The future of the Kickstarter-funded MMO Ashes of Creation looks unclear at best and dire at worst, and if you're among the masses who bought the game on Steam and feel you aren't getting your money's worth, you might have success simply asking for a refund.
For some context, Ashes of Creation was the most successful MMO Kickstarter campaign ever, with the fundraiser launching in 2017 and raising almost $3.3 million. The game itself finally launched into Steam Early Access in December, and only a few weeks later its success would crumble into ashes (sorry) with the abrupt resignation of top leadership and mass layoffs.
Intrepid Studios founder and Ashes of Creation director Steven Sharif, who was the first to leave the company, said he resigned in protest after the Board seized control of the studio and started asking him to carry out unethical orders. After that, "much of the senior leadership team resigned" and Intrepid started notifying remaining staff of impending mass layoffs, according to Sharif.
Intrepid recently announced a developer update stream where it'll answer questions about the whole situation, but it's safe to say players are rightfully concerned. Former Intrepid communications manager Margaret Krohn announced her departure on LinkedIn and said she doesn't know how the game will continue "when the heart and soul of the product, the amazing dev team, was all laid off."
For all of those reasons, people want their money back. Kickstarter backers and those who bought the game straight from Intrepid may be out of luck, but Steam users are sharing scattered success stories even when they don't meet the platform's refund policy requirements. GamesRadar+ deputy news editor Catherine Lewis was able to get a refund for the game by submitting a help request and choosing the 'I have a question about this purchase' prompt rather than the refund request option. That seems to be your best shot at reaching an actual human and explaining the situation if you're past the refund date or your playtime exceeds the platform's policy for receiving a refund.
There are a bunch of useful Reddit threads from people who successfully received refunds for Ashes of Creation even with dozens of hours of playtime. Here are just a few I've found, some of them with language you can copy and paste into your own help request if you want to try that:
W Steam! Refund accepted from r/AshesofCreation
How to get a Steam refund on Ashes of Creation when you played more than 2 hours and after 2 weeks. from r/AshesofCreation
Steam accepted my refund request! from r/AshesofCreation
Steam accepted my refund request! from r/AshesofCreation
The lies of the false prophet have come to light. All hail our one TRUE lord and saviour: Lord Gaben from r/AshesofCreation
Steam's official policy is to automatically deny refunds for games played more than two hours or owned for more than two weeks, but it'll occasionally make exceptions in cases like Ashes of Creation. There's still no guarantee your request will be approved, but it's definitely worth a shot using the above information as guidance.
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