Valve has been under tight scrutiny ever since the National Center of Sexual Exploitation came down on them last year for allowing the game House Party to be sold on Steam, uncensored. Not only did the NCSE come down on Valve, but they had a coalition of international Christian groups come down on Valve as well, threatening to make an example out of them for what they claimed was the company using Steam to sell porn to kids. Well, Valve acquiesced and forced all developers to censor their sexy-time games and forbade them from publicly distributing uncensored patches through Steam.
It appears as if that’s not enough.
HuniePot, the developer of HuniePop and HunieCam Studio, recently informed their followers that Valve is prepping to remove HuniePop from Steam unless any and all sexual content that violates their guidelines are censored or edited out of the game. This is despite the fact that the Steam version of HuniePop is already censored.
The news came courtesy of a tweeted published on May 17th, 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.— HunieDev (@HuniePotDev) May 17, 2018
While HuniePot notes that it’s unlikely that Valve will not forcibly remove HuniePop from the libraries of Steam users, it’s very possible that the game could be removed from the Steam storefront unless the edits are made to the title.
HuniePot is already attempting to get the situation resolved as quickly as possible, and stating that once there’s any word the community will be informed.
I am following up with Valve to resolve the issue in the best way possible. Will keep you guys posted. https://t.co/TYX0V1yixo
— HunieDev (@HuniePotDev) May 17, 2018
Right now we have no idea what’s going on, and it’s completely possible that some Social Justice Warriors have been attempting to get games removed off the service by reporting them. It’s also possible that after Valve bought up Campo Santo, the studio is using its overreach to take away the kind of games that appeal to anti-SJWs. Alternatively, there’s the possibility of Valve having to tighten up games depicting adult-oriented content in lieu of the new U.K., digital ID verification mandate, which is set to go live later this year.
I did reach out to Valve to ask for clarification on how a game like HuniePop violates the guidelines, and whether or not games like The Witcher 3 or GTA V will also have to comply to these new standards. If Valve decides to comment on the matter, the article will be updated with their response.
As of the writing of this article, HuniePop is still available on the Steam store for $9.99.
[Update:] Nekoworks has also confirmed that Valve has sent them a letter as well, with Automaton reporting that Tropical Liquor must be thoroughly censored or else it will be removed from Steam.
We have been informed that adult content in Tropical Liquor must be censored by the end of this month or the game will be removed from Steam. We are working on this issue.https://t.co/Cs3VxVARQy #steam
— NEKO [email protected]配信中！ (@nekopara_pr) May 18, 2018
LupieSoft, the makers of Mutiny!! have also been hit. They made it known on Twitter that their game will also be pulled in two weeks if they don’t comply with removing any and all elements of sexiness from the game, even though it’s already censored for Steam.
In fact @Lupiesoft has been one of the strictest developers in terms of following Steam’s guidelines, and absolutely nothing in Mutiny!! violates their guidelines. After our Steam publisher @MangaGamer met with Valve in person, they were told that ecchi content was fine on steam.
— Lupiesoft (@Lupiesoft) May 18, 2018
MangaGamer published a short blog post over on their official website, explaining that Valve recently changed the content policies for Steam, making everything much stricter and reneging on the previous agreements they had made with content publishers regarding games containing sexy content…
“Despite our best efforts to respect both the letter and spirit of Valve’s content guidelines as we were made to understand them, we are wholly in the dark with this latest apparent shift in policy as no clear guidelines or standards have been provided. We will seek to negotiate with Valve to keep Kindred Spirits as-is on the Steam Store to the best of our ability, but failing that we still require guidelines to modify the title and future titles to fit these new, apparently stricter standards.”
Not every developer of lewd games has been hit. Christine Love, who made Ladykiller in a Bind, has not received a notice from Valve, showing that the company is specifically targeting only certain developers and certain kinds of games.
Why I’m not surprised? pic.twitter.com/sfOXfkR2Ej
— Black Cat Dandy (@BlackCat_Dandy) May 18, 2018
So far, Valve has yet to respond to any of the developers, and have only given them two weeks to comply with the new, stricter standards otherwise their games will be removed from the Steam store.
(Thanks for the news tip Richard)