers are paid by developers (in various ways) to give good reviews/impressions of games regardless of how good/bad a game is. On top of that the more obscure a game is, the more likely it is to be covered by an unknown or relatively unknown YouTuber.

Which means it's very easy to go to YouTube to look up footage of a game and run into a situation where the channel owner is incentivized to give a good impression of a game regardless of the actual quality of the game. And because a person may not be familiar with who the established YouTuber's are, may just use that to cement their decision to buy a game they are unsure about.

Regular YouTube viewers will be aware of this, but people that don't regularly watch YouTube game channels are unlikely to be aware of it and if they are aware of it, may not know which channels are trustworthy. I've watched one YouTuber (Wanderbots) grow from about 10-20 views per video to now 100's of views per video. In the past he'd regularly comment on how difficult it is to get review copy and how much easier it is to get if you have a reputation among indie devs of giving good impressions in exchange for early access to their games.

As well, because the more established YouTuber's get thousands of game codes every month, smaller titles are rarely covered by more established YouTuber's. And that's not a typo, there are multiple video's of TotalBiscuit where he mentions this, and that it is impossible to determine which are the good ones and which are the bad ones before playing them. And that there is no time to play more than single digit percentages of them each month enough (2-4 hours) to get a good idea of how good the title actually is.

That means that most indie titles end up getting covered by smaller YouTubers that are more desperate to get review copy and thus more incentivized to give good impressions in hopes that it'll increase their chances of getting review copy in the future.

BTW - That YouTuber, Wanderbots? Now that his channel has grown a bit, he covers far FAR less obscure indie titles than he used to because it's become easier for him to get access to better indie titles. As well, he doesn't have to shotgun (IE - take a chance on as many titles as possible) random titles in order to try to get his channel off the ground.

IE - YouTube isn't the greatest place to go to try to find honest impressions of obscure indie titles.

Regards,
SB
 
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This is really good. Sony used too offer refunds and I did get GTA V (digital on PS3) refunded because having pre-ordered it way in advance on PSN, had forgotten, then bought it on disc, and despite the fact my PS3 had downloaded the digital version, Sony made it easy to refund to my PS Wallet. Technically not a refund as that money is still in Sony's ecosystem.

I was disappointed that Sony had ceased refunds in the UK until somebody pointed out a recent(ish) change in consumer rights legislation for digital purchases. It's not cool that Sony has picked the low bar position, i.e. the law required this, this is all we're doing, fuck you PlayStation owners.

This doesn't change my caveat emptor position and I've never had a technical issue with a PlayStation game that warranted a refund - unlike Steam. Steam's system is great.

Caveat Emptor is great if there was a reliable way for a consumer to find out about a title ahead of time. But the reality is that it isn't that simple. The more obscure a title the more likely it is that you'll run into less than honest reviews of a product. Indie direct to video movies face the same problem (IMDB user reviews).

Having a way to rescind your purchases is, IMO, absolutely required in an environment where you allow any and all indie titles access to a consumer storefront.

People rightly campaigned for just that thing with Steam for many years along with Steam loosening their requirements for getting a title onto Steam. Steam couldn't do one without the other. So refunds got implemented first, then after that was established for a few months, Steam greatly relaxed their requirements for indie titles getting onto Steam.

Sony has gone the other direction. They appear to allow any and all indie content on the platform, with almost zero consumer protection.

Sure, an argument can be made that Steam should have enabled refunds much earlier, but at least they didn't release the floodgates on indie titles until there was a mechanism in place to protect the consumer.

Regards,
SB
 
That's when people were expecting it, but it seems it was never rolled out based on the official policy MrFox linked to.

I think you missed my follow up post. It's been over 9 months. What's the point of only rolling it out to the wide open public if they sign up for the Xbox Insiders program? Anyone can sign up for that program. It's not exclusive at all.

Edit: seems like it might still be in Insider only?

 
Caveat Emptor is great if there was a reliable way for a consumer to find out about a title ahead of time. But the reality is that it isn't that simple. The more obscure a title the more likely it is that you'll run into less than honest reviews of a product. Indie direct to video movies face the same problem (IMDB user reviews).

Consumers don't have some innate right to try before they buy. Where it is offered (trials, demos etc) that is entirely at the cost of another party and very much a act of faith and good will. The act of buying something you've got zero experience of, and no accounts from others you trust (like reviews) is plain stupid. There's no other word for it. :nope:

I'm all for consumer protection, but not idiot protection. No State should be legislating for idiocy - let Darwin manage the thin end of the gene pool :yep2:
 
The act of buying something you've got zero experience of, and no accounts from others you trust (like reviews) is plain stupid.
It's not stupid - it's unavoidable reality. Look at the number of products on Amazon without reviews. We can't have all experienced them. And the reviews don't tell you if it's good or bad for your purposes either, often enough. A full detailed analysis of a product before you get it isn't possible 9 times out of 10. You can for big ticket items like HDTVs (how many review the OS? How many tell you if you'll personally like the navigation of a Samsung instead of an LG?) but not the large majority, and you've no idea if the reviewers share the same tastes and values as you. What's intuitive to use for one person isn't for another.

