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Pokemon Scarlet and Violet‘s release has been plagued by bugs, ranging from strange graphical glitches to useful exploits, to a more frustrating set of game crashes and performance issues. Coupled with complaints about the game’s design, some fans have decided to seek refunds for their copies of Pokemon Scarlet and Pokemon Violet.
Soon after the game launched, threads started popping up in the Pokemon subreddit with players chronicling their attempts to seek a refund from Nintendo customer service. While the Nintendo eShop has a flat policy that disallows refunds because of a change of mind, an accidental purchase, or because players don’t like the game, it will honor refunds for faulty products.
Players have to go through customer service to request a refund, where they will talk to a Nintendo rep to plead their case. Most Reddit users who have posted about successful refunds say they have used the game’s performance issues and crashes to argue that the game is faulty, requiring a refund. User u/Hotdog_Daddy even claimed that “the rep actually told me that given the situation regarding the state of Pokemon S/V she would elevate my case to ensure the refund was approved.”
So far players have reported successful refunds in a number of regions, with some countries having strong consumer protection laws that entitle customers to refunds in cases where a product is faulty, or different to what was advertised. Not all refund seekers have been successful, however, and others have said that the process for them to be accepted for a refund was intentionally tedious.
Nintendo hasn’t issued any official statement on the Pokemon refunds at present. While complaints about performance issues have been widespread, it’s unlikely Pokemon Violet and Scarlet will reach the same level of widespread refunding that prompted Cyberpunk 2077 to offer an unconditional refund window after its release. Despite its issues, Pokemon Violet and Scarlet have sold a huge number of units since its release, setting records not just for the Pokemon series, but for Nintendo games in general.
