The major digital storefronts have faced reckonings in recent years, and haven’t always come out of them smelling like roses. This is partly because they have kicked certain decisions into the long grass, but are now being forced to come down one way or another. The other side, sadly, comes down to political pressure to de-list games that certain regimes, in this case the Chinese communist party, don’t like.
Recent months have seen some of these issues come to a head when Valve, notoriously reluctant to intervene in the content available on Steam, refused to sell a game called Super Seducer 3. SS3 is a full-motion video offering that uses multiple-choice dialogue for the player to go through dates with women.
These are, in other words, rather shoddy FMV games about ‘pickup culture’ and are fronted by one La Ruina, who, representing the developer, posted various communications with Valve about why the game had been refused by Steam. Valve’s reason was, “Steam does not ship sexually explicit images of real people.” La Ruina contends that, with 61,000 Steam wishlists for the game, he is “ready to take a butcher knife to the game” and that it would be “easy enough” to edit it to be as “safe” as other FMV games on Steam, removing the explicit imagery in question. In response, the Valve representative reiterated the company’s decision to neither “sell the game or re-review it”.
BACK FROM THE GRAVE
This story is from the July 2021 edition of PC Gamer US Edition.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Sign In
This story is from the July 2021 edition of PC Gamer US Edition.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
TERMINATOR: RESISTANCE
Revisiting Teyon’s game after Robocop: Rogue City.
RICH'N BEEFY
LIKE A DRAGON: INFINITE WEALTH is a dizzyingly huge all-you-can-eat Yakuza buffet
ROUND 8 FIGHT!
TEKKEN 8 is a blend of nostalgia for fans and a pair of welcoming arms for newbies
HOLY HELL
THE INQUISITOR is a grim yet strangely gripping dark fantasy adventure
SHOT DEAD
There are flashes of greatness in SUICIDE SQUAD: KILL THE JUSTICE LEAGUE
THE BEST NON-TRADITIONAL WAR GAMES
Is it possible for wargamers to give peace a chance?
WHEELIE GOOD
Freewheeling with Northern Irish indie studio Billy Goat Entertainment and its next project, PARCEL CORPS
PALWORLD
Shockingly, animal cruelty doesn't make for a fulfilling experience
DIVINE FREQUENCY
This horror-RPG-FPS built in the Doom engine is terrifying
AVOWED
Obsidian's next RPG goes all in on first-person action