Tag:

Developer

Steam is now blocking NSFW updates for published adult-only games, according to a raunchy RPG developer

by admin September 19, 2025

The great ‘dematuring’ of videogames continues with reports that Valve are now forbidding “post-launch NSFW content” for games on Steam, even those that are already “adult-only”. That’s according to Crimson Delight Games, the developers of fantasy RPG Tales of Legendary Lust: Aphrodisia. They launched it on September 15th with adult content warnings, after submitting it to Valve’s review process in August, and had planned to add sexy scenes through updates while working on a big DLC expansion for 2026.

These updates are not going to happen anymore, apparently because everybody’s favourite PG-rated cartoon villains, global payment networks, are putting pressure on Valve. Instead, the updates will need to be submitted as proper official DLC so that Valve can give them a formal review.

This will likely mean more work for the devs and potentially, release delays, compared to the relative ease of publishing an update or patch – as Valve explain in their FAQ, “Steam makes it easy to patch your game or add content at any time that you need to in order to best serve your audience on your schedule”.

“We were told all new adult content for our game has to go through DLC, presumably so it can be reviewed and approved,” the developers wrote in response to a Reddit post about the situation this week. We don’t know the inner workings of Valve / Steam, but we’re in a couple of NSFW dev communities and these new rules weren’t in place before the Collective Shout uproar and subsequent payment processors’ censorship.”

If you’re new to Collective Shout, they’re an Australian activist group who campaign against “the objectification of women and sexualisation of girls in media, advertising and popular culture”, and are also affiliated with conservative groups who campaign against sex work and pornography at large.

Back in July, Collective Shout claimed credit for stampeding Mastercard, Visa and other payment processing companies and networks into forbidding the transaction of a vast number of sexually themed or otherwise “NSFW” adult games on Steam and Itch, including a lot of games from queer developers. Collective Shout have yet to properly explain which individual games they consider unfit for sale and why.

Steam and Itch have now changed their policies to give the payment networks some control over what counts as acceptable “adult” material. They have also delisted or removed a lot of games, with Itch electing to seek out new payment partners while revising their catalogue. Valve are reportedly denying the release of “mature” games under Steam early access, possibly because (to echo Crimson Delight’s point above) the platform holder needs to be able to review the finished work before approving it for sale. I say ‘reportedly’ and ‘possibly’ because Valve still haven’t made a formal comment on these recent events. I’ll ask them again now.

In the Reddit thread about the rejected NSFW updates, Crimson Delight have only good things to say about Valve’s handling of the situation. “I have to say the reviewer was kind and forthcoming, we didn’t feel threatened or bullied in any way, and we got the feeling they were trying to do their best to help devs navigate the process,” developer Frenzin writes. “But the fact of the matter is that Valve has payment processors breathing down their neck, and the rules keep getting stricter as time goes on.”

“Valve isn’t the problem here,” Frenzin continues. “The big credit card companies are. If anything, Valve has stood up to them and pushed back. They could’ve simply nuked the 18+ section of Steam, but they didn’t, they stuck up for developers. Obviously adult games make Valve money, but it’s a drop in the bucket compared to the rest of Steam’s catalogue. Silksong itself probably earned Valve more than most NSFW titles put together.

“Given that we’re erogame devs, we’re against any sort of censorship (as long as the content isn’t sexualizing minors or nonconsensual in any way),” the developer comments. “But it’s important to understand where the real problem lies, and it’s not with Valve.”

My very Lukewarm Take regarding the on-going NSFW/mature game crackdown is that people should be allowed to get their rocks off to whatever responsibly created fictitious media they choose in the absence of evidence that they are doing harm, and large finance corporations with no actual mandate to serve the public interest shouldn’t play the part of moral sentinel.

I’d flesh that argument out with reference to Tales of Legendary Lust, but my efforts are hindered by the UK’s new Online Safety Act, which requires me to verify my age to visit the game’s Steam page and visit the developer’s subreddit (thanks to Automaton for being the messenger). I don’t have a credit card for Steam verification, and Reddit’s camera age verification widget seems to think that my age defies categorisation. Which, you know, fair dos. You can find a SFW version of the game on Itch, though.