In The Olden Days, you would go to a shop, examine the goods, and make a decision. Sellers were also able to hoodwink consumers and cheat them out of money thanks to caveat emptor. Consumers should be allowed to inspect their goods before committing to a purchase. That's the basis of the Distance Selling laws and refunds for games.
 
It's not stupid - it's unavoidable reality. Look at the number of products on Amazon without reviews.

For every product without reviews there are dozens of alternatives with reviews. Don't want to buy something without trying it first then don't buy online. The world doesn't owe consumers a fully inclusive, risk-free experience. if you want that then you put in the effort yourself.

It's a choice, not a right. This entitlement bullshit pisses me off. Take fucking responsibility for your decisions and stop whinging that the world isn't fair.
 
For every product without reviews there are dozens of alternatives with reviews. Don't want to buy something without trying it first then don't buy online.
That's simply not true. Some stuff can't be bought without going online (you ever tried buying men's shoes in size 6? Let alone red patent leather ones?!). Some stuff doesn't have meaningful reviews. Actually lots doesn't. Buying something rated 5* on Amazon doesn't mean it's not got a glowing fault.

This entitlement bullshit pisses me off. Take fucking responsibility for your decisions and stop whinging that the world isn't fair.
How on earth can you make an informed decision if you can't actually check your product?? It's not entitlement bullshit but the principle of consumers having a look at their products before committing to the sale contract, factoring in the transition from material goods to digital goods etc. And the additional issue that you can't sell it on like you can physical goods that prove unsuitable. I've been looking at guitar looper pedals recently, watching and reading lots of reviews, and there are people who say they can't get on with a specific model. Not a problem with a guitar pedal as you can sell it for a large portion of retail price and buy the other one that's a better fit for you. Go into a shop, try a game people are writing glowing reviews about and find you can't handle the control scheme, walk out happy. Read a thousand glowing reviews for a novel game, watch YouTube videos for the amazing control and gameplay, buy it and find you can't handle the control scheme, you're stuck with it. Except of course on Steam where you can get a refund (which you'd cancel if you were in charge). And on Google where you can get a refund. And seemingly on Xbox. And other services that recognise when you can't go somewhere and try it yourself, it makes sense to let you try it yourself at home before committing to a purchase. All of which is apparently the consumer being irresponsible.
 
Well firstly your point is non sequitur. The existence of one exception doesn't prove itself the rule everything else should be measured by. "You can't get a refund for a movie, ergo you shouldn't get a refund for anything else," isn't logical.

Secondly, you don't get refunds for food you've eaten either, yet in law you're allowed to refuse payment for a meal you felt was sub-par and then argue the case out in the civil courts. The laws are inconsistent, which is where it should be considered what's being asked and where rights should be extended (remembering once upon a time aboslutely no rights existed and society changed this because society saw consumer rights made for a better, happier world).

What's being asked for from games isn't the opportunity to eat the whole meal and then pay nothing, or watch the whole movie and get a refund, but to walk out early and get a refund once the quality has been proven to be below that expected at the point of sale.
 
Consumers don't have some innate right to try before they buy. Where it is offered (trials, demos etc) that is entirely at the cost of another party and very much a act of faith and good will. The act of buying something you've got zero experience of, and no accounts from others you trust (like reviews) is plain stupid. There's no other word for it. :nope:

I'm all for consumer protection, but not idiot protection. No State should be legislating for idiocy - let Darwin manage the thin end of the gene pool :yep2:

I agree, legislating it would be the worst possible thing in the world. As you say people are NOT entitled to it and the government should not guarantee something like that.

What I'm saying is that if a corporation cares about its customers it should offer some mechanism to protect its customers from unscrupulous sellers on their marketplace.

Just look at the retailers that have a reputation as being very consumer friendly. Walmart, for example. No matter what I buy there, I can easily take it back for a full refund for any reason. I can safely buy something regardless of where they sourced it with the assurance that if the product doesn't suit my needs I can return it. This even applies to food.

Now, I don't believe that should be regulated and laws made requiring them to do that. But as a consumer it is much appreciated and I'm far more likely to shop there because of it.

Likewise, here I'm praising Steam and others for offering mechanisms to protect their customers from unscrupulous or just plain incompetent sellers on their marketplace. At the same time, I'm certainly not going to praise Sony or others for not doing the same.

