Polygon article on how indie developers might have to try new tricks to survive on Steam with the refund policy.
As often as Polygon does something stupid (like the recent Rockband 4 review), they also put out gems like this. It feels like sitting down and listen to some con artists talk shop... time delays, bundling, holding back content... the indie scene is gonna be weird soon and it's all because the only way they could make money before was because they didn't have to give it back.
"Wah, people can return our product if they're not satisied!"
Welcome to the real world, you little fetuses. Software should not be some magic realm where the customer has zero recourse for a bad product.
Is there any other industry where independent start-ups feel threatened by customers demanding satisfaction?
This article makes some really bad assumptions. For instance, they assume that Steam titles bought during sales, but never played, are prime candidates for being returned. HA! Unless a person is really strapped for cash, they're not going to be jumping to return something they snagged during a sale. They'll keep it in their library, and by the time they play it, it'll be to late to get a refund. (Which is a point most of the article conveniently forgets, that the refund has a 14 day window.)
If Indie developers are so terrified of refunds on Steam, then they should just push sites like GamersGate, Green Man Gaming, Amazon, etc. Third party sales aren't eligible for refunds. This is something the article never talks about.
I'm also laughing at how stupid this article sounds trying to act like there's suddenly this huge incentive to get people locked in for 2 hours of play! I think every game designer ever would love to be able to get a player to put in 2 hours without stopping. (Well, except for Squeenix, who apparently think that 13+ hours before the game starts getting good is the way to go.) If your game is good, then getting a player to put in 2 hours without even thinking about the clock isn't a challenge. And if you can make the first two hours good, then just go ahead and make the whole game good too, okay?
If you're whining about how gamers can now try games for up to 2 hours, testing to see which they want to spend their money on, then you're scum for wanting to win customers based on ignorance.
If you're whining about how now gamers can get up to 2 hours of your game for free, you're an idiot because if they really wanted to never spend money on games they'd go out and pirate them, not just limit themselves to 2 hour chunks with lots of filling out forms in between.
If you're whining about how your game has less than 2 hours of gameplay, and you made it just before this announcement then I feel bad for you, but see my point above. If you've only got an hour to offer, then you'd better be sure it's something people are going to feel is worth their money. People like to pay for good content. They really do. If you didn't make something worth people's money, then you don't deserve to make money off of it, and never did.