Source link

September 19, 2025 0 comments

Game Reviews

Despite a change in developer, Little Nightmares 3’s new demo suggests more of the same, for better or worse

by admin September 19, 2025

Little Nightmares 3 has a demo! And if you were worried a new developer might mean big changes for the well-received horror series, this generous playable jaunt through ancient corners suggests – for better or worse – there’s nothing to fear.

Little Nightmares 3 demo

Developer: Supermassive Games
Publisher: Bandai Namco
Platform: Played on PC
Availability: Out now on PlayStation, Xbox, Switch, and Steam

This third macabre tale brings an entirely new crew of adorably creepy moppets to put through the wringer; there’s the bird-masked Low, with his trusty bow and arrow, and the spanner-wielding Alone, hidden behind her helmet and goggles. Solo, you’re free to pick either and the game controls the other. But unlike Little Nightmares 2 – which remained a strictly single-player affair despite introducing dual protagonists – optional co-op is supported, meaning there’s now properly room for two on this grim adventure.

Beyond that, though, Supermassive Games (the studio behind Until Dawn and the Dark Pictures Anthology, here taking over from original developer Tarsier) very much appears to be working to a familiar script. That means pint-sized peril in side-scrolling platform adventure form, where pursuit set-pieces against giant grotesqueries are punctuated by physics-based puzzles.

It’s a perfectly solid formula, but Little Nightmares has always been best defined by its distinctive ambience, where the world and its horrors feel like they’ve slithered straight from a child’s imagination. That, series fans will be relieved to discover, is amply evident in the demo; the intimidatingly cavernous spaces and unfathomable heights of its sand-blasted ancient city backdrop – the Necropolis – immediately make you feel very vulnerable and very, very small. And it’s all brought to life with an instantly recognisable visual identity built around suffocatingly thick particles and extreme contrasts of light and dark. Honestly, if someone hadn’t told me, I don’t think I’d ever have guessed this was the work of a brand-new team.

Little Nightmares 3 demo trailer.Watch on YouTube

Unfortunately, the demo suggests that in so closely adhering to a well-established formula, Supermassive has replicated many of the series’ worst habits too. Little Nightmares 1 was already a fussy, fuzzy thing, but it was intriguing enough – and refreshing enough – to carry me through. Second time around and the relentless parade of returning micro-frustrations eventually wore me down, and – if 3’s demo is representative of the full game – many remain.

Image credit: Eurogamer/Supermassive Games

We’ve got fussy platforming where the ability to move in and out of the screen never quite gels with the side-on camera; already I’ve spent far too much time failing trivial tasks – toppling off beams, overshooting ledges, and misjudging jumps – thanks to perspective obfuscation.

We’ve trial-and-error insta-death sequences paired with checkpoints on the wrong side of a dull busywork; a speed-reliant combat sequence at odds with the ponderous controls, plus poor environmental signposting. Twice in the demo I ground to a halt because the lighting, level design, and camera placement heavily suggested the path forward was into the screen when it was actually the opposite, secreted along a shadowy route entirely off-camera. None of this is particularly new for the series, but that doesn’t make it any less of an irritation.

Image credit: Eurogamer/Supermassive Games

The hope, then, is that the good stuff will be plentiful enough to offset the familiar frustration, and there’s still promise in the way Supermassive has captured the series’ grimly fascinating spirit. Even the demo – with its scores of shroud-covered corpses and streets of eerily statuesque dead – manages to suggest so much history without ever saying a word. Granted, the giant doll-baby that pursues you throughout is a bit rote compared to some of the series’ best abominations, but I’m willing to give it a pass based on how the demo ends.

And really, there’s still nothing else quite like Little Nightmares (until Tarsier’s similarly styled kids-in-dark-places adventure Reanimal, at least), so I’m unquestionably onboard for more. Little Nightmares 3’s demo is available now on PlayStation, Xbox, Switch, and PC if you want to try it yourself, and the full game arrives on 10th October.

Source link

September 19, 2025 0 comments

Esports

Adult game developer claims SubscribeStar has “soft-banned” their NSFW game

by admin September 17, 2025

The developer of adult game Degrees of Lewdity claims they have been “soft-banned” from Patreon-like subscription platform SubscribeStar, positing ongoing action from conservative activists may be to blame.

