Night_Trekker
Member
Nobody can play the game.
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EA refuses to refund user for Sim City and then threatens a ban if they chargeback
- Thread starter IcyRhythms
- Start date
Nobody can play the game.
Blown out of proportion.
Just judging from that chat, the customer service rep. should've used tact and granted a refund in this case. Or at least clarified that it's a temporary ban until any eventual chargeback has been re-paid, not a permanent ban..
That said, the guy has seemingly no idea how the digital payment world works. Of course he'd get suspended if he went to his bank and issued chargebacks that way. Chargebacks are considered fraudulent by any merchant (EA in this case) in any industry, not just virtual stuff.
Chargebacks cost money, not just the amounts charged back but there's a fee ontop of every chargeback to the merchant and if too many are incurred then Visa et.al. issues further fees and potential blocks on the payment methods as a whole, prohibiting it's use. Something any business wants to avoid at any cost.
Just judging from that chat, the customer service rep. should've used tact and granted a refund in this case. Or at least clarified that it's a temporary ban until any eventual chargeback has been re-paid, not a permanent ban..
That said, the guy has seemingly no idea how the digital payment world works. Of course he'd get suspended if he went to his bank and issued chargebacks that way. Chargebacks are considered fraudulent by any merchant (EA in this case) in any industry, not just virtual stuff.
Chargebacks cost money, not just the amounts charged back but there's a fee ontop of every chargeback to the merchant and if too many are incurred then Visa et.al. issues further fees and potential blocks on the payment methods as a whole, prohibiting it's use. Something any business wants to avoid at any cost.
StreetsAhead
Member
The biggest problem is that you CAN'T play the game because of the systems EA put in place (or failed to, as it were), no?
Kill Your Masters
Member
EA is to incompetent to avoid it then other than threatening customers. Any cost in this case would be preparing for a lot of users and beefing up server capacities before release to justify for the product.
He is talking to you. Yes YOU!
People whine, People cry foul, but in a few months their finger will be pressing the pre-order button for the next shit sandwich about to be served up.
Cosmonaut X
Member
"Have you seen the trailer? ALL OVER MY FACE!"
Six weeks later...
"AWHWHAHHHH! IT'S PISS! IT'S PISS ALL OVER MY FACE!"
Nja, yes every server except these are "fine", but if you try to connect to them you get an error or you will be able to start the game but the connection will be lost.
You'd have to prove that Sim City is "faulty, not fit for purpose or doesn't match description". Unless the game is down for several days at once, I doubt that you've got a case.
test_account
XP-39C²
Getting banned for doing a chargeback is understandable i think since there isnt any proof around it (chargebacks can be done regardless if there is any issues with the game or not). It is a good question how refunds/returns should be handled in cases like this though.
Well the problem is due to the fact that it is not always online.
Cpt.Underpants
Member
Thanks for supporting the gaming industry....NOT
How about just avoiding the game entirely since always-online is just so unreliable on release? Or just wait for a while until its stable
Kill Your Masters
Member
So where can I donate to EA to have better servers and to support the poor poor suits? Oh right, I give them the money upfront.
While I don't support piracy I don't get the logic behind supporting the industry when the industry likes you in a bent forward position.
Normally I wouldn't condone piracy, but if its the only way to actually play this game then so be it. Telling EA "We want to play your game, just without your always online garbage" isn't going to collapse the industry. Hell if the industry thinks every game needs to follow the mobile model, perhaps it needs another great purge to return to common sense.
The game will never be stable because its still inherently based on its terrible, terrible DRM. You'd think they'd learn from the Diablo 3 backlash. Then again it is EA.
Well it obviously depends what kind of always on we are talking about. If It's only online check for your licence? Probably not.
But if companies will want to host some portion of the game in cloud, then yes, it will happen more than it should have.
When EA announced they were going through with no steam but Origin on PC people called me a fanboy for saying I wouldn't buy anything through Origin.
So far it looks like a great decision both on a game quality level and a services level.
Luckily warned a few friends to not buy/at least wait a month for Sim city, but know a guy and his gf who both tried to get refunds and already called the bank to do a chargeback.
blitzcloud
Banned
also I refuse to buy a singleplayer "multiplayer" experience without the written promise that in case they stop giving service someday they will drop the always online requirement.
Imagine if demons souls stopped working because the servers go down. I refuse.
Imagine if demons souls stopped working because the servers go down. I refuse.
dripdripsplash
Member
So it's allright then ?
