After years of allowing just about anything to live on the platform, Valve began cracking down on games deemed too explicit and/or offensive for Steam. This wasn’t motivated by any desire to moderate the platform, but rather because payment processing companies, such as Visa, Mastercard, and PayPal, began putting pressure on the platform by threatening to pull support unless games deemed a ‘brand risk’ for these companies were removed.
We’ve since seen several games delisted from Steam, such as the indie horror game Horses and the lewd gacha game Brown Dust 2. We now have another game joining these ranks: Hong Kong 2097. For those unfamiliar, Hong Kong 2097 is the upcoming sequel to an infamous bootleg SNES game called Hong Kong 97 (nice spot, Automaton).
Hong Kong 2097 Won’t Release On Steam
This shoot-‘em-up was a political commentary on the upcoming handover of Hong Kong from the United Kingdom to China, and parodied the gaming industry by incorporating absurd and offensive features and imagery. 30 years later, HappySoft has returned to follow up on its controversial bootleg, but the studio has hit a stumbling block in Valve.
Lewd Gacha Game Brown Dust 2 Will No Longer Release On Steam
Steam’s crackdown on racy games continues.
“Steam has declined to ship Hong Kong 2097 and retired the store page,” writes co-developer KaniPro Games. “The reason given is third-party content, which is technically true. It’s unfortunate, but I knew there was a chance this would happen. The game is NOT cancelled. We’re already looking into Itch, GOG and DLsite.”
Hong Kong 2097 has likely run afoul of copyright law as the political satire features depictions of real people, such as Donald Trump, Travis Kelce and Taylor Swift. The sequel is partially inspired by the recent uptick in censorship in the gaming industry, making the delisting sort of poignant.
“In a world of encroaching censorship and social media algorithms crushing our freedom of thought, Hong Kong 2097 and its disrespect for all that is sacred is a breath of fresh air,” reads the game’s now-delisted store page.
The protagonist of the original game—a relative of Bruce Lee named Chin—returns in 2097 to take down the fictional nation of ‘Amurikkka’. I suspect the number of K’s in that title is telling of the type of content we can expect to see in Hong Kong 2097.
- Brand
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Valve
- Original Release Date
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September 12, 2003
- Original MSRP (USD)
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N/A
- Hardware Versions
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Steam