It is completely irresponsible, IMO. But it isn't something that should be regulated. Sony should be free to offer refunds or not. And consumers are free to choose to buy from them or not due to their policies. In other words, I would certainly urge people to buy ALL of their games from another vendor that tries to protect them if it is available rather than Sony, because then if they buy a lemon, they aren't stuck with it.

Regards,
SB
 
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The only experience I have with shitty games that warrant a refund is Kerbal Space Program. It was buggy on consoles, and both MS and Sony gave refunds if you went through support after the developer was unable to resolve the problem. Despite the clusterfuck, it had great reviews, look it up! So it took a while to figure out they would NEVER debug it (major legal issues with the devs doing the port, repeated promises). This was not noticeable until quite a few days of play, and there are no policies which could have solved that without opening a can of worms. Sony eventually removed it from the store, and according to the devs sony rejected their patch. They finally hired a different studio to do a complete rewrite of the port with the latest code, and obviously it's free for those who bought it. Interestingly, I really hope they'll recover from this and I want the game to work much more than I want my money back. But I fully understand why some wanted a refund.

The store is designed as an intermediary between publishers and customers, and they have to negotiate this. If they want to impose a "money back guarantee" as part of the store they need the major publishers to be convinced it's good for their business. Money back guarantees are profitable based on additional impulse buys (meh if it sucks I'll just click refund, if I remember to do it) being higher than remorse refunds, and usually it has to be a hassle to get a refund. If it's profitable on MS platform, it will also be on Sony platform. If MS had to cancel this it's probably because publishers were unconvinced the change of policy will be ultimately more profitable than the status quo.

It's not easy to make a policy that can solve this. We are talking about publishers who said used games are piracy. An industry using manipulative gambling techniques with real money loot boxes as the future of video games. A sick renewed focus on planned obsolescence. If they ever add some "as seen on TV" satisfaction guaranteed or your money back, it's because they think they'll make more money that way.
 
The store is designed as an intermediary between publishers and customers, and they have to negotiate this. If they want to impose a "money back guarantee" as part of the store they need the major publishers to be convinced it's good for their business. Money back guarantees are profitable based on additional impulse buys (meh if it sucks I'll just click refund, if I remember to do it) being higher than remorse refunds, and usually it has to be a hassle to get a refund. If it's profitable on MS platform, it will also be on Sony platform. If MS had to cancel this it's probably because publishers were unconvinced the change of policy will be ultimately more profitable than the status quo.

Anecdotally, word from most developers on Steam that have talked about it is that they generally seen a sales uptick due to this that isn't offset by refund requests. There are some developers who have complained about refunds devastating their revenue, however. Said developers generally having really bad games in the store (asset flips, games with almost no gameplay but with achievements for achievement hunters, buggy games that haven't been fixed in months/years, etc.)

Regards,
SB
 
Well firstly your point is non sequitur. The existence of one exception doesn't prove itself the rule everything else should be measured by. "You can't get a refund for a movie, ergo you shouldn't get a refund for anything else," isn't logical.

Very tricky word choice there. I’d say almost dishonest, like a politician twisting the words of a rival politician.

It is normal in a capitalism based society for businesses to NOT give refunds even if it sucks.
 
Some movie theaters actually do offer refunds. It also isn't uncommon to go to a restaurant, eat a meal, and then request and get a refund if it wasn't to your taste.

Regards,
SB

This is all correct and I imagine some people choose those theaters and restaurants over ones that are less favorable to the buyer.
 
Very tricky word choice there. I’d say almost dishonest, like a politician twisting the words of a rival politician.
An example was presented as if proving that refunds for games was unrealistic. It's not as there are many situations where refunds are given?
It is normal in a capitalism based society for businesses to NOT give refunds even if it sucks.
I don't think that's true. Heck, I've heard on this board about people taking unwanted consoles back to GameStop and getting new replacements at no extra cost etc! In the UK you can get refunds for lots of reasons, certainly for anything broken or missold, and likewise across Europe. And as pointed out repeatedly, some companies provide zero-quibble refunds even for digital goods. Refunds may not be a universal option afforded consumers, but it's far from rare also. That probably depend on where in the world you live. People doing most of their shopping haggling from street vendors will have a very different experience.
 
That's simply not true. Some stuff can't be bought without going online (you ever tried buying men's shoes in size 6? Let alone red patent leather ones?!). Some stuff doesn't have meaningful reviews. Actually lots doesn't. Buying something rated 5* on Amazon doesn't mean it's not got a glowing fault.

Perhaps there are some fringe things, like mens size 6 red patent leather shoes, that are difficult to find in stores. I'm size 11 and favour Nike Air for running but they come up small so I need a 12 and most places, even Lillywhites, don't carry their full range in size 12. However this isn't an unsolvable problem. My long experience of Nikes for running means I can be confident in buying a size 12 and knowing they'll fit. Crisis averted. Even if they didn't fit, I could return them and try again.

Games are a far cry from shoes.

