Disaster Valve responds to payment processor controversy, hopes devs “have another game” to put on Steam - Valve has notified the affected developers and offered App Credits

Article (Archive)

A couple of days ago, news broke of a rule change in Steam’s onboarding process for developers. Specifically, a change in the Rules and Guidelines section states that content violating “rules and standards set forth by Steam's payment processors and related card networks and banks, or internet network providers” is restricted from being distributed on the platform.

Notably, this led to a large number of adult-only games to be removed from the platform, and while many agree that they probably don’t belong on Steam, Valve has faced criticism for bowing to the regulations of payment processors. Now, the company has responded to the issue – but don’t expect anything to change.

Valve is compensating devs affected by the rule change
Thanks to an update from the publication GamingOnLinux, which contacted Valve, we now have an official statement on the issue. Valve has essentially confirmed the situation and has been “directly notifying developers” affected by the change, going on to say it is “issuing app credits” to devs should they wish to continue distributing on Steam in the future.

We were recently notified that certain games on Steam may violate the rules and standards set forth by our payment processors and their related card networks and banks. As a result, we are retiring those games from being sold on the Steam Store, because loss of payment methods would prevent customers from being able to purchase other titles and game content on Steam.

We are directly notifying developers of these games, and issuing app credits should they have another game they'd like to distribute on Steam in the future.

Source: GamingOnLinux
App Credits are a currency on Steamworks for developers to publish content on Steam. Usually, there is a fee of $100 for “each new app” published on Steam, but developers can purchase App Credits to prepare for upcoming releases. So, with the loss of content (and therefore revenue), it seems that Valve is refunding devs and hoping they return with a game or app that complies with the guidelines set by payment processors or network providers.

While you may agree that these adult-only games don’t belong on Steam, PC gamers fear further restrictions being put in place. Censorship at the hands of payment processors, networks, or anyone else outside of Steam itself could be an issue going forward if these companies decide to alter their own rules and standards. Plus, the (seeming) lack of warning will catch devs off guard.

 

[Forsaken Wanderer]

Fuck off Valve. You gave in to the Jews and now the Steam ship is sinking fast.

Try and stop me pirating you foreskinless cronies

 

[Rome's rightful successor]

Gabe, why? You used to be cool man.

 

[Picnic_Boy]

And much boxed wine was consumed in celebration.

 

[Fagnacious D]

Fuck off Valve. You gave in to the Jews and now the Steam ship is sinking fast.

Try and stop me pirating you foreskinless cronies

I know they're the biggest PC game store online but, what options did they have if VISA and mastercard pulled out? Have only bitcoin and other crypto currencies be accepted as a form of payment?
Don't get me wrong, I hate the fact that they cucked out like that but, the payment processors seem to have everyone by the balls now. There are very few places that can stand up to them and even fewer willing to.

 

[Hitman One]

GamingOnLinux

Of course freetards are the ones screaming loudest about Child Rape Simulator 3 or whatever being taken off Steam.

 

[SuperConglomerateWhale]

Fuck off Valve. You gave in to the Jews and now the Steam ship is sinking fast.

Try and stop me pirating you foreskinless cronies

The jokes on you, they have all of the foreskins already.

 

[natural born loser]

I know they're the biggest PC game store online but, what options did they have if VISA and mastercard pulled out? Have only bitcoin and other crypto currencies be accepted as a form of payment?

They have enough money to hire lawyers that could raise enough of a stink that the Feds could weigh in and slap this shit down forever. Make payment processors common carriers.

 

[Lieutenant Rasczak]

I know they're the biggest PC game store online but, what options did they have if VISA and mastercard pulled out? Have only bitcoin and other crypto currencies be accepted as a form of payment?
Don't get me wrong, I hate the fact that they cucked out like that but, the payment processors seem to have everyone by the balls now. There are very few places that can stand up to them and even fewer willing to.

People didn't listen to Josh about the payment processors and networks and now everyone's suffering for it.

 

[Tanner Glass]

They have enough money to hire lawyers that could raise enough of a stink that the Feds could weigh in and slap this shit down forever. Make payment processors common carriers.

The amount of money they would lose would be baffling just from having VISA and Mastercard freeze them out for the years this would take to get pushed through. Likely $40 billion dollars or more.

