Recently Valve announced a groundbreaking change of policy in regards to how it polices
the Steam store.
No longer will games be pulled from the store or even rejected altogether for inconsistent
and confusing reasons.
Now, a new policy is being worked on that will allow all games to be sold - no matter
how potentially offensive or objectionable the content is, as long as it's not "illegal"
or "straight up trolling".
The news was revealed in a blog post from June 6th 2018.
Here Valve posted a lengthy write up where they explained their position on the issue
of "Who Gets To Be On The Steam Store" and their new approach going forward.
To break things down, firstly, Valve dispelled the notion that any outside forces, including
payment processors, influence Steam's decisions to not allow certain games.
Some payment processors, for instance, are known to want to distance themselves from
businesses dealing in certain adult services and it has been speculated by some that this
could part of the reason.
However, it turns out that this isn't true.
Valve has said that zero outside forces contribute to their decisions.
They also clearly state that all decisions are handled by actual people within the company
and that nothing is automated.
So, with that notion, they then go into how hard it's been to weigh up whether certain
titles should be allowed to be sold or not.
They admit that the current method is confusing to everybody - customers, developers and even
within the Steam staff themselves, where disagreements can sometimes arise.
It's clear that some changes needed to be made and Valve explains how they went back
to one of their founding principles as a company - this being to give as much freedom to both
consumers and creators as possible.
They state: "Valve shouldn't be the ones deciding this.
If you're a player, we shouldn't be choosing for you what content you can or can't buy.
If you're a developer, we shouldn't be choosing what content you're allowed to create.
Those choices should be yours to make.
Our role should be to provide systems and tools to support your efforts to make these
choices for yourself, and to help you do it in a way that makes you feel comfortable."
They then go on to say: "With that principle in mind, we've decided
that the right approach is to allow everything onto the Steam Store, except for things that
we decide are illegal, or straight up trolling.
Taking this approach allows us to focus less on trying to police what should be on Steam,
and more on building those tools to give people control over what kinds of content they see.
We already have some tools, but they're too hidden and not nearly comprehensive enough.
We are going to enable you to override our recommendation algorithms and hide games containing
the topics you're not interested in.
So if you don't want to see anime games on your Store, you'll be able to make that choice.
If you want more options to control exactly what kinds of games your kids see when they
browse the Store, you'll be able to do that.
And it's not just players that need better tools either - developers who build controversial
content shouldn't have to deal with harassment because their game exists, and we'll be building
tools and options to support them too.
As we mentioned earlier, laws vary around the world, so we're going to need to handle
this on a case-by-case basis.
As a result, we will almost certainly continue to struggle with this one for a while.
Our current thinking is that we're going to push developers to further disclose any potentially
problematic content in their games during the submission process, and cease doing business
with any of them that refuse to do so honestly.
We'll still continue to perform technical evaluations of submissions, rejecting games
that don't pass until their issues have been resolved.
" The rest of the post clarifies that just because
Valve allows certain games, it doesn't necessarily mean that they agree with them.
It also notes that the required tools for opening up for the store in this way are still
being worked on, so you shouldn't expect these changes to be immediate, but that this is
something that will be coming in future, when it's ready.
This is clearly a landmark decision, with Steam being by far the largest and most influential
distribution platform for PC.
The decision has come following numerous recent controversies over games running into issues
with Steam's policies and facing removal.
For instance, at least 12 developers, including the dev for the popular HunniePop, were all
rounded up last month and received an email saying that unless they removed adult content
from their games that the games would be pulled.
Valve then got in touch with all the developers again and said to disregard the previous emails
and that the games will be re-reviewed and they will follow up if there are any issues.
This didn't end up happening, but it naturally left all of the developers affected feeling
confused and uncertain about their future on the platform.
As mentioned earlier, the change in rules will finally clear up any confusion like this,
over what is and isn't allowed, and will ultimately allows creators to feel much more secure.
Steam has been criticised many times over the years due to their vague and inconsistent
rulings and this will now be something that's much clearer.
To help explain what exactly is changing, let's begin by looking at the current rules
for games published on the Steam platform.
The current system offers this basic 10 point list for what isn't allowed on Steam and then
no further info or context to supplement it.
Leaving things vague has allowed Valve to police things how they see fit, but this is
to the detriment of developers who want to abide by their rules but aren't sure what
crosses the line and what doesn't.
For example, rule 2 blocks "pornography" with no further details and what is and isn't classed
as this.
You do not have to look further than games like Grand Theft Auto to be able to see both
nudity and sex on the Steam Store.
In fact, many big modern games now include adult content, yet these are seen as not falling
foul of the rule.
It's not just AAA games, though.
You can even find some indie titles on Steam with not just full frontal nudity, but detailed
and fully graphic sex scenes, such as Ladykiller In A Bind.
Ladykiller In A Bind is a 2016 indie visual novel and Valve approved its release despite
its graphic nature.
Many other games, though, will require censorship.
This is normally done through the use of optional, external patches that will uncensor the game.
However, last year Steam started to become stricter on these patches too.
The visual novel publisher MangaGamer, whose games often require censorship to be allowed
on Steam, said this last November: "On Friday, we received a notice from Valve
demanding that we remove all links and discussion of adult patches from official sources on
Steam, including the Steam Store Pages, and Steam Discussion boards.
This is in direct conflict with what we discussed with Valve during our meeting with them, and
Valve has not yet given us a reason why this policy has changed."
Other developers spoke of similar treatment and it is now common practise to not discuss
any censorship patches officially within the platform.
And all of this is despite the inconsistent nature of the rulings.
Whilst Valve makes some developers jump through hoop after hoop to get their games to their
audience, others are given a free pass fully uncensored.
Some games will be censored from the get go, especially those from bigger companies who
are used to Steam's treatment, such as MangaGamer.
Others though, will attempt an uncensored release but then get pulled from the store
by Valve not long after release.
This happened with 2017's House Party, for instance, a click and point adventure game
that's somewhat similar in style to the Leisure Suit Larry series.
The devs then had to censor any nudity to be allowed to put the game back on the store.
It's not just suggestive content either.
Steam has been known to pull other controversial titles, like it did originally with 2015's,
ultra violent twin stick shooter, Hatred.
The game was later then put back on the store, without being toned down, but only after massive
backlash over its removal.
As you can see, Valve's new announcement should completely change these problems.
Not only are the rules much less confusing, although the "straight-up trolling" policy
could admittedly be seen as still somewhat subjective in nature... but now, as long as
it's nothing illegal, devs should no longer have to worry about any rules at all.
What do you think about the decision to open up the store in this way?
Do you support the decision?
Would you like to see other platforms follow in Steam's footsteps?
Let us know what you think in the comments below and, until next time, thank you for
watching.