Minecraft Owners Denied Refunds for Lack of Split-Screen

The recently released Xbox 360 edition of the ever popular world-building game, Minecraft has had a somewhat rocky launch, as the game’s split-screen ability was not properly elaborated on to early purchasers. Unbeknownst to many of those who bought the game, the much-vaunted couch co-op functionality of the XBLA title is only available to those with an HDTV.

[Emilio_Estevez]

Dead Rising does the same thing. And Mojang didn't develop this one, 4j studios did.

[TheModernKamikaze]

Not telling the consumers that there's a catch in what you get: bad.

[Bereaver]

Tell me about it. My friend bought TERA and wasn't aware that game time cards weren't ready yet. So that 30 free days he got for pre-ordering can't be used because you have to have a subscription setup in order to play. Even if it is *free*, you still need to have a subscription ready to start when the 30 days are up. Talk about stupidity.

[Ser]

Only available for HDTVs eh?...Well, I can sympathize with the folks that were burned on this one...Of course, I'm only sympathetic if there was no fine print indicating that you needed an HDTV. If there was fine print...learn to read it?

[hazelamy]

the thing is, by all accounts, there wasn't.

this would seem to indicate that was in fact the case.

http://www.kotaku.com.au/20...

of course, i just checked, and they've added a line at the end about needing an hdtv.

but if they think that covers them for buyers who bought before they changed it, they're very much mistaken.

scee tried the same bullshit, changing the description of a product and expecting that new description to hold water, when they screwed up the minis pick and mix sale from christmas.

and they had to give refunds, ms will too.

[chadachada123]

Why would you get 4 disagrees...for supporting the guy right above you? That makes absolutely no sense.

[ElementX]

I'm surprised how many people own a 360 or PS3 and don't have an HDTV. I've had an HDTV for years, the first one I got was one of those massive Sony Trinitron tube tvs but it displayed up to 1080i and I was able to play some original Xbox games in 720p

[N4GGamer]

Think yourself lucky that you're not the typical parent who just bought his son/daughter minecraft to play in their own room. Kids don't get HDTV's for their bedrooms and most minecraft players are kids.

[GroundsKeeperJimbo]

Was digging around on the Minecraft forums and it seems that in Sub-HD split-screen all the text became un-readable, and a few of the textures would just look terrible.

Seems to me that you can patch in the ability and let the players decide if they want to stomach the graphics in sub-HD themselves.

[bahabeast]

split screen for hdtv only make no friggin sense IMO and yes their are still alot of people who dnt have hdtv's me myself just joined hdtv revolution last year and my tv is onli 24 inches but ill NEVER EVER go back to sdtv.

[Fishy Fingers]

Of course it does, playing co-op SD would offer each player around 1/4 the pixels a solo HD player would get (what the primary setup would be), that will have a hugely negative effect on details like text or textures.

[hazelamy]

even if there is a legitimate reason, they didn't warn people that a major feature would be disabled for non hdtv owners.

[Fishy Fingers]

Should of gone co-op on a HDTV then.

[hazelamy]

there was no warning that splitscreen would only work with a hdtv before the game was bought, like on their storefront.

legally i think ms are on shaky ground denying people a refund.

[Perjoss]

Surely there cannot be too many people that own a SDTV. If there was no fine print about this they should just refund them all the same though.

[Hufandpuf]

I say no refund. They should have bought the PC version instead.

[_LarZen_]

If poor people can scrape together money for a X360 and games they should be able to do so to with a little HD Ready tv..

This is 2012 aint it?

[Muffins1223]

Who the hell does not have a hdtv?They stopped making old ones like in 2002 or something...

[Trekster_Gamer]

You are oh so very clueless....

If it was advertised to work with all TV then they should be refunded. Plain and simple. But to assume everyone does not have a HDTV is just plain dumb.

[N4GGamer]

To make things worse, Notch has been tweeting how much lovely money he's made out of this. It's disappointing to know he's more worried about money now than customer satisfaction.