On top of that - Epic Games' Tim Sweeny would 100% personally blow the head of Visa and Mastercard (at the same time) and put in any restrictions they wanted just to try and steal market share from Steam.

Valve is a huge company, sure, one of the biggest in the video game space - but Visa is nearly 100 times their size and Mastercard is not much further behind. Not to mention it's been tried already several times over (when they hit OnlyFans, Pornhub, etc) so there's not much for Valve to do here.

 

[Drain Todger]

I don’t give a damn what the content is. Letting payment processors act as final arbiters of what constitutes acceptable content on the web is an unconscionable abrogation of people’s freedom of speech rights. This is just modern-day pearl-clutching over obscenity, and I won’t have it.

 

[karz]

They have enough money to hire lawyers that could raise enough of a stink that the Feds could weigh in and slap this shit down forever. Make payment processors common carriers.

VISA and Mastercard are a legal US Duopoly. Whatever their fuckass arbitrary rules are in the realm of facilitating digital purchases through their network infrastructure, it becomes a business standard. There is no way to counter this.

Spoiler: sperging

I am not being hyperbolic when I say that, effectively, the entire system of credit/debit consumer purchases made through VISA / Mastercard is what keeps every other business' revenues green in the US. I am sure that Valve has deep pockets to challenge this fuckass arbitrary rule in court. However, VISA / Mastercard's pockets are effectively bottomless as they collect fees and interest every month from every single credit card purchase. On the order of tens of billions of dollars per month in revenues. For perspective, VISA/Mastercard have been joint defendants in a lawsuit over rewards programs cards (like the airline miles type rewards) since 1998, and the lawsuit has not yet been settled. VISA / Mastercard could and would cut off Valve from their payment infrastructure if Valve challenged the cartel's rule in court, starving Valve of any revenue to try and fight in court.
It doesn't help either that major investment institutions, BlackRock, Vanguard, and State Street Investments, hold a collective stake of ~20% in VISA and ~18% in Mastercard, which gives the cartel even more financial incentive to enforce their fuckass arbitrary rules.

tl;dr its gay and retarded but this was an inevitable outcome as payment processors clamp down on adult content distribution.
Someone may come up and offer a crypto shop to buy adult games or something but at this point its anyone's guess.

This is just modern-day pearl-clutching over obscenity, and I won’t have it.

It's gay and retarded, but conservatives have been screeching about it for decades, and they're making headway. Read the room, blud.

 

[Dawdler]

This is allowed to happen on purpose

 

[depressed_kiwi]

Imagine being so deranged that the fucking corporate payment processers have a better moral compass than you.

 

[Forsaken Wanderer]

I know they're the biggest PC game store online but, what options did they have if VISA and mastercard pulled out? Have only bitcoin and other crypto currencies be accepted as a form of payment?
Don't get me wrong, I hate the fact that they cucked out like that but, the payment processors seem to have everyone by the balls now. There are very few places that can stand up to them and even fewer willing to.

That is true, there is no capitalism because nobody uses cash anymore and all payments are processed by Jews, so therefore they control who gets to sell and who gets to purchase.

But... it would have been so satisfying if Valve said fuck you.

Yes they would lose sales for a while but if they publicly said it was the payment processors that are doing this they could have just tried to wait it out and generate public hate.

People would have been so angry at the payment processors that the Jews may have actually had to back off.

But alas, everyone gives in.

 

[Town Drunk]

So a globohomo company is going to finger wave at me and tell me I can't buy a legal product. Considering Steam cards I can buy at a retailer is a thing, I have no idea why they bent the knee, unless MC is the ones to process that transaction.

Everyone cheering this is cheering for people to have control over your life as an adult. Deciding what is right or wrong for you. If you don't want to watch or play it, then don't.

When A is deemed the worst thing ever and removed, then it moves on to B, and then on to C, etc. Where the most bland inoffensive thing is now the most offensive thing, because everything else was eliminated.

 

[Thiletonomics]

That is true, there is no capitalism because nobody uses cash anymore and all payments are processed by Jews, so therefore they control who gets to sell and who gets to purchase.

But... it would have been so satisfying if Valve