This deals with The Microsoft Store website for the United States (EN-US) and so games on it would be ones with the ESRB rating system. The information here does not universally hold true for other countries, languages or rating systems.
If you were selling things, and part of your system was broken in some small but potentially impactful way, would you want to be told about it? Know about it? Fix it? Or would you not give anyone any easy way to tell you, and then ignore attempts to let you know about it?
How's your website working, seems like a question somebody would want to be aware of, and repair if at fault. Even if by and large it all works splendidly for huge volumes of customers and is a sort of technical marvel. Or not.
As far as we can see from the outside, Microsoft has contracted Digital River to run the entirety of e-commerce for The Microsoft Store. That is, the microsoftstore website, That scope appears to include the "chat now" button (pre-sales reps via text) or calling the toll-free number on the webpage for questions and help. The outside (we do not have any sort of in-depth first-hand knowledge of the specifics) includes the text on the website about the hosting, informational postings (including FAQ pages) and text/voice communications with various of these aspects.
The end result here is that the microsoftstore website and communications avenues are not with Microsoft itself, but rather those contracting to and working on their behalf. You are not dealing with Microsoft itself. There appears very little (nothing) in the direct way to contact anyone with any power or responsibility when it comes to the microsoftstore website . That includes the lack of any direct feedback mechanism on the webpage, no direct email addresses to any named entity or representative, or communication methods to anyone other than the first line of contact (Tier 1, Level 1) . This includes via social media, as those who might answer such things are not part of the online store mechanism.
In general, the only way to contact anyone involved "directly" is via phone, and the only people answering the phone are reading out of a book that often will not cover the issue a caller might be interested in. That often times is nothing but an expanded web FAQ a caller might be able to read most or all of themselves. This lack of information also includes physically contacting a Microsoft Store, as they are not part of those running the website either. All in all, any other means outside of this by which one may believe they can ask about or find about about something wrong or problematic will only refer back to calling the people that can't deal with anything out of the ordinary.
This system is dysfunctional and of little help to those who might actually need it.
Such things might be of little surprise to anyone, and many are likely quite aware of getting the runaround from a multi-faceted decentralized conglomerate that often has parts of itself going haywire and off kilter (say, the way the Xbox One was originally "marketed") in any number of methods and manners.
As we've mentioned elsewhere at length here, two of the biggest games the end of this year are big deals.
Specifically, Fallout 4 and Halo 5 are the two games in this tale.
You might think that being of such import and so eagerly awaited by the gaming community, that everything would be proper and no customer would be trying to inform anyone of problems with their sale, be a potential issue large or small.
Yet, problems small though they were are exactly what happened with The Microsoft Store when trying to order physical copies of those two games online. Nothing insurmountable (or even there to intrude in one case) but wrong nonetheless. A wrongness that revolves around the ratings for the two games.
We aren't big fans of the ESRB. It's at best an annoyance to adults in general, and we happen to be of the opinion that the idea of moderating children in these sorts of ways is usually at best pointless. It should be all up to the parents, not a trade group or society. Still, how we feel about the group or their ratings (or the entire question of responsibility and maturity) isn't the issue -- the fact and reality of the practicality is that companies selling games set their behaviors according to the game's ESRB rating.
So how does microsoftstore handle the two games? Backwards.
First, Fallout 4. This game (just like the last one) is rated M. This means that according to the ESRB, it should be for those who are 17 or older. Effectively, it's a "will not be sold to those under 18 and parents take care if you get it" marking. If you walk into a store to get this, almost all retailers of this game will age verify any purchaser of Fallout 4 is over 17 via drivers license or the like. Online is trickier, as it can be expected that anyone buying such will be using a credit card or other method where you can't get the mechanism for purchase unless you're at least 18. (For those mechanisms that a parent can set up for those under 18, the adult is responsible for setting up restrictions online or by rules).
Whatever. How does the microsoftstore website handle the game? In no way. Anyone visiting the page can look at it and see the marketing materials and order it. Which leads one to believe they wrongly think the game is T. Either way, see for yourself. US Microsoft Store Website for Fallout 4
Second, Halo 5. This game (unlike the rest of the FPS in the series) is rated T. This means according to the ESRB, it should be for those who are 13 and older. Effectively, it's a "go ahead and buy this for your kid and let them play it alone it's okay" marking. If you walk into a store to get this, almost no retailer will even glance at somebody purchasing Halo 5.. Well maybe not if they were 6 and alone, the same way it would be odd if they were buying a bike and gave the clerk a hundred. Online is also trickier, for the same reason above, the payment method is rather its own age verification.
Whatever. How does the microsoftstore website handle this game? Before you can go to the page with the game or any of its marketing materials (which lie about on the Xbox website and youtube fully age unrestricted) or order it, you have to fill in that your age is 18 or over, or it blocks you. Yes, not 13 or over, 18. Which leads one to believe they wrongly think the game is M. Either way, see for yourself. US Microsoft Store Website for Halo 5
That's that then.
Forget for a minute about the at least somewhat pointlessness of age verification (age gates) online anyway. After all, it's not like an eight-year-old doesn't know to just fill in the year to the one on the bottom of the list (in this case you'd have a date of birth as 1 1 1905). It isn't as if you don't need a payment method that verifies your age anyway. So at best an age gate (whatever a game's rating) is superfluous, and indeed the first questions somebody might ask about seeing one here on this game might be "What, did you have a problem ordering?" or "Were you unable to pass the date of birth page?" Not "What's the point of an age gate for something you have to buy with a credit card?" or "Yeah, why would they have one for a T game and not an M game?"
The issue though isn't geting past the page, or age verifications themselves, or if you (as an adult or when logged in) need to be presented with one though, It's why would you ever try and age verify somebody for a T game but not for an M game. If one, why not the other? If you're going to bother, why not the one with the 17 and up "rating" and not the 13 and up "suggestion"?
Something's broken, and that something could conceivably hurt sales for the T game, and even if not, it just makes you look inept to be asking for an age for the one nobody in physical-land asks for. While leaving the one everyone in physical-land checks on alone.
Even more broken appears to be the lack of a system for finding somebody who might be able to fix it. Or really, even somebody that cares at all. Regardless of how silly it may or may not be for a customer to be concerned.
And so we call that customer hostile.
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