I’ve bought an asset from assetstore which says it works on mobile a three months ago. However it did not work. After several weeks, the author concluded that the problem is a Unity limitation and it will not work until Unity fixes it.
However, recently ,there are a package which does similar and works on mobile. So I request for refund. This is Unity’s reply.
I have a lot of packages which does not work without author support. If this is their policy, then I think this is a good lesson to learn.
Yeah, that’s a crap policy. It doesn’t give you any time to work with the author to try to resolve the problem. Instead, as soon as you have a problem, you have to request a refund.
I can in one way understand Unitys policy because they dont want ppl to buy assets, use them in a game and then get a refund. But i agree it will end up very problematic for the customers, logical step is of course to try and solve it with the asset dev first and its sad that this might cause problems.
I have several thousand spent on assets. Some work well, most don’t, and I’m hoping for author to be able to resolve them eventually. But since this is Unity policy, I will not buy assets that in advance, and I will ask refund immediately if not working.
I was in the same boat. I bought dog days on the premise it worked out of the box on all platforms. It would not even build on on them. ( it simply came up with cryptic errors that did not explain what was wrong and and shut down) I tried contacting the author and no reply… I looked in the forum and saw other users were having the exact same issue and they were and have not yet gotten a response from the author. So I requested a refund. The day after I purchased it. I was denied with unity stating they only refund editor extensions and since this was a demo that had a working example (IE webplayer demo) that I knew what I was getting into. (Hello … the guy claimed it ran on all platforms out of the box which it did not) Anyway… the long and short of it… Unity said they would try and contact the author and try to get this resolved and I never heard from them again and the author has still not been in contanct with me or any of the users that had issues with the product… Only advice I can give is be damn careful about what you buy cause thier refund policy is NON-EXISTANT.
After about a week of trial and error I finnally managed to hack together code to make that damn thing run on mobiles… but when something is advertised to run out of the box on all platforms the end user should not have to spend a week or two just trying to make an asset work. Especially when the error codes are so damn cryptic they are basically saying Unity encountered and error. thank you have a nice day
The 14 day policy shouldn’t be an issue if they author agrees with the refund (i had a refund, for substantial money, on the single asset i ever got reimbursed, after more than 3 month, but with the agreement of the author that it couldn’t fit my need unlike what the description stated, and got reimbursed immediately).
Try to ask the author if he agrees and if so, resend your email to them with the author in copy and stating he agrees.
Well, I have spent more than 2k $ in Asset Store and, didn’t had problems with any package. Just one time the package don’t work and Unity team offers me the refund, but, the author had contacted me and solve the problem. So, I tell to the Unity team to don’t refund me because the author already fix the bug. That’s it, the only thing, is that you need to ask for refund in the first days after bought.
You are lucky then. I have probably close to 10k spent, There are some packages which the author disappeared, and its not working, and Unity is still selling them.
I expect a Assetstore to make sure the things they sell are working, and if not, they should not be selling them in the first place. When it is says working on mobile, I expect it to work on mobile. And if it doesn’t and after working with author ), they should refund. Remember there are alternative packages which came out later with similar features that work on mobile.
Anyway, Unity gone silent about my other 2 refund requests. This is my second time I’m issue with Assetstore, the first time, I bought a package that did not mention it needed a specific requirement, which I only found out after buying. And also Unity refuses to refund. They are eroding my trust in them as an assetstore
I think Unity pretty much needs the 14-day policy, or something like it, since lots of people release assets with the promise that they will be adding more to it later, and Unity has no way to force people to keep their promises. If I buy an asset, it’s always with the understanding that I’m getting it as-is, and any author promises to add cool new features or fix bugs are just a potential bonus, not something I’m counting on ever getting.
From the other side of the fence, the way we (asset store devs) see refunds as customers getting 100% of the content, then taking back 100% of the money – meaning the buyer gets stuff for free, and the developer gets nothing. Two weeks is plenty of time to figure out if something is right for you or not – and in all honesty, it’s really up to you to do your research before hitting the Buy button.
Buying software, especially software that comes in source code form, is not like buying a TV or some other physical product. When you return the TV and get your money back, you don’t get to keep a clone of that TV back in your livingroom. With software you do. How to guarantee that the customer actually stops using what he got the refund for? How to ensure that he doesn’t screw over the developer so he can get stuff for free?
You can’t.
If anything, the Asset Store policy is too lax on the matter. It’s quite common in the software industry to not offer refunds at all. PayPal always rules in favor of the merchant on this matter, for example. Downloadable software is generally not covered by any kind of return policy.
If you ever get to the point of publishing a paid Android game, you will experience the effect of a lax policy. Expect to see your customers abuse the crap out of the lax system, with them purchasing the game, then getting a refund within 5 minutes. They keep the game, and you get screwed. Worse yet, expect to see your game pirated within the first 24 hours by some fella that does exactly that – buys the game, gets a refund right away, and your game will be up on the pirate site with 0 dollars in your bank. If pirates couldn’t get a refund, at least you would get something out of the process – and chances are, the piracy rates would plummet as well.
And speaking of piracy – that’s actually a really good way of “evaluating” something. Not certain about some package? Pirate it and try it. If it suits your needs, consider buying it so that you have access to all the latest updates.
P.S. The views expressed in this post are solely my own – as an Asset Store content developer – and do not reflect the views of Unity as a company.
A big part of the problem is, often you see a good looking asset…but it is no longer supported (even though it is still full price.) There simply is no way to know what the current status of support is, unless you go to the forums. There needs to be a few more rating categories, such as
Developer support
Ease of use
Completeness - this one is fuzzy, but it basically is…does it do what it advertises in a straightforward way, without needs hacks or being unusable because of some obscure situation. I think many assets on the store are not clear on what the “gotchas” are, like…“Super awesome shadow package (but doesn’t work with deferred rendering)”.
I just think quality is not just something that looks nice on the asset store, but also is clear on how to use it and doesn’t have unadvertised gotchas that you find out some time later.
You see, in my case, I buy because author say should work mobile, it don’t, and it takes more than 14 days for developer to get try, and test and finally conclude it is a Unity bug. And there are similar packages released now which work on mobile. So, I should be entitied for refund. And Unity being slow/refusal is very bad customer experience for AssetStore.
So this means that if something doesn’t work, you request a refund immediately, then contact the author that it is broken, and if he fixes it buy it again?
I’m around that too it’s not the full asset store but it’s definately all packages i could want.
Keep in mind a few packages (substance database similar) make 10k quick to hit
