Terms of use
These are the rules for using porchlight.gg. They're written to be read. By playing as a guest, making an account or buying Premium, you agree to them. How we handle your data is on the privacy page.
The short version
- The games are free, and they stay free. Premium is an optional monthly membership for cosmetics.
- Be decent to the people you play with. We remove people who aren't.
- Cancel Premium any time in two clicks. You keep it until the end of what you paid for.
- Changed your mind? Ask within 14 days of a charge and we'll refund it.
Who can use Porchlight
You must be 13 or older to make an account. If you're under the age where your country lets you agree to terms like these yourself, a parent or guardian has to agree for you. Keep your password to yourself: you're responsible for what happens on your account. One person per account; don't sell, share or trade accounts.
How to behave
Porchlight is a place for people to play games together. Don't:
- harass, threaten, or abuse other players, or target anyone for who they are;
- post sexual content, hateful content, spam, or links meant to scam or infect people;
- cheat: use bots, scripts or outside help in ranked games, collude with other players, or throw games to move someone's rating;
- pick a username that breaks these rules or pretends to be someone else, staff included;
- attack the site: probe for weaknesses, overload it, scrape it, or try to get into other people's accounts. If you find a security problem, tell us at the address above and we'll thank you.
Moderators can mute, suspend or remove accounts that break these rules, and remove what they posted. Most problems get a warning or a mute first; serious ones don't. If you think we got it wrong, write to us. Suspended accounts can still get a copy of their data or have it deleted (see the privacy page).
What you write
What you write in chat, messages, your bio and the story game stays yours. You let us store and show it to the people it's meant for (and, for story games, anyone who opens the replay) for as long as it's on the site. Don't post anything you don't have the right to share.
Premium
- What it is: an optional membership that adds cosmetics, such as a star by your name and extra table surfaces. What's included may grow; we won't take something that's free and make it Premium, and we won't remove what Premium includes without telling members first.
- Monthly: $8 a month, charged when you subscribe and then every month on the same date until you cancel. Sales tax is added where the law requires it, and checkout shows the total before you pay.
- One month: a one-time $8 payment for a month of Premium. It doesn't renew and there's nothing to cancel.
- Cancelling: account drawer → Premium → Manage subscription → Cancel. No email, no call, no questions. Premium stays on until the end of the month you've paid for, then stops; you won't be charged again.
- Prices: if the monthly price ever changes, we'll email subscribers at least 30 days before it applies, and you can cancel before then.
- Payments are handled by Stripe. We never see your card number.
Refunds
- Within 14 days of any charge, write to contact@porchlight.gg from the email on your account (or tell us your username) and we'll refund that charge in full, no reason needed. Premium from that charge ends when it's refunded.
- After 14 days, charges aren't refundable, except when something went wrong on our side: a double charge, a charge after you canceled, or Premium not working. Those we always fix.
- Refunds go back to the card you paid with and usually show up within 5 to 10 business days, depending on your bank.
- If your account is suspended or removed for breaking these rules, unused Premium isn't refunded, but any subscription is canceled so you aren't charged again.
- Nothing here takes away rights you have under the law where you live.
Closing your account
You can delete your account any time from the account drawer. Deleting it cancels any Premium subscription first. We may close accounts that break these rules, or that have gone unused for a long time (the privacy page says how long, and we email a warning first if we have an address).
The service
We work hard to keep Porchlight running, but it's provided as it is, without guarantees: games can have bugs, the site can go down, and we may change, add or retire games and features. Restarts for updates are announced in the lobby first. Ratings and leaderboards are for fun, and we may correct or reset them if something went wrong.
To the extent the law allows, Porchlight Technologies, LLC isn't liable for indirect or consequential losses from using the site, and our total liability to you is limited to what you paid us in the 12 months before the claim. Some places don't allow these limits, in which case they apply only as far as the law there allows.
Changes and the legal bits
If we change these terms in a way that matters, the date at the top changes and the lobby says so for a while; for changes that affect Premium members, we email them too. Carrying on using the site after a change means you accept it; if you don't, you can cancel and delete your account. These terms are governed by the laws of Texas and the United States. If part of them turns out to be unenforceable, the rest still applies.