Indie dev defends criticism of Steam refund abuse amid review bombing of his game: ‘It’s wrong to refund a game after having fun with it and completing it’

XDeveloper Mateo Covic, who went viral for complaining that thousands of people had refunded his game after finishing it in less than two hours, says he’s not actually unhappy about the number of refunds or money he lost, or even Steam’s policy in general—he was merely expressing frustration with players who “bragged about having a fun time with the game and refunding it after completion.”

Covic is the solo dev of Paddle Paddle Paddle, sort of a very-low-budget Split Fiction. He got the ball rolling over the weekend when he shared an image of a one-line Steam review stating, “Great game, finished within 1:40 hrs (refunded).”

Tagging the official Steam account, Covic wrote on X, “This should not be possible. Would be cool if you could finally do something about your refund policy… Got dozens of reviews like that and 21% refund rate even though the reviews are 90% very positive… That’s over 55,000 Refunds btw.”

The message quickly blew up, and not entirely in good ways. Discussions about the obvious loophole in Steam’s refund policy and what might be done about it followed, but so did a brief review bombing of Paddle Paddle Paddle, which holds a “very positive” overall rating on Steam, but is “mixed” in recent reviews. Many of those negative reviews aren’t aimed at the game but at Covic himself, for suggesting that playing a game to completion and then refunding might be uncool.

(Image credit: Mateo Covic (Twitter))

My initial thought was that the numbers—55,000 refunds on a game that, according to SteamDB, hit a peak concurrent player count of 401— seemed a bit funky. I reached out to Mateo about it and he agreed: He’s not sure why they’re “pretty out of place,” as he put it, but he shared his sales data with me to prove they’re legit, and speculated that it might be simply because the game has enjoyed slow but steady sales since it launched in July 2025. He previously said Paddle Paddle Paddle had sold 150,000 copies on Steam back in December 2025.

Even the current controversy hasn’t really impacted the game’s sales trajectory, Covic said: “This discussion and virality right now did not change anything so far except that I’m getting plenty of hateful DMs daily and people review bombing my game.”

Covic said the tweet that started all of this was something of a misstatement: The 20% refund rate on Paddle Paddle Paddle is actually pretty normal for a “rage game”—the sort of thing streamers like to play and performatively scream about—he explained, and he wasn’t upset about the number of refunds but with people posting gleefully about playing the game from start to finish and then refunding it.

“My tweet phrasing was a complete mistake and I should have definitely not put the refund number in there,” Covic said. “This led to a big misunderstanding: I have absolutely no problem with refunds at all and did not care about that before my tweet. The game always had a refund rate of 20% and that’s normal.

“I just wanted to say that I think it’s wrong to refund a game after having fun with it and completing it. That was my only point.”

Covic does take issue with one aspect of Steam refunds: not the system itself, but the way people use it. “I wish that players would write down more useful comments … many (not all) refund comments are not really helpful,” he said.

“People refunded the game with the reason ‘game too difficult,’ and their comments do not really help me to improve or fix the game. Paddle Paddle Paddle is a rage game, so it was planned to be hard. I would like to read more constructive feedback here.”

As for those who liked Paddle Paddle Paddle well enough to play it from beginning to end but then refunded it anyway just because they could, Covic said that’s just not a philosophy he can support.

“One of the most common comments under my tweet was that a two-hour game isn’t worth paying for and should be free,” Covic told me. “Personally, I don’t agree with that. Some of the best games I’ve ever played, such as Fears to Fathom and A Short Hike, are incredible experiences that take less than two hours to finish.”

Despite all the kerfuffle, Covic is leaving the troublesome tweet up, saying he’s “not gonna hide this mistake.” For people who are seriously interested in Steam refund figures, he also recommended Simon Carless’ Game Discovery Co. newsletter from February 2025, which dives deep on the topic. (I echo that recommendation, for the record.)

Covic is now working on a roguelite called Rogue Jungle that’s expected to be out later this year.