2013, oh how you've buttered our lips with such sweet, sweet gossip. We're barely into the third month of the year -- and not quite hot off the heels of the Xeno-Gate fiasco -- and we already have EA bumping and grinding on the bed of anti-consumerism with SimCity. As if all the news-woes thus far haven't been enough, EA's new official stance on the fallout is that they won't be officially supporting refunds anymore.
Dig EA, dig! I want to know what you find down there, Satan does too.
VentureBeat is reporting that EA has made it officially clear what their stance is regarding refunds for SimCity. Apparently, anyone who buys SimCity from Origin will be met with the unfortunate reality that EA does not offer refunds on digital purchases, even if the product doesn't work.
According to EA's official Origin Twitter account...
Regarding recent confusion: In general we do not offer refunds on digital download games. Please review our policy https://help.ea.com/article/returns-and-cancellations …Regarding a rumor: We will not ban players for requesting refunds. Please review our returns & cancellations policy: https://help.ea.com/article/returns-and-cancellations …
The “rumor” they're referring to is the news from their customer service rep who threatened to ban a user from his Origin account if he went through with a chargeback since EA was denying users refunds.
Just so we're clear: Your Origin account will be banned if you follow-through with a chargeback on a digital purchase from EA's digital distribution service. That's just their policy.
Meanwhile, Polygon has been using their review score to depict their revulsion at EA's business practice by removing enough numbers to make some Metacritic review bombers blush with envy.
Polygon's official number for SimCity is now 4 out of 10, down from the previous 8 out of 10, which was down from the original 9.5 out of 10.
On a side note, The Escapist is reporting that Amazon has reinstated the sale of SimCity once more. Presumably this coincides with the European launch of the game. EA has also been gutting more features from SimCity to free up as much bandwidth as possible, including disabling “Cheetah Mode”.
Always-on DRM looking scrumptious yet?
That image up top from Co-Optimus is a perfect description of SimCity right now. I love it how you pay $60 for a game with gutted features, the possibility of not even letting you play and having the company invasively monitor your play experience every time they allow you to play. What's left to be said? Oh right...
Dig EA...dig.
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