Although the page is allegedly still available, a search for the game’s name now no longer returns any results, and anyone who does manage to find it will discover they can no longer submit payments or support the project.

“My Subscribe Star page has been soft banned, if that’s the term,” Vrelnir wrote on their blog. “It’s still there in a sense, but people can no longer support me, payments are no longer being accepted, and I cannot post the update there. I haven’t been informed why. I’ve contacted support, but have yet to receive a response.

“Due to the timing, I suspect this is connected with the recent troubles regarding internet privacy and freedom, in the UK in particular, with governments restricting access to adult content,” they added (thanks, TheGamer). “It’s part of an international trend to control the sort of content people can access, and create. I’ve heard a lot about activist groups spearheading this, about Mastercard and Visa pressuring governments.”

The UK reference likely pertains to the UK’s Online Safety Act (OSA), which is reportedly already making studios reconsider certain in-game features due to the new rules set out by the OSA.

GamesIndustry.biz has invited SubscribeStar to comment and will update as/when we hear back from the company.

This is the latest in a string of high-profile changes by digital storefronts like Steam and itch.io following pressure by its payment processors and conservative activitists to moderate adult content on their sites. Itch.io “deindexed” all adult NSFW content from its browse and search pages back in July after an open letter from conservative campaign group Collective Shout called for a stop to “payment processors profiting from rape, incest and child abuse games on Steam,” targeting the CEOs of PayPal, Mastercard, Visa, Discover, and Japan Credit Bureau (JCB).

For more on the situation, read our feature, what’s going on with Steam and itch.io’s crackdown on adult content. Yesterday (September 15), we reported that Valve seemingly no longer permits games with “mature themes” to be released in early access.

Source link

September 17, 2025 0 comments

Esports

Vampire Survivors’ developer created publisher to “share the luck” with other indie studios

by admin September 16, 2025

Poncle founder and Vampire Survivors creator, Luca Galante, has said the team established publishing arm Poncle Presents to “give something back to the indie community.”

In a recent interview with GamesRadar, Galante, who developed and published Vampire Survivors under the studio name Poncle, explained that the (now expanded) team established its publishing arm to share what it learned from the game’s development with other indie studios.

“Basically, we got very lucky with Vampire Survivors,” Galante told the publication. “The game has been so successful that – we definitely made some mistakes when it comes to putting the game out there, but we learned a lot, and wanted to try to sort of share what we learned with other indies.

“It was a way to try and give something back to the indie community, share the luck.”

Indie studio Poncle revealed its publishing division, Poncle Presents, in September 2024, emphasising that it would not operate as a “traditional publisher” but would work more as a label or fund to enable people to “make their games.”

Galante said he sees “a lot of publishers I don’t like” and uses these to “define what a good publisher should be.”

He went on to explain that he sees “a lot” of publishers that “exploit the platforms just to make money,” by putting out “games that are incomplete or in early access that actually never get completed.”

Instead, Galante believes publishers should “make genuine games, genuine products, something that has some real value” and understand “that not everything can be a breakout hit.”

This is the reason Poncle Present plans to “keep supporting games post-launch” regardless of how successful they are because “once you put the game out there, you have an audience, and as big or small as it is, that audience deserves to be treated fairly.”

The publisher has so far released two titles, both indies under $5: Doonutsaur’s arcade roguelite Kill the Brickman and Nao Games’ hack n’ slasher Berserk or Die.

Poncle Presents is primarily focusing on small teams that are “very transparent in what they do,” with Galante seeing a publisher’s role as “making the developers and the players happy” rather than simply a business.

While there are currently no plans for a Vampire Survivors sequel, Poncle announced in 2023 that an animated TV show based on the hit roguelike had been greenlit.

Source link

September 16, 2025 0 comments

Game Reviews

Balatro update delayed as developer preserves “hobbyist” approach to ensure this isn’t the last update the game gets

by admin September 15, 2025

Balatro was set to receive a 1.1 update this year, but its solo developer LocalThunk has pushed it back in order to preserve his “hobbyist” approach to game development.

In a statement titled “I’m slow”, the developer apologised for the delay, adding he “probably shouldn’t have announced any date”. “I feel bad for not keeping that promise, and I am sorry,” he said.

