Please do not trust Pretendo's paid services

[Ondrashek06]

When I paid them $10 for a month of Juxtaposition access on 3DS, it kept giving me "error 000-0000" and no Miiverse. No support email or anything to contact for help or a refund. Their database of errors said fuck-all about 000-0000.

If you're thinking to give them money to access their paid services, don't. You'll end up $10 poorer and with no service.

 

[Jayro]

So you knowingly paid for a scam, and then...
*checks notes*
...complain about being scammed on GBAtemp.

Nice.

 

[lone_wolf323]

Hilarious you bothered to even pay for such a thing. Even more so when the app you are wanting is only claimed to be 38% completed on their so called website.

 

[NandoLawson]

So you knowingly paid for a scam, and then...
*checks notes*
...complain about being scammed on GBAtemp.

Nice.

Since when is Pretendo scam?

 

[PoorPocketsMcNewHold]

They do offer support on their Discord, but it's a community one. Don't expect a dedicated support team to be there however.
You should not consider this as a "paid service" but as a donation. Their end goal is indeed to have servers be available for free, which some already are, mostly for Wii U games if i recall for the "stable" servers.

 

[lone_wolf323]

They do offer support on their Discord, but it's a community one. Don't expect a dedicated support team to be there however.
If you haven't used any of it yet, you could instead perhaps, ask for a refund then, if you haven't already. You should not consider this as a "paid service" but as a donation. Their end goal is indeed to have servers be available for free, which some already are, mostly for Wii U games if i recall for the "stable" servers.

You do realize there is a world of difference between using the phrase donation as opposed to a paid service. If this is a donation then OP would be screwed in getting any sort of a refund.

 

[PoorPocketsMcNewHold]

You do realize there is a world of difference between using the phrase donation as opposed to a paid service. If this is a donation then OP would be screwed in getting any sort of a refund.

Indeed. Should have precise that's it's very unlilely they'll get one. I meant to just "try asking nicely" but shouldn't have given them them hope they'll get a refund. Will edit my post accordingly.

 

[lone_wolf323]

Well. After looking at Pretendos discord.

1. Its labeled Free service everywhere on there. and

2. What the heck did you pay for with it? Where is it stated theres some sorta paid services with it?

 

[anotherthing]

Where is it stated theres some sorta paid services with it?

The button to sign up for their $10 a month thing is quite literally labeled "Donate".

But it's good to know that the 3DS side of things isn't quite mature yet. Not sure why they started with the Wii U stuff first when you look at how many people own 3DS models versus the sales of the Wii U, but here we are.

 

[SylverReZ]

Pretendo is free, so why are you offered to pay for it? There is a donate button if you wanna help with server costs and that's about it. The devs will not solicitate you to pay for their services, and if that's the case, then its a scam.

If you need any help, then their Discord server offers plenty of advice if you're troubleshooting issues with installing Pretendo.

 

[NandoLawson]

Afaik you are able to upgrade your account to play one the beta servers, but it is promised to be free when the services development is finished.

 

[RedDucks]

1. It's not a "paid service". Everything that isn't in beta is always open to the public, and there's already several games like this. We also hold an open beta at least once a year, but often times more than that. Each game is worked on independently, so there is no ETA for when any one game will come out of beta. We are a small team with only one full time person, and literally hundreds of games to get through. Not to mention all the other related services not directly tied to games being functional (Pretendo is not just game servers. It's an entire Nintendo Network replacement)
2. Donating to support the project is always optional, and is a way to support development. As a way to make people feel like they got something of value for supporting, they get access to the beta servers. But again, once out of beta it's always available to everyone. You can simply choose not to donate and wait for games to come out of beta when they come out
3. As noted already, there is support on Discord but there's also GitHub issues, Twitter DMs, and a dedicated forum channel for beta users. All of which could have been accessed. As mentioned this is mostly community run, but you always have the option to ping staff and developers if there's a serious problem, and things generally get forwarded to the correct channels fairly quickly
4. Despite these being just donations and not a "paid service", there are dozens of instances of refunds being issued to people, for several reasons. Including people unhappy with the service, realizing they won't be able to use it (IE, the game they wanted isn't supported), etc

We are often more than happy to work with people, you just have to actually given us the opportunity to do so

Not sure why they started with the Wii U stuff first when you look at how many people own 3DS models versus the sales of the Wii U, but here we are.

Because it's what I owned at the start of the project, and when I started things my only real goal at the time was Super Mario Maker. That's really the only reason. I originally had no plans to do anything more than that, but I eventually switched gears and decided it would make more sense to just replace all of NN than only stitch together pieces of it

But it's also a bit inaccurate to say the 3DS side is less mature than the Wii U side as we have people on the team now dedicated to the 3DS. It's less "one console is less mature", and more "the whole project is beta software so issues are expected to crop up at some point on both platforms". The 3DS and Wii U actually share quite a bit of the same backend (same account server, same Miiverse server, sometimes the same game servers for instances like the friends apps and Super Mario Maker). So they are both relatively the same level of "maturity". It's just not out of beta, for a reason

 

[The Catboy]

Maybe don’t pay for free services.
You should be able to do a charge back

 

[J-Will]

Besides, you can still play online on Nintendo's servers until April 2024.

 

[SonicMan44]

The button to sign up for their $10 a month thing is quite literally labeled "Donate".

But it's good to know that the 3DS side of things isn't quite mature yet. Not sure why they started with the Wii U stuff first when you look at how many people own 3DS models versus the sales of the Wii U, but here we are.

sigh just pay on their patreon.

 

[tfwh2ubzat]

Imagine complaining about bugs in a non-commercial beta that you voluntarily opted into paying for, as a donation to support development of a massive undertaking that promises to breathe new life into a handful of our favorite systems that have been mercilessly abandoned by their manufacturer - a massive undertaking that is already showing great progress in delivering on those promises.

If you can contribute in kind to, or can afford to contribute financially to, development - that's fantastic! But lets not start complaining about the project, and worse yet falsely accusing the devs (who we should all be very grateful to) of perpetuating a scam. SMDH.

Pretendo is not yet perfect, and not yet fully-functional. But it's an absolute hail mary on the part of the devs/community in effort to save our cherished 3ds-family and WiiU systems from gathering dust in a closet. Frankly I'm very impressed with what has already been delivered, and I have very high hopes and expectations for this project.