GOG.com have gone and up to date their refund coverage, and it’s a doozy. This week, the DRM-free storefront introduced that their 30-day refund window is increasing, now not restricted to games which have sat unplayed and undownloaded in your library. Now, you possibly can spend a complete month plugging within the hours, understanding whether or not you need to preserve your new toy earlier than the clock runs down. It’s a beneficiant transfer – twice so long as comparable insurance policies, with not one of the playtime restrictions. But it’s one locations a whole lot of religion of their prospects to not reap the benefits of that generosity.
GOG’s refund coverage has at all times had a month-long respiratory room, however there have been strict caveats. You’d normally solely get your a reimbursement if a game hadn’t but been downloaded or performed. A type of “oh, I didn’t really want that” choice for salvaging impulse purchases. Special consideration could be taken if a purchase order had technical points, however ’til now, you’d normally be caught with a game when you downloaded it – whether or not you preferred it or not.
This week, GOG introduced that it was kicking the doorways to refunds huge open, whether or not you’ve downloaded a game or not.
We at all times believed in a ‘gamers-first’ method and with this voluntary replace to our Refund Policy you will get a full refund as much as 30 days after buying a product, even if you happen to downloaded, launched, and performed it.
More particulars – https://t.co/WfwZkyLkbo
— GOG.COM (@GOGcom) February 26, 2020
This new method is staggeringly beneficiant, even by the requirements of GOG’s rivals. On Steam, you’ve acquired 14 days to determine whether or not you’re sticking with a purchase order, so long as you don’t plug greater than 2 hours into the game. It’s the identical deal over on the Epic Games Store. But with GOG, you’ve now acquired a complete 30 days to make up your thoughts, and it doesn’t even appear like there’s a tough restrict on playtime.
Of course, refunds aren’t being granted with out query. Refunds might be requested by contacting GOG’s buyer help crew, and – as GOG confirmed to the oldsters at PC Gamer – the shop will deal with every refund on a case-by-case foundation, asking you to elucidate why you’d like your a reimbursement. It’s not likely clear the place they’re drawing that like, although. On their Refund Policy FAQ, GOG merely ask that you simply be cheap.
“Please respect all the time and hard work put into making the games you play and remember that refunds are not reviews. If you finished the game and didn’t like it, please consider sharing your opinion instead. Also, please don’t take advantage of our trust by asking for an unreasonable amount of games to be refunded. Don’t be that person. No one likes that person.”
If you might be that individual (actually, don’t be), GOG reserves the best to say no to refund requests. Still, 30 days is a very long time. Long sufficient that you may beat all however the longest RPG sprawls and nonetheless probably get away with a refund.
There’s a extra troubling aspect to GOG’s coverage, thoughts. See, the shop’s huge promoting level is that, not like Steam or Origin or that, not one of the games it sells include DRM (Digital Rights Management) restrictions of any type. You shouldn’t ever must examine in with a server or launcher to confirm possession earlier than firing up a game. Good stuff, proper?
But it throws a wierd wrench into this refund coverage. Right now, it’s unclear what’s stopping somebody from downloading a game and backing up the installer (or the game recordsdata completely) on one other drive earlier than getting a refund. Responding to a concerned comment on their authentic Twitter submit, GOG defined that they’re relying on their prospects to simply, like, be cool about it.
“This update was possible thanks to our community’s respect for all the time and hard work put into creating the games you buy on GOG.com and playing by the rules. We can only hope and encourage users to continue to do so.”
Time will inform if that religion holds out.