Since release, LocalThunk has been crunching alone on a balance patch and a mobile port, before taking some time out and then beginning 1.1 work slowly this year. “However, I chose to only work on the game like I did when the project began, as a hobbyist,” he said, “and it turns out that it’s a lot slower than working in crunch mode 12 hours per day like I was around launch.”

Balatro Mobile – Official Release Date TrailerWatch on YouTube

LocalThunk said the prospect of rushing the work “felt terrible”. “I am working slowly, but I like it that way,” he said.

“I have never, before Balatro, set a deadline for any of my creative projects and I now realise how important that is for my process,” he continued. “I am in a very lucky position in that I can choose to work this job however I wish, and I think the best version of ‘work’ for me is the version that makes me want to come back to my keyboard every day, healthy, and hopefully just as excited about game development 5 years from now as I am today. I don’t want 1.1 to be the last update this game gets.”

As such, the 1.1 update will be “done when it’s done”, and will be available for free across all platforms. It just won’t be this year.

He concluded: “The Balatro player in me will absolutely not allow me walk away from developing this game…Rest assured, it will happen.”

After a shaky start with ratings boards, Balatro has gone on to find phenomenal success. LocalThunk has 100 percent completed his own game, which has “equipped” him to better design the next update.

This is a news-in-brief story. This is part of our vision to bring you all the big news as part of a daily live report.

Love Eurogamer? Make us a Preferred Source on Google and catch more of our coverage in your feeds.

Source link

September 15, 2025 0 comments

Game Updates

Vampire Survivors developer Poncle on what it takes to be a good publisher: “Not everything can be a breakout hit”

by admin September 14, 2025

Getting your game a publishing deal has never been an easy thing to do. Right now, it’s especially hard given that for many publishers, if it doesn’t seem like a guaranteed hit, it likely isn’t something they’ll take on. This is something that Vampire Survivors developer Poncle, or rather the actual person, Luca Galante, takes great issue with, and in a recent interview he spoke more broadly of his issues with publishers, and his thoughts on now being one.

“I see a lot of publishers I don’t like, and I think that’s my way to define what a good publisher should be, probably,” Galante explained to GamesRadar. “I see a lot of publishers that try to exploit the platforms just to make money, basically, because the video game industry is very obviously an industry that makes a lot of money. There is a lot of money to make. I see that these publishers will try and just exploit platforms for money.”

He went on to note how there are publishers who will put out simply incomplete games, or early access games that never get finished, and that for him, “what a publisher should do is, first of all, make genuine games, genuine products, something that has some real value, and then understand that not everything can be a breakout hit.” Galante also spoke of the importance of post-launch support, and for him this is “definitely a big thing from my point of view that publishers should be able to offer.”

As of now, Poncle has published two games, Berserk or Die, a beat ’em up where you have to mash your keyboard to beat enemies, and Kill the Brickman, a Brick Breaker-esque, turn-based roguelike game, both of which are cheap as chips (£3 and £4 respectively).

It’s these kinds of affordable games with smaller teams that Galante wants to lean towards in publishing, and in particular his priority is to find devs “that are very transparent in what they do, they want to talk with their community, and they have a real, genuine passion for making games.” Not only that, it’s important to him that these devs get to realise their vision by enriching it, as opposed to forcing in things like microtransactions or season passes.

Galante is, perhaps most importantly, fully aware with how lucky he got with Vampire Survivors, and that’s why he wants to publish other games. “We definitely made some mistakes when it comes to putting the game out there, but we learned a lot, and wanted to try to sort of share what we learned with other indies. It was a way to try and give something back to the indie community, share the luck.” Good luck indeed! At this point in time, every dev needs every ounce of the stuff they can get.

Source link

September 14, 2025 0 comments

Game Updates

Balatro’s 1.1 update won’t come out this year, so developer Localthunk can keep working at a healthy pace

by admin September 13, 2025

Balatro’s free 1.1 update won’t release in 2025 as originally planned, developer Localthunk has announced. There’s no new release date, but they say the update’ll arrive when they’ve been able to complete it, while continuing to work at a healthy pace.

This update was first announced by publishers Playstack in August last year, with Localthunk subsequently revealing in a chat with Bloomberg that it’ll feature, among other stuff, some new jokers and a revamp of the Matador card. The latter dishes out a cash boost whenever you play a hand that triggers a boss blind’s ability.

