Is review removed after refund?

Community Showcases
1

As an asset creator-publisher I somehow am insecure about how the review/rating system works in Unity Asset Store. It is still possible to anonymously rate without writing a review which I am asking to be changed. On the other hand, a bad review can be the customer doesn’t learn enough about the asset from the description and demo before buying and regret it afterward. So if the (bad) review by the said customer has already been shown in the asset item page, will both the review and rating be removed once the refund procedure is successful?

This is extremely dangerous if the answer is no. Any one can buy their own asset and give good review then refund themselves for free popularity boost; worst, threatening to give bad review for their rival’s asset and submit the bad review anyway after confirming the refund submission from their rival.

TripAdvisor claims they have a fully functional review monitoring system by both AI and human inspectors, but this still happened. Showing how fragil the online review/rating system can be gamed.

2

on the other hand a dev using refund to delete the bad review is not fair for the users

3

Because each refund case must be submitted by the asset publisher and then reviewed by the AS staffer manually, hopefully AS can preliminarily judge whether there is merit to retain the review and even if the refund request is fishy.

4

I agree with the author of this thread. Sometimes you get reviewers which are trying to manipulate you, especially if they’re posting on behalf of a company, so they’re not taking a personal responsibility for their actions.
They won’t bother to update their review after receiving proper support or a refund.

5

It would be best that the asset store team looks into each and individual review which has complaints. Refunds in return for removing a bad review is manipulation the other way when it comes to bad asset store authors.

Why would the bad review be removed? What next, press is supposed to not review films because they didn’t pay for it? World doesn’t work like that.

But for reviews that do appear manipulative should be reported and Unity should add it to a queue and manually assess each one, I’m sure that’s agreeable, right?

6

FYI, I’ve been researching this as a journalist for two years. IMO, and based on my research, the asset store team currently removes reviews in a political and manipulative way, to artificially boost certain specific assets. As a journalist, I’ve collected evidence over two years, and also am publishing the results on YouTube and several news platforms. In addition, posts that touch on critical issues in the forum are also deleted. For example, this post I just made will probably be deleted as moderators artificially cull the forum to “remove drama”. Overall, it’s bad for Unity and the community because the reviews system is intended to give objective feedback. And it’s useful to have positive and negative, even if it’s exposing flaws in the asset store or exposing severe personality problems of certain asset creators. There is a lot of discussion of this problem on platforms like Reddit and Discord. The asset store management are not hiding anything from the community at large, and it hurts the reputation of the Unity company. It hurts game devs. Hiding “drama” from the public by the asset store staff deleting reviews to enforce their “no drama” approach is really just whitewashing the reviews process. And it’s done only for certain asset creators who have the ear of asset store management, IMO and based on my research. It’s political and it hurts a lot of game devs. It also slowly destroys the reputation of the Unity company. For that reason, it’s worth discussing.

7

Hey all,

I agree that reviews and policy surrounding reviews should be clear to both sides of a market place as well as clear to those who attempt to mediate issues.

Currently this is the policy we see regarding the removal of reviews:

To keep the review section an open and honest environment, Unity will only deem comments abusive and consider their removal if they are:
- Using offensive language
- Discussing topics Irrelevant to the package in question

From the perspective of the user, it is a pretty limited policy and I can see why it has caused confusion.
Reviews can also become tricky regarding asset updates, upgrades, and refunds.

The review system is something we are looking at carefully and discussing better solutions that benefit the user and publisher.

Policy

For now, here is some added context to why some reviews or responses may be removed.
All reviews and responses are held to the terms stated in the Unity Website & Communities Terms sheet.
Take note of section 5 and 7

Each report is reviewed manually and we take great care to make sure we are as “fair” as possible, because it is our intention to do what is best for the user base as a whole, even when some individuals are affected and feel that it is unjust.

If you have questions about the removal of your review, please contact support for context.
You are also welcome to re-write a review for the same product as long as you follow behavior that we consider appropriate (note the policy linked above).

