A handful of "adult" themed game developers have received emails from Valve, requesting that the games either remove supposed content that goes against Steam's TOS, or be removed from the Steam Store entirely. HuniePop, Mutiny!!!, and The Stargazers, according to Valve, have been reported by unnamed users for "pornographic content", and are to be pulled from sale within 2 weeks if changes are not made. By technicality, none of the Steam versions of these games have such content, as it had to be censored to make it onto Steam initially. HuniePop itself, is a game that has been unchanged and sold on Steam since 2015, selling over 500,000 copies, yet it has not faced removal concerns until now. There are uncensor patches hosted offsite, but unless Steam has quietly changed its TOS, then these games met needed requirements already.

With such a claim being made years after the fact, it brings into question what content Valve considers too "racy" to allow on their digital storefront, and what games will be further removed. Two of the affected developers, HuniePot and Lupiesoft have spoken about their issue on Twitter, stating that their games "follow Steam's guidelines...we were told [by Valve] ecchi content was fine on Steam.". Lupiesoft goes on to say that this could potentially jeopardize the company, and that Steam's targeting of their games is unfair, due to a large content of western games having similar, if not more nudity.

What are your thoughts? Is this kind of removal wrong? What do you think has prompted Valve to only now take action?

We've just received some troubling news today that @steam_games has decided to pull down our titled "Mutiny!!" within 2 weeks for 'reports of pornographic content'. Now those of you who know @Lupiesoft know that we don't put that on Steam, or advertise that content on Steam.

— Lupiesoft (@Lupiesoft) May 18, 2018

- IMPORTANT NOTICE -
I've received an e-mail from Valve stating that HuniePop violates the rules & guidelines for pornographic content on Steam and will be removed from the store unless the game is updated to remove said content.

— Kyu Sugardust (@HunieKyu) May 17, 2018

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EDIT:

• Nekopara's developer's game, "Tropical Liquor" has also received an email requesting that the game be censored, or removed.
• Kindred Spirits has been notified.
• Battle Girls and Galaxy Girls has been notified.
• Re:Lord 1 has been notified.
• Roommates has been notified.

UPDATE 2: As of May 19, all developers that received this warning email from Valve, have all gotten a follow up email stating that emails about imminent removal of their games was sent out by mistake, to disregard the warning, and that the games will be re-reviewed immediately to make sure the games do indeed meet requirements to stay on the Steam Storefront.

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[SomeKindOfUsername]

While I don't know the specifics for any other games affected, I have a pretty good idea why Huniepop was removed. For those who don't know, the devs offer a patch to restore nudity in the game that was removed. However, this "patch" is an empty file that doesn't actually modify the game files, all it does is enable content that is normally disabled.

So, the issue probably has more to do with the fact that otherwise prohibited content is still being distributed on their CDN, just hidden, than any nefarious anti-sex or anti-nudity (because the only time people care about "censorship" is when sex and nudity is removed) agenda. If the patch was really a patch this might not have been an issue. Alternatively, devs officially offering such a patch at all might be against the rules.

This is all just a guess though, but it makes sense given other games featuring nudity and the like are still available. I'm sure the devs have come to the same conclusions as well, but hey, what better viral marketing than the outrage culture from the "fuck censorship" crowd? The religious freaks taking credit for this are using the same opportunistic tactics, so good job signal boosting an otherwise unknown entity in the process.

The situation with Kindred Spirits is very strange, assuming Valve really truly knew and approved of the content. One of the parties is/was lying, we don't yet know which.

With all that said, Valve still messed up majorly. Why take action now later years (lol Valve time)? Why not be more clear about their guidelines and reasons for removal? Why so wishy-washy on adult content in general, allowing it in some context but not others?

 

[Jonna]

While I don't know the specifics for any other games affected, I have a pretty good idea why Huniepop was removed. For those who don't know, the devs offer a patch to restore nudity in the game that was removed. However, this "patch" is an empty file that doesn't actually modify the game files, all it does is enable content that is normally disabled.

So, the issue probably has more to do with the fact that otherwise prohibited content is still being distributed on their CDN, just hidden, than any nefarious anti-sex or anti-nudity (because the only time people care about "censorship" is when sex and nudity is removed) agenda. If the patch was really a patch this might not have been an issue. Alternatively, devs officially offering such a patch at all might be against the rules.

This is all just a guess though, but it makes sense given other games featuring nudity and the like are still available. I'm sure the devs have come to the same conclusions as well, but hey, what better viral marketing than the outrage culture from the "fuck censorship" crowd? The religious freaks taking credit for this are using the same opportunistic tactics, so good job signal boosting an otherwise unknown entity in the process.

Deep Space Waifu has the exact same thing, except it wasn't even an "offered" patch, the devs literally put it right in the public forums for every one to see.

 

[RedBlueGreen]

You're more than welcome to add me to your ignore list. No need to piss on me and call it rain.

Just as I can easily ignore you nobody is forcing you to look at games you don't like on Steam. You can easily just scroll past them.

I have no actual problem with you, I'm just pointing out that we can easily ignore or not interact with something we don't wish to. I was deliberately making a ridiculous exaggerated argument to show how ridiculous I think the "I don't like it so it should be removed" way of thinking is.

 

[Bladexdsl]

time to take out the trash

 

[Chary]

Failed to fetch tweet https://twitter.com/HuniePotDev/status/997979877977436160

 

[Osha]

Man, talk about backpedalling.

 

[gudenau]

That "mistake" update was one heck of a backpedal, I want those to be removed to be honest.

 

[Osha]

That "mistake" update was one heck of a backpedal, I want those to be removed to be honest.

Yeah, let's remove the functional games, I'm sure it's more important than all the garbage ones that don't even run properly and still manage to get past Valve's incredibly lax quality check. If anything, Tecmo Koei's titles should be removed from the store first because of how abysmal their PC ports are.