In a blog post about the decision to delay the update, Localthunk wrote that it all comes down to wanting to ensure they keep on taking care of their health and desire to keep on developing the roguelike deckbuilder in the way they work, as you can read below:

The truth is that I probably shouldn’t have announced any date for the 1.1 update at all. I’m a hobbyist developer at heart and I love to tinker. If you read my blog post about the Balatro timeline, you’ll know that since the game went public in the summer of 2023 I have become all too familiar with the crunch and stress that inherently come with professional game development. The struggles of pre-launch are detailed in that blog post, but unfortunately it didn’t stop at launch. Immediately after Balatro 1.0 came out in February 2024 I dove right in to a big balance patch (1.0.1), then into the mobile port of the game right after, and by the time the mobile version came out in late 2024 I was well and truly burned out.

I took a break from everything to do with the game for a few months until the start of 2025 when I very slowly eased myself back into the work. However, I chose to only work on the game like I did when the project began, as a hobbyist (a few hours per day, and not always on the 1.1 update), and it turns out that it’s a lot slower than working in crunch mode 12 hours per day like I was around launch.

So, they now plan to keep on working at that slower cadence. “Balatro 1.1 will still come out, of that I am certain, but the new timeline is going to be it’s done when it’s done,” the developer explained, “It will be a free update for everyone on all platforms when it’s ready, and it’ll probably need some adjustments when it’s out there in the world (like 1.0 did), but that won’t be this year.”

I’m glad to see Localthunk putting their health and happiness above all else. After all, given that Balatro’s well-earned (not just because it led Edwin to have to write about boobs) and rampant popularity isn’t going to evaporate into nothingness anytime soon, there’s no sense in trying to rush 1.1 out. Folks will still be here for it further down the line, and ready to whip out their decks the moment it drops.

Source link

September 13, 2025 0 comments

Gaming Gear

MSI Afterburner developer adding ‘triple channel voltage’ support for future MSI RTX 50 graphics cards

by admin September 11, 2025

MSI Afterburner’s sole developer, Alexey Nicolaychuk, is working on a new update for the app that will expand its voltage support for overclocking enthusiasts. In an update on the Guru3D forums, Nicolaychuk revealed that he’s working on “triple channel voltage” aimed at future MSI graphics cards that will expand voltage control beyond just core voltage manipulation.

Triple-channel voltage control will allow users to control two additional voltage parameters on future MSI graphics cards: memory voltage and aux (MSVDD) voltage. Core voltage control also gets an upgrade, boasting a direct PWM access mode featuring an expanded 100mV offset range for these cards.

Blizzard brings Diablo 4’s Developer Update livestreams back from the dead to reveal Season 10

by admin September 10, 2025

Things haven’t been going well in the world of Diablo 4. Everyone pretty much knows that, but it’s especially weird when Blizzard can be seen has having given up itself. In August, the studio took the very unusual step of announcing the game’s next PTR (Public Test Realm) via… a Discord Q&A.

That’s the 2.4.0. PTR, containing much of the Season of Infernal Chaos content, which would typically be enough of a big deal to warrant multiple developer livestreams. The PTR has come and gone, and we’re now under two weeks away from the start of the game’s next season, so now we’re getting a developer livestream.

Manage cookie settings

Blizzard announced that the next Developer Update livestream will take place on Tuesday, September 16. You’ll note that this is not the less structured, more casual Campfire Chat, which is about as good of a sign as we can get.

The show kicks off at the usual times – 11am PT, 2pm ET, 7pm UK – and will serve as the last preview of Season of Infernal Chaos, Diablo 4’s 10th season. We expect the new season to kick off September 23, so there’s just about enough time to start building excitement.

As always, there’s going to be a panel of developers who will guide us through the big new content additions, and what’s changed from the season’s 2.4.0. PTR (held in August). The livestream announcement namedropped Chaos Armor, Chaos Rifts and the updated Infernal Hordes among the topics we can expect to see discussed.

There’s going to be a Q&A segment at the end, too, as usual. What is changing is the format of the livestream itself. Blizzard didn’t say what form it’s going to now take, so we’ll have to tune in next week to see for ourselves.

