Pokémon Players Are Seeking Refunds For Glitchy Scarlet & Violet

Some players of the new "Pokémon" games are seeking out a beast far more elusive than any Charizard or Snorlax. They're looking for a Nintendo Switch game refund.

"Pokémon Scarlet" and "Pokémon Violet" have made it to store shelves, ringing in a new generation of collectible creatures to battle and thrusting the franchise into the sort of open world structure that fans once only dreamed about. Unfortunately, this next jump forward for the series has proved to be anything but a clean leap. Prior to launch, early reactions to "Pokémon Scarlet" and "Pokémon Violet" indicated that the ninth generation games were notably far less polished than their predecessors. Unfortunately, those concerns proved to be accurate with the public release. Even with the "Day One" patch installed, players have encountered all manner of performance issues, visual bugs, texture glitches, lag spikes, and crashes thus far. 

Many users have sought ways to smooth the games out as much as possible, with some even finding that closing the game once every hour or two and reopening it temporarily mitigates the technical issues (via GamesRadar). For some, however, the issues are so egregious that they're washing their hands of the game entirely and seeking refunds for their purchase.

Several users on the r/Pokemon subreddit are attempting to get their copies of "Pokémon Scarlet" and "Pokémon Violet" refunded. u/Jaded_Goth wrote that they decided to seek a refund due to the games' performance issues. "Could you honestly look at this game and tell me this was their best effort?" the user posted. "The FPS and the graphics made me double check if I was accidentally playing this on a toaster."

Some users suggested that an additional patch could address the games' myriad issues. "Pokémon Legends: Arceus" received several patches, including the "Daybreak" update, which added content while also featuring minor performance and bug fixes. However, others argued holding out hope for an unannounced patch is risky. "If you genuinely are disappointed with the game, I'd strongly urge you to [refund] instead of complaining or trying to raise awareness of the game's issues," u/sellouthipster wrote. "I highly doubt any kind of fixes are coming — especially before Christmas — and I have zero urge to play a broken game."

Multiple users claim to have successfully refunded their digital copies by calling Nintendo, though they have done so with varying levels of ease. Some accounts, such as u/Hotdog_Daddy and u/tiredboxer, quickly received refunds, while others like u/Taldras had to persuade Nintendo to make a one-time exception to its general policy of no digital refunds. For physical copies, some users including u/xJadusable noted that retail outlets like GameStop have refund options, but mileage may vary based on location.