EA recently removed several game modes, such as Rush and Squad Deathmatch, from Battlefield 6’s matchmaking. One player refused to accept this and requested a refund from Steam despite having played for hundreds of hours.
The rules are actually clear: Anyone who wants to return a game on Steam should have played no more than two hours and request a refund within 14 days of purchase. Steam usually approves these refunds without issue. But after hundreds of hours of play, the odds are usually slim.
ForBattlefield 6an extreme exception has now been triggered: The Reddit user ExplorEverythingOncerequested a full refund for his purchased Phantom Edition of Battlefield 6 (100 euros), even though he had already clocked an impressive 470 hours of gameplay.The surprising part: Steam ruled in his favor and refunded the full purchase price.
EA Removes Rush Mode
This move came in response to the community’s frustration after EA removed several game modes from the shooter’s matchmaking system.As a result, the traditional 12v12 attack-and-defense mode “Rush” was removed from regular matchmaking without replacement.Other modes, such as “King of the Hill” and “Squad Deathmatch,” had already been removed previously.
So these modes haven’t disappeared from the game permanently, but they can no longer be searched for or played directly through the official matchmaking system. You can still find them via Battlefield Portal (or custom servers), though player counts are lower there, as a large portion of the community still prefers the quick matchmaking search.
For the affected Steam user, this was the proverbial straw that broke the camel’s back. Since Rush was by far his most-played mode in Battlefield 6, he contacted Steam Support directly and denounced the removal.
Argument Convinces Steam Support
In hispost on Reddit, in which he also shares screenshots of the successful refund as proof, he describes his approach:
I contacted Steam Support and explained that several game modes had been removed without warning nearly a year after the game’s release. I provided them with a link to the Battlefield website, which lists all the modes that are supposed to be available via matchmaking, as well as the latest Community Broadcast.
The Steam representative agreed with this argument and approved a full refund for the Phantom Edition of Battlefield 6. The discrepancy between the product’s advertising and the actual in-game content was apparently sufficient to warrant an exception.The user received a full refund of the $109.24 he had paid at launch.
If you take a look at the official
Why is EA removing these game modes?
There is now an official explanation for the removal:Too many parallel modes would divide the Battlefield 6 player base too much.This would lead to longer wait times and matches that would increasingly have to be filled with bots.
To counteract this fragmentation, the developers have limited official matchmaking to a selection of the most popular modes. With Season 5, an improved server browser is also set to be integrated, making it easier for the community to search for and host such game modes.
For fans of the removed modes, however, this is only a small consolation for now. It’s also unclear whether Steam will approve further refund requests due to the lack of matchmaking modes. In such exceptional cases, Valve reserves the right to make decisions on a case-by-case basis, which will be evaluated individually by support staff.