Image credit: Blizzard Entertainment.

We’ll be able to do so via Diablo’s official channels on YouTube, Twitch, Twitter, and TikTok. And, Blizzard is throwing in a free cosmetic – the Fusillader’s Arc Rogue Crossbow – if you watch any Diablo 4 livestream on Twitch for 30 minutes while the Developer Update is live.

Season 10 is the last announced season on the Diablo 4 2025 roadmap, which was revealed in April. It’s going to take us all the way to December, so that’s pretty much it for Diablo 4 seasons in 2025. Apart from the next IP collaboration taking place in the season, Blizzard really has its work cut out for it to make a case for Infernal Chaos, because Season 9 has been a major letdown.

Source link

September 10, 2025 0 comments

Midair neon jetpack combat between a robot and an android lady

Product Reviews

If you saw Ruiner and thought it would be cool in first-person, its developer is back with, you guessed it, an FPS

by admin September 10, 2025

There’s one round little chubster robot with an exposed core, so I yank it out of his chest and he drops immediately. I could throw it like a grenade, but instead I absorb it to earn a brief superpunch power-up that I use to launch myself at one of the heavier-armored robots, bashing the metal plates right off him. While I’m up close and he’s staggered I switch to shotgun to finish him off, then jetpack away. There’s a bunch more robot enemies in this arena, and I saw some ammo up on the wallrun I could reach while I wait for the core-yanking ability to come back online.

This is a fairly typical five seconds of Metal Eden, a superspeed neon FPS where you’re a parkour android with a big bag of tools for movement and for destruction. There’s a grappling hook and double-jump, a freezy grenade, and a morph ball mode right out of Super Metroid that lets you roll around flinging homing missiles and lightning.

(Image credit: Deep Silver)

Staggering enemies with a punch before finishing them off guarantees they’ll drop health, while throwing a core at them ensures they’ll drop ammo. If you were detecting a hint of the Bethesda Dooms about Metal Eden you’re spot on. There’s also a fair chunk of Ruiner, developer Reikon’s previous adrenaline-pumper. But where that had a birdseye view and cyberpunk flair, Metal Eden is a sci-fi movement shooter about rescuing digitized colonists who’ve been imprisoned for extremely nebulous reasons by a coalition of drones and robots who are even less human than the Bubblegum Crisis cosplayer who is Metal Eden’s android protagonist.

What it really reminds me of is Necromunda: Hired Gun, an under-rated movement-shooter that drowned you in abilities like wallrunning and grapple-hooking and slow-mo, which made for frenetic action when you remembered to use them all but could also be a bit overwhelming if you didn’t play for a few days and then tried to remember what the controls were.

The story is likewise overwhelming, with a bitter computer named Nexus as the main narrator and a lot of stylish but wilfully confusing flashbacks. It’s a little like Ruiner that way, only where Ruiner made sense in the end, when I hit the credits six or seven hours into Metal Eden I was even more confused than when I started.

(Image credit: Deep Silver)

Which wouldn’t be as much of a problem if there weren’t so much story, constantly being monologued at you mid-level when you’d rather be shooting dudes. Metal Eden paces out its mostly linear levels with zipline rides past futuristic tower blocks while Nexus drones on, and occasionally some actual drones appear to shoot at you in case you’re getting bored. While I was playing Metal Eden the first time I couldn’t help but think how dull those segments would be on the replay, and the same with the lingering introductions of each new gun and blank-faced robotic enemy.

And while they are annoying on my second time through these levels, I’m surprised to find an even bigger annoyance. There’s no New Game+ mode for finally cutting loose with all the unlockable abilities, weapons, and upgrades. Instead, when you select a level from the post-game menu you load in with whatever minimal loadout you had the first time, back to square one. In a genre I’d expect to be all about the replay—the speedrun, the showboat second playthrough where you get to demonstrate all the skills you developed the first time—Metal Eden instead feels like a game that wants you to put it down and move on the second you roll credits. Which makes the $40 price a bit harder to swallow.

If they patch in a New Game+ mode though, Metal Eden will be an easier recommendation for adrenaline junkies who get off on wallrunning around arenas shooting plasma at giant spiderbots.

Source link

September 10, 2025 0 comments