It’s no secret that Valve has been waging war on adult content recently, having already banned or delisted several games from Steam. A raunchy gacha game called Brown Dust 2 was recently delisted, while the most high-profile example recently was undoubtedly the horror indie title Horses from notable indie developer Santa Ragione.
A lot of this is down to payment processors such as Mastercard and Visa, putting pressure on Valve to pull titles they deem as brand risks, which has begun a widespread crackdown on adult content. However, as seen with Horses, it seems as though Valve doesn’t really seem to distinguish “brand risks” from actual games, made more evident by what is actually allowed on the storefront at the moment.
Valve Is Somehow Still Letting An Epstein Game Get “Updates” On Steam
One prime example is a game on Steam called Epstein, which appears to be a pretty generic survival game that is set on Jeffrey Epstein’s private island. You’re tasked with infiltrating the island, taking down enemies as you make your way to the top, and engage in a fight with “Jefry” himself. It’s obviously a meme game, intended to get a chuckle out of someone that scrolls by it on the storefront rather than something that’s actually been made with love and care, but it seems strange that something like this is allowed to exist while Horses isn’t.
Your Credit Card Provider Might Prevent You From Buying All Those Adult Steam Games Thanks To The New Guidelines
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Epstein is even getting new “updates” in conjunction with real life events that involve very real allegations of child exploitation, something that Steam’s own onboarding guidelines state is against the terms of service. Following the release of a batch of Epstein documents earlier this week, the developer behind Epstein announced the “Epstein Case Files” update coming in February that promises to add a variety of new features such as PvP and story-driven side quests featuring Diddy and “Tramp”.
What makes Horses and adult games like Brown Dust 2 a “brand risk”, and not a game that literally has you infiltrating the private island of a very real alleged sex trafficker? It’s possible that it could be quite literally down to game content, as having played Epstein for a short while (yes, I really did that), there doesn’t seem to be anything wrong with the actual content from a surface level.
It’s just difficult to know what’s going through the heads of people at Valve when they’re deciding what it will and won’t allow to be sold on the platform. Given that the final build of Horses doesn’t even include anything against Steam’s onboarding guidelines, how are developers supposed to make meaningful games that actually touch on adult topics without fear of being delisted and buried?
- 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
- Weight
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N/A
