Release

For a week or so now, we’ve heard rumblings that Valve are preventing the creators of games with “mature themes” from releasing their games in Steam early access. At least two developers have disclosed that they’re affected – Dammitbird, creators of raunchy fantasy RPG Heavy Hearts (do not click unless you are happy to look at a werewolf’s penis), and Blue Fairy Media, creators of The Restoration of Aphrodisia (do not click unless you are happy to read about lewd transformations).

Dammitbird have screencapped and shared a message from Steam’s submissions team, via Ana Valens on Bluesky. It reads: “Your app has failed our review because we’re unable to support the Early Access model of development for a game with mature themes. Please resubmit when your app is ready to launch without Early Access.”

The Blue Fairy Media folks have posted about a similar rejection message, adding “we can confirm our title was hit by this as well after multiple weeks of back and forth in the review process with absolutely no mention of this policy prior.”

Whether this is a new policy from Valve remains a little unclear. The platform holder’s early access submission documentation doesn’t make any stipulations about “mature themes” at the time of writing, and there are mature-themed early access games currently in development, which suggests it’s a recent shift of direction. On the other hand, one adult game developer, Drooskati, has posted screens of a comparable rejection message from June 2024.

Valve have yet to reply to my request for comment, sent about 10 days ago. Assuming they are now prohibiting mature-themed games from early access, all this is probably a continuation of the industry-wide crackdown on sexually themed or explicit videogames, instigated by payment processing networks earlier in the year.

This summer, Valve changed Steam’s rules to give banks, payment processors and card companies a say on what constitutes acceptable NSFW material. Then, they delisted a bunch of games. According to Valve, it was either that or risk payment processing partners blocking Steam transactions at large.

Itch.io have also been affected by the payment processor ban on “mature themes”. The indie store delisted thousands of games in July, and are now seeking out new payment processing partners who are happy to deal in adult material.

The situation has been clouded by the refusal of various participants to take responsibility for the delistings and removals. In August, Mastercard insisted that they have “not evaluated any game or required any restrictions” on Steam, while Valve contend that payment processors have told the platform holder they’re acting to ensure compliance with Mastercard’s policies.

I had a go at explaining the broad strokes of how payment networks police the definition of acceptable sex in videogames last month. The short version is that payment networks often end up being enlisted as unofficial enforcers of laws and taboos around sexual material, by dint of their control of economic activity. They are horribly ill-equipped to serve this purpose, however, because they are corporations with brands to protect. If a sufficiently large or vocal group can make a fuss about the transaction of any particular type of commodity, the corps may feel compelled to pull support.

The enforced policy changes on Steam and Itch.io appear to reflect a new reactionary campaign against sexual themes or material in art or entertainment, and especially queer art deemed abhorrent by conservatives. The Australian lobby group Collective Shout have claimed credit for bringing about Steam’s policy changes by applying public pressure to Mastercard, Visa and others. They published an open letter in July co-signed by two religious anti-porn and anti-sex work organisations, the National Center on Sexual Exploitation and Exodus Cry.

Collective Shout and their affiliates have said that they’re campaigning against representations of sexual violence and objectification that could contribute to violence towards women and girls. They have yet to provide details of the individual games they find disagreeable, however, or demonstrate how they are or might be harmful.

In the meantime, a large number of developers have been deprived of a livelihood. Eurogamer recently published a feature based on interviews with several of the queer developers affected that is worth a read. I’ll let you know as and when Valve update us on their early access policies.

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