 

[brunocar]

Yeah, let's remove the functional games, I'm sure it's more important than all the garbage ones that don't even run properly and still manage to get past Valve's incredibly lax quality check. If anything, Tecmo Koei's titles should be removed from the store first because of how abysmal their PC ports are.

DW8 still uses a single CPU core :|

 

[Deleted User]

I'm omega conservative, I believe in a lot of things the same organization believes and campaigns for, and I agree with what Valve is doing. I agree with NCOE getting valve to take down sexual content from their store front. Personally this isn't just about porn, but just not having to see this gross weeb shit everytime I open steam. If you want to play hentai games, OK but buy it from the correct place. Don't put it up on Steam.

Let me ask a question, would it be censorship if Steam pulled down a virus disguised as a game? Why is pulling down hentai games censorship? There are so many other places you can buy hentai games.

To play devil's advocate here, Huniepop had really nice gameplay, being unironic here. I really loved the Bejeweled type gameplay to it. But maybe that's my inner baby-boomer that plays facebook games all day talking.

 

[Beerus]

Wow nice mistake steam

 

[Sonic Angel Knight]

UPDATE 2: As of May 19, all developers that received this warning email from Valve, have all gotten a follow up email stating that emails about imminent removal of their games was sent out by mistake, to disregard the warning, and that the games will be re-reviewed immediately to make sure the games do indeed meet requirements to stay on the Steam Storefront.

I knew it, had to be a bot. You bots, always causing panic and heart attacks on us humans. Go back to discord and stay there.

 

[brunocar]

I'm omega conservative, I believe in a lot of things the same organization believes and campaigns for, and I agree with what Valve is doing. I agree with NCOE getting valve to take down sexual content from their store front. Personally this isn't just about porn, but just not having to see this gross weeb shit everytime I open steam. If you want to play hentai games, OK but buy it from the correct place. Don't put it up on Steam.

Let me ask a question, would it be censorship if Steam pulled down a virus disguised as a game? Why is pulling down hentai games censorship? There are so many other places you can buy hentai games.

To play devil's advocate here, Huniepop had really nice gameplay, being unironic here. I really loved the Bejeweled type gameplay to it. But maybe that's my inner baby-boomer that plays facebook games all day talking.

so you think violence is fine but tits arent? i mean, fuck if im gonna buy any of these games, i can get porn elsewhere, but people like these so im not gonna argue that it should be taken down, besides, if these get taken down, then what about the witcher trilogy's multiple explicit sex scenes?

 

[PhyChris]

Damn SJWs

 

[SG854]

I'm omega conservative, I believe in a lot of things the same organization believes and campaigns for, and I agree with what Valve is doing. I agree with NCOE getting valve to take down sexual content from their store front. Personally this isn't just about porn, but just not having to see this gross weeb shit everytime I open steam. If you want to play hentai games, OK but buy it from the correct place. Don't put it up on Steam.

Let me ask a question, would it be censorship if Steam pulled down a virus disguised as a game? Why is pulling down hentai games censorship? There are so many other places you can buy hentai games.

To play devil's advocate here, Huniepop had really nice gameplay, being unironic here. I really loved the Bejeweled type gameplay to it. But maybe that's my inner baby-boomer that plays facebook games all day talking.

I agree they shouldn’t take down viruses disguised as games. Censorship is bad and people need the freedom to infect their computers, for a price that is.

 

[KingVamp]

I like how he compared a game that he doesn't like to an actually harmful thing such as a virus.

I agree they shouldn’t take down viruses disguised as games. Censorship is bad and people need the freedom to infect their computers, for a price that is.

lol

 

[dAVID_]

So games that don't actually include pornography but have existing pornographic mods are getting taken down? That's complete bullshit on Valve's part, as anybody can make a mod for a game, regardless of the developer's consent.

I know! We should also ban computers next because computers can be used for criminality, hacking, and pirating games. And the worst of all, making innapropiate game mods.
We should also water because bad people like criminals drink water, that way we can end criminality!

 

[Deleted User]

I like how he compared a game that he doesn't like to an actually harmful thing such as a virus.

I dunno dude, I can make the argument that hentai is harmful.

so you think violence is fine but tits arent? i mean, fuck if im gonna buy any of these games, i can get porn elsewhere, but people like these so im not gonna argue that it should be taken down, besides, if these get taken down, then what about the witcher trilogy's multiple explicit sex scenes?

Game primarily for sex =/ game with 100 hours of content with sex

Also I don't know where people are getting violence from this. This whole campaign is to take down games with sexually graphic content/patch out sexual content.

 

[gudenau]

Yeah, let's remove the functional games, I'm sure it's more important than all the garbage ones that don't even run properly and still manage to get past Valve's incredibly lax quality check. If anything, Tecmo Koei's titles should be removed from the store first because of how abysmal their PC ports are.

I'm not a fan of the shovel ware stuff either.

 

[Sonic Angel Knight]

I agree they shouldn’t take down viruses disguised as games. Censorship is bad and people need the freedom to infect their computers, for a price that is.

For the low price of $60 you can infect your pc with the virus of the waifu anime girls. Make your pc scream senpai with a collection of different music and girls from the selection of Senran Kagura. But that's not all, for additional $30, you can get a season pass, every month we will add more girls which means more viruses to your system that even Cortana on windows 10 will be jealous you turned her off. So she doesn't feel left out, she will be subject to the virus of the waifu making her your only choice in waifu. DOWNLOAD TODAY.

(In case no one understands, this was a joke.)

On a serious note, least fakku is trying to reach out. Wait is this appropriate for the forum?

Failed to fetch tweet https://twitter.com/FAKKU/status/997316438447669248​