Cpt.Underpants
Member
What made you think I was a bender to this kind practice? I bought Diablo 3 at launch out of trust for Blizzard. Finally got to play after a couple of hours of wait. I fucking hated that experience. Wasn't the D3 ERROR37 not enough to convince you that always online is just so unreliable?
Lesson learned. You either wait for it to became stable of just avoid it entirely
It's not like there are no cheaper and better alternatives like Cities XL, Tropico or Anno 2070...
People need to stop giving attention to EA. It's not like you can't live without them. I'm free of EA Origin until now, and I intend to stay that way until they cut that spyware crap out of it.
People need to stop giving attention to EA. It's not like you can't live without them. I'm free of EA Origin until now, and I intend to stay that way until they cut that spyware crap out of it.
RurouniZel
Asks questions so Ezalc doesn't have to
Always Online DRM is best DRM right guys?
Right?
...
Right?
...
Always Online DRM is best DRM right guys?
Right?
...
In the case of Sim City, always on DRM could be justified for the multiplayer network component, but not having any options for some kind of simple internet activation that lets the player play an offline version for atleast 30 days without internet is dispicable.
Cosmonaut X
Member
Yup - should have bought your good EA games used or had them given to you as gifts. That way you'd have really shown your support for what they were doing right...
Thank you for posting this, I wanted to say it too
I agree that piracy is wrong, but what the industry doing is worse. They are taking money for defective products and refusing any recourse to the consumer other than a chargeback (with all their games held hostage).
Part of me would love to see a mass of people create origin accounts, make a single purchase each of sim city, then all do a mass chargeback. That would do two things:
a) Make EA sit up and take notice that a lot of people are annoyed
b) Send them a financial message they can't ignore
Of course, such a thing would probably be deemed illegal to do in states where anti-consumer practices are condoned.
Personally, I'm of the opinion that large swathes of this industry need to get stuffed. They are actively hostile towards consumers, and 'voting with your wallet' does nothing since the publishers all seem to copy each others' dumb ideas in short order. It's becoming absolutely pathetic, and I'd love to see a few of these big publishers go the way of atari.
I just cancelled my order and felt like I was in some kind of bizarro world. Aside from the two hour wait, they were pretty decent, and gave me a voucher for no particular reason at the end. They didn't have to, I am outside the 14-day return policy even though it is a preorder. So yeah, they've retained me as a customer for the time being.
witchedwiz
Member
gamers in the us!
class action! go-get!
pity i'm not in the us, else i'd love to smell some ea piss-pant if gamers would ACTUALLY do something smart
a refund is a basic stuff when you buy a product and there's pretty much always one, lest you buy digital content.. and I doubt in the eula of simcity there's something on those lines
class action! go-get!
pity i'm not in the us, else i'd love to smell some ea piss-pant if gamers would ACTUALLY do something smart
a refund is a basic stuff when you buy a product and there's pretty much always one, lest you buy digital content.. and I doubt in the eula of simcity there's something on those lines
gamers in the us!
class action! go-get!
pity i'm not in the us, else i'd love to smell some ea piss-pant if gamers would ACTUALLY do something smart
a refund is a basic stuff when you buy a product and there's pretty much always one, lest you buy digital content.. and I doubt in the eula of simcity there's something on those lines
I wouldn't be surprised if the TOS for Origin prohibits you from joining class act lawsuits against them.
From my experience Origin support is actually very good. I guess you could have experienced more problems if you already had an access to the game.
Diddy Kong
Banned
EA being EA
Refund is "basic stuff" as a policy, not as an immediately available legal recoursegamers in the us!
class action! go-get!
pity i'm not in the us, else i'd love to smell some ea piss-pant if gamers would ACTUALLY do something smart
a refund is a basic stuff when you buy a product and there's pretty much always one, lest you buy digital content.. and I doubt in the eula of simcity there's something on those lines
Hero_of_the_Day
Member
Absolutely. That's why I started the sentence with "it's shit", a statement that obviously shows my full support.
That was... odd. This line stuck out to me for some reason.
Something more useful than what? Obviously English probably isn't Rajeev's first language but in the context of Sim City being pretty useless and them not offering refunds to everyone had me chuckling.
Treemonkeys
Member
No it's not broken, it's down servers. No online service has every had 100% uptime, ever. This shit just happens.
I would feel bad for the average joe who got suckered into this without knowing, but if you post on Neogaf, bought this game, then did a charge back when the servers are inevitably down, you're stupid.
And I'm not the one that bought the damn game, so lol at 'standing up to it'.