How on earth can you make an informed decision if you can't actually check your product??

Avoid spending money on unknowns. This is not rocket science. This is a lesson I learned as a child when cartridges for the Atari 2600 were £30 (approx £100 today with inflation) which was most of an entire birthday or Christmas present.

I've been looking at guitar looper pedals recently, watching and reading lots of reviews, and there are people who say they can't get on with a specific model. Not a problem with a guitar pedal as you can sell it for a large portion of retail price and buy the other one that's a better fit for you.

I would never buy something like this unseen, I'd find somewhere where I could go and see it. When I bought my Amiga at fifteen or sixteen I had to travel 80 miles to a store which had both that and the Atari ST and who had told me on the phone that I could use both to see which I would eventually buy. This remains an option for many things. The convenience of online shopping means people have the option of buying unknown products but it rarely completely removes the option to actually travel and see things in person.

It's effort vs. ....

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And on Google where you can get a refund. And seemingly on Xbox. And other services that recognise when you can't go somewhere and try it yourself, it makes sense to let you try it yourself at home before committing to a purchase. All of which is apparently the consumer being irresponsible.

With the cost of many refunds being borne by Google and Microsoft, why should they pay for consumers poor decisions? How will people change if there is no consequence to poor decisions; this is literally the opposite of the traits that promote evolution and self improvement.

"Oh no, I made a poor decision and nobody stopped me, now I've lost money.". Good, you've learned a valuable lesson there. You're now in a better position to make purchasing decision that you were yesterday. :yep2:

What I'm saying is that if a corporation cares about its customers it should offer some mechanism to protect its customers from unscrupulous sellers on their marketplace.

Corporations don't cares about customers, they're collectives of people. They closest they get are understanding the demographics that make up types of customers. When Apple execs say "we care about our customer's privacy" what they mean is they think their customer's prioritise privacy and, more importantly, privacy issues are a liability issue that they and their legal team want to avoid.

The decision to offer no question refunds is a conscious decision to engender freer-spending. Consumers are more likely to spend if they can get a refunds. Unfortunately that doesn't remedy the underlying problem of shit software. The cost of many refunds are borne by retailer not the originator of the product. Steam is more complicated because it has different options but I wouldn't assume every refund hits the publisher/developer.

Likewise, here I'm praising Steam and others for offering mechanisms to protect their customers from unscrupulous or just plain incompetent sellers on their marketplace. At the same time, I'm certainly not going to praise Sony or others for not doing the same.

And I'm with you on this. There absolutely are valid reasons for refunds such as the game having technical issues and not being as described, but Life of Black Tiger doesn't fall into this category. Sony literally published footage of it on YouTube (and in their Store). In retrospect I wonder if this was an intentional warning. You see instantly that production quality was bad - the only way you would not know this is if you did literally no research at all. And for that, no I don't think consumers should be entitled to a refund. :nope:

Should Sony be exercising some form of artistic/technical censorship beyond TRCs? I'd argue no.
 
You're confusing a poor decision with an uninformed one. See my examples about the guitar pedals and game control schemes. You can do all the research in the world and still find something that isn't appropriate for you or doesn't work for you. Another example - waterproof overshoes. Hard to come by in stores, and online reviews of products don't describe which size is going to be best for your particular footwear. Only way to be sure is to buy what appears the best fit, and then get a replacement if you need another size. And if the replacement isn't available, get a refund.

Let's also point out that you can't even be sure of a gameplay video on PSN (ignoring the fact that these are always best-case advertisements and don't always accurately present what'll you'll be experiencing), so research isn't really being supported by the retailer here.

Ultimately, we have limited time and resources and don't want to have to waste it unnecessarily when there are better, more efficient solutions, based on the ancient concept of 'seeing the product before you buy it'. That's even less rocket-science than any notion you've presented. Given a choice between having to look up products on the web and accumulate multiple personal evaluations and filter out the dross (LoBT is 7.5 on Metacritic) and find and review footage and derive a probability of suitability with x number of hours work, versus seeing the product in person and determining sometimes in a matter of moments if it's any good ("sound quality of these earphones may be amazing like everyone says, but they don't fit my ears"), it's a no brainer which contributes more to society. Fair refunds provide a quick way to facilitate the classical model of commerce where you view the goods yourself and decide whether you want them or not.

Perhaps it's the example of LoBT that's affecting your perception, as that was such an obvious turkey no-one should be duped. We're mostly talking principle here, not the specifics of this one game that precipitated the discussion. If platform holders aren't going to filter their content, how do they prevent their users being ripped off while also generating consumer confidence so users will be willing to take a chance on an unknown which is essential to new products getting discovered and established - you won't get any reviews if no-one plays it? Is it best to do nothing and trust to third party actions, or to provide a simple but fair refund policy? Many of the content providers are choosing the latter...
 
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