Something we see often is aggressive or harassing language toward individuals. We do not tolerate this behavior at any level even when it is “mild trolling.” We will remove reviews that are reported and match this behavior.

Being banned from making reviews:

We will ban a user from making reviews when they have a record of excessive communication infractions, as well as abuse in the Asset Store review system. This includes behavior on the forums, private correspondence to Unity Staff, and Unity Connect communications.

A user may also be banned from reviews when they are a security threat, or involved in illegal activity within the Unity ecosystem.

To violate these rules as a publisher may lead to having all products disabled and being banned from selling on the store.

Bans are rare and they only occur in extreme situations. Forum bans are temporary and provide a cooldown period. Secondary Forum bans may be permanent.

1 Like
8

Individual concerns
@DavidLieder Please feel free to provide the situation for other users to see. This helps provide feedback for us and shows users how we operate. I am happy to discuss further as to why your reviews were removed.

I also understand why our actions may look like hiding drama, but we only mediate situations that are brought to our attention from our users. We allow plenty of fair opinions in our forums and in reviews, but we have no tolerance for items listed in section 5 here.

9

Being banned from making reviews:

.

Don’t you think it is too much punishment - to deprive a person and his family large part of the income for a few careless words?

1 Like
10

No, because a few “careless” words can prevent depriving another person and their family of income too. Two sides to the coin.

We are adults. Adults sell things. If an adult is acting like a harmful idiot, the adult should be deprived, and set as an example to others.

The trend is, nobody takes things seriously. Then this happens and suddenly, it’s depriving? Best people take it seriously and respect others. From the start.

It’s called being an adult in 2019. Obviously I don’t refer to you or your assets or situation, but it’s difficult job to meditate any dispute and I’m happy Unity’s team looks into complaints.

4 Likes
11

I’m not sure what you refer to with the asterix spam. Can you explain better and more clearly, please.

12

Adults and smart people at all need to understand several things. Not all people in the word was grown in same nice condition. Not all people in the world have same characteristics. So they speak sometimes in differed manner. We are very different people here.

And now can you please give me example of a “harmeful idiot” here on forum you are speaking about?
About whom did you speak?

13

I deliberately refer to no-one because that’s not productive to the conversation. A lot of people will do damage around them and must be removed. The country doesn’t matter. The conditions they grew up in doesn’t matter. None of that matters because a business is not the same thing as a charity.

What matters is simple: Unity provides clear rules of operating on asset store. Clear rules for reviews (google has them too) and people obey. Clear rules in multiple languages.

Those that refuse to follow the rules can and absolutely should be removed. If the rules aren’t clear, then your only real argument is “we need clear rules” and that’s fair.

It’s simple, in terms any adult can understand. And final, because their presence on the store is a privilege, never a right. When a person crosses over from being a privileged guest to someone harming the store experience for everyone else, they are removed.

Again, it’s not a charity, and it absolutely needs to be governed with an iron fist, because where money is concerned, it is no laughing matter - at all for buyers or sellers.

I’ve said what I need to say and will not be responding further in the topic - but I do not believe - in any situation at all, that the personal situation of the buyer or seller has any relevance in the asset store. It can’t, because the moment it does, the asset store becomes something you can manipulate endlessly.

Nobody wants that.

4 Likes
14

For my opinion. If you ready prove in court that someone really financially harmed another person here without any reason, you may consider to remove him from the place, no mater if you financially harm him too. It is fair. But if your are not ready to prove you may expect to meet his lawyer soon. :wink:

15

I am afraid this doesn’t answer half of my concern raised in this thread: A publisher open a puppet account (or ask their friend/family to do it), give good review/rating to their own asset then refund themselves. Sure they lose 30% to Asset Store, but the popularity boost is tremendous after passing the 3-rating threshold. Some may be obvious (yet AS still turns a blind eye to these cases and sends a very bad message to other publishers), but most are done skillfully and invisible to other users to report.

16

I couldn’t agree more, we see this with games as well sadly today its getting just as bad as assets. ,some people throw tantrums, and gave unfair reviews and its never a review of the issues that they are having, its typically someone throwing a tantrum, because something didn’t go there way… So glad Unity is doing this as I see to many reviews, that just make me sick and NOT want to sell assets and I have not for this reason… So glad Unity is on board with this… People can give a bad review but it should be a fair one… Not one where its clear the person is just acting like a child and having a melt down. I been here about 9 years and it has gotten really bad the last few years.

1 Like
17

Hello I have seen you around, and not to pick on you, you seem like a nice person, but I will tell, I have not always agreed with Unity or there ways, but when it comes to assets I feel for the most part they been fair, they are time, I feel they screw up they are human. and it happens but…if an asset is completely broken, and you bought it, Unity will give the money back… I never had that issue… now if you are trying to get it back, because someone got into a fight with the asset publisher , then I would not give someone money back for that either…

Remember if your making and selling a game, we see a lot of people refunding, and depending who you are selling for, Google Play, XB1, Steam what ever it can cost you money…as well, if you are the developer, so remember if you plan to make games, treat people how you want to be treated as well. now and its not pleasant to bust your butt only for some to make you refund someone money, for a lie or a wrong reason… but known assets, that have thousands sold, there should be ZERO reason an asset is refunded, unless, the publisher didn’t read something about it not supporting, a platform, or what ever or something related where its completely unusable…because with art and code, even if refunded, you guys already downloaded and have access, so that is really in my opinion unfair to the publisher. this has keep me as a professional game developer from selling a thing because I see what many known asset devs go though… and I wont work for free either…

So just next time you buy something do your research before you bother… buying it… Then give them, and your self a mature , fair review, I see to many reviews that sound like they are coming from someone who is not really an adult or a fair review…Yes if its not a 5 star, sadly everyone will down vote you, it happens to all of us…Which I never liked myself… but all you can do is be fair about it…don’t be unprofessional about any review you give no matter HOW upset… you are. /cheers

PS I see why Unity has changed this and this can be a good thing, I always felt the Unity asset reviews was broken… and only got worse. I dislike that we can’t review products where we get a new upgrade, we used to be able to delete a review and update. I used to do it once a year to be fair to the publishers… We can’t anymore. since like a year or so ago.

1 Like
18

Yes, this is possible, but it’s the kind of abuse mentioned above that risks Unity delisting all of the publisher’s assets. The Asset Store team does try to police this kind of abuse.

2 Likes
19

The current Asset store system prefers the sellers and allows them to get a free pass with bad business practices. The main problem is that as buyer you have no right of return (like in European law) and Unity acts only as commissioner. When an asset is in the store Unity makes only a quality check for the current version but it can happen that you buy a product und after importing it in a project you will notice a sea of red flags because the version is not more compatible even the asset store states: " Supported Unity versions: 5.6.4 or higher".

In my case i have contacted the developer and he promised me that the team will care about the bugs and it will take some days (that was in the last week in December). In the meantime i have seen a review by an other user who gave only 1 of 5 stars for this asset because of the bugs. Some days later i checked the asset in the store again and the review was removed. When a user reports serious bugs then Unity should at least consider to remove the asset from the store and make a new quality check. After i contacted again the developer in January again i was told they need additional three days.

My consequence is that i do no use my Visa anymore for asset store purchases and check out with Paypal and buy no more products which are well-established.

2 Likes
20

I’ve looked at the reviews of yours and nowhere do I see the developers harassing you? The developer of EasyRoads even gave a good answer?! I do see what tone you’re using in your reviews and it’s not a good one. For example, you’ve titled the review for Gaia as “Overrated”, gave one star and named MapMagic (a competitor product) out of the blue inside your review.

It feels like you buy Assets without actually looking at the description/manual/YouTube videos whatsoever and if something doesn’t work, you blame the developer for allegedly lying/being misleading about his Asset. That’s not how it works.

5 Likes