The Steam video game store has changed its content policy to “allow everything”, unless it is illegal or “straight up trolling”.
The shift comes after controversy surrounding games which many people considered were offensive.
A school shooting simulation game was removed from the store last month.
But now games publisher Valve, which owns Steam, said it was not up to the company to decide what should or should not be on sale.
The new policy paves the way for pornographic games to be made available on the platform, including in virtual reality. It would make the Steam store the first major VR platform to offer adult content."
people are way over reacting. Steam isn’t a retailer and shouldn’t be treated as such either. Steam should filter out the junk/shovelware… Poor quality products. They shouldn’t bother blocking products because someone doesn’t like the content of said game. Don’t like the product…don’t buy it. Thats part of free market. I’m really pissed off with self righteous overzealous freaks trying to tell others what they can and can’t do. This, and many other reasons, is why Americans are spit on more and more across the world. Oversensitive douchebags.
Steam is clogged with a huge flow of games that are way under every possible standard. Probably dumping greenlit wasn’t a great idea ( not that it was perfect).
Of course they do. Steam offers products for sale and takes a cut from the producers of those products for putting them on their “shelves” - exactly the same as any other retailer. And if you think other retailers don’t get money for putting products in their stores, think again.
Stupid Dragon, they shouldn’t be able to, but unfortunately unscrupulous retailers often don’t care.
Steam is NOT a retailer. They don’t put products on shelves. They’re just a platform that others pass through. And they take cuts of transactions for offering the platform. There is a subtle, but very clear, difference.
Because of that they are not responsible for what people do. Their only responsibility is to keep the platform running. In that regard they could do much better imo.
Steam is not like a retailer that handpicks which products they want to have in their store/on their platform. If you’re looking for that go to GoG or Itch.Io. Steam has said since day 1 they were going to be an open platform. And now people start to whine? That’s just stupid since you knew from the start what it was about.
You logic is all good until politics just decide otherwise and equalize “open digital distribution platform” to retail.
I don’t know how it’s it eu and us but here we have a few big torrent trackers just blocked by government. Back in 2012-2013 people were saying stuff like trackers shouldn’t be blocked because they don’t actually store pirated content - only magnet links. But here we are.
Claiming to be a platform, not a retailer is a cope out in itself. Up until now they have behaved like a retailer, limiting what’s on their shelves - now they want to claim otherwise.
Of course they pick their own products. They started off with their own then went into partnership with several gamemaking companies to get their games on the site. As the whole thing’s taken off they’ve expanded their product range same as any other retailer does.
I think the japanese service known as DLSite has non H content and H content packed on the same website. The approach has worked for them for years, I don’t exactly see why or how this is a bad thing
In the Netherlands we had Piratebay and such blocked after some lawsuits. However only a few ISP’s actually enforce it. Because BREIN is an institution with no legal rights and is more like a “watch dog” then anything. The governments aren’t going to force companies to change their business setup unless its breaking law. And at this point Digital platforms and Digital Retailers are two different things. Should be treated differently as well.
Valve already had been given the boot by EU court a few times. So if they break any actual laws we’ll be crashing down on anyone harshly. Not giving a damn whether they be Google, Apple or such. Steam however isn’t breaking any laws other then moral ones.
Once again you’re wrong Medea. The only reason Valve, recently, started to police and censor some games… was because of a whiny “moral” outcry from people. Just in many other aspects of “entertainment” last few years where people cry and whine “forcing” companies to change. Well Valve isnt’ falling for that manipulation and I command them for it. Valve hasn’t been behaving like a retailer at all for the most part and are just going back to their roots. As too hwo it was before the whiners tried to make them change.
Its nice how americans talk about freedom of speech, but have no clue what it actually means. To most it means you can say and do what you want, unless I disagree with it. Then everything has to be changed. Well for those nitwits that don’t get it… Tolerance is also part of freedom of speech. And most people seem to be lacking in the Tolerance aspect. People who don’t get what free market is about. People who cry wolf every damn time something happens they don’t like. People with mile long toes to step on and are “hurt” by even the most idiotic of things. Who gives a fuck about such cry babies who need to grow the fuck up and get some back bone. Instead of blaming Steam. Or in their case blame everyone and everything and never take responsibility for themselves. Steam does nothing wrong in this regard and forcing Steam to take action is just treating symptoms instead of an actual disease. You want to treat “misogyny” and “racism” and such then think of actual meaning ways to deal with it.
Time for groceries. Non issues like this, and the whiny nature of many just pisses me off to much. Time for some sun.
Whether or not you want to call Steam a retailer doesn’t matter in the end. Valve has taken content of Steam many times and will probably do so again. If they don’t do that they need to a draw lines somewhere and transparently communicate where they are.
Even if they decide to not police the content coming on to Steam they’ll still have to do it anyway, to avoid breaking laws.
They should be vetting every game being sold on Steam considering the amount of $$$ they’re raking in every day.
if you cannot tell them from the pics and ratings and end up buying one, you can always return the game. Should not take more than 2 hours playtime to figure it out.
That is already true today, I don’t think it will get dramatically worse because of this.
Not really sure how to improve this though without basically focusing on AAA and ignoring the rest. As the games are just released you cannot base it on ratings, so maybe on rating of the last game by the same developer, but that might not be so easy.
At least more detailled / complex filters would help, even if it is then up to me to tweak them
but the crazy number of games that are out everyday often hides the few good stuff.