Here’s Why Steam Bans Adult Games
If you’re a fan of adult games, I don’t blame you, but video game distributors Steam and itch.io have already started doing just that. Both platforms have recently removed a slew of adult games, signaling a major shift in the way games are distributed online and how distributors handle explicit content.
Whether you’re worried about censorship, wondering where your favorite games have gone, or trying to figure out what’s considered “too explicit” these days, I’ll break down what’s happening, why it’s happening now, and what it means for the future of gaming and free speech.
Why did Steam and itch.io start banning adult games?
The ban began in Australia. On July 11, Collective Shout , a self-described “grassroots campaign movement against the objectification of women and the sexualization of girls,” published an open letter about Steam addressed to major payment processors such as PayPal, Visa, and Mastercard.
“We, the undersigned, write to you to request that you stop processing payments on gaming platforms that host games with themes of rape, incest, and child sexual abuse,” the letter begins. It goes on to condemn No Mercy , a 3D visual novel featuring non-consensual sex, as well as hundreds of other “rape, incest, and child sexual abuse games on Steam and Itch.io .”
The Collective Shout letter worked.
What games have been removed from Steam and itch.io?
On July 16, Steam’s parent company, Valve, responded to the announcement by removing hundreds of games with extremist content. Valve has traditionally been lax in moderating adult games, but the company said the games it was subject to moderation “violate the rules and standards set by payment processors, card networks, or internet service providers,” so they were removed.
Valve also updated its documents to advise potential game publishers not to submit games with “content that may violate the rules and standards set by Steam payment systems, as well as their associated card networks and banks or Internet service providers. This includes certain types of adult-only content.”
Itch.io has upped the ante by removing all games tagged with “NSFW” from its store pages and search results and publishing the following “non-exhaustive list of prohibited topics”:
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Non-consensual content (actual or implied)
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Topics for minors or “barely legal”
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Content of incest or pseudo-incest
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Bestiality or animal related
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Rape, coercion or force
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Consequences of Sex Trafficking
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Revenge Porn/Voyeurism/Hidden Camera
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A fetish involving bodily waste or extreme harm (e.g., “excrement,” “vomit”)
Itch.io says it is conducting a “comprehensive audit” of removed content to “ensure we can comply with our payment processors.” Games that pass the credit card company’s content review will presumably be reindexed.
Censorship or commerce?
Whether this qualifies as censorship depends on how broadly you define the term. The legal status of the removed games has not changed; they have not been outlawed. Instead, two private companies have decided to no longer sell them. In practice, however, the effect is much the same as a government crackdown: thousands of games that were easily accessible a month ago are now much harder, if not impossible, to obtain.
The outcome may be the same, but payment processors have very different incentives than governments. There are a number of morally neutral reasons why it might be in the financial industry’s best interest not to process payments for risqué games. According to payment processors, selling adult content often leads to increased fraud and chargebacks. “Certain types of products and services… are simply riskier,” Gil Tov-Lee, chief marketing officer of Appcharge, a direct payments platform for mobile game publishers, told gamesindustry.biz , adding, “Risk costs money.”
Then there’s the confusing maze of content laws. The legal status of pornography and/or indecent content varies from country to country and state to state, potentially making it a crime to process payments for “extreme” games in some places.
There is also the public relations aspect. Any profit a bank makes by helping people buy adult games is certainly less than the loss it might suffer by being associated with those games in the public mind.
What does too far mean?
Even if you agree in principle that some video games are too extreme or problematic to download, how do you know which ones fall under that definition? Games linked to “sex trafficking” include everything from No Mercy to Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas to Act!, a “human trafficking awareness game” organized by End Slavery Now .
The inherent vagueness of imposed censorship will likely lead to self-censorship. “The mere publication of vague rules against certain types of adult content leaves every developer of a potentially controversial game in the dark,” wrote game designer Naomi Clark on Bluesky.
But on the other hand, it’s hard to deny that some games cross a line, even if that line is hard to define. As Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart said of hardcore pornography, “I know it when I see it,” and that’s easy to “see” in something like No Mercy.
Slippery slope arguments aside, I’m sure many, if not most, would prefer to live in a world without Relentless . That’s the end result, achieved without government censorship or imprisonment. In a sense, it’s a victory for freedom. Free speech doesn’t just apply to video game developers. Australian activist groups are free to publish open letters to pressure credit card companies, just as game distribution platforms are free to decide what speech they want to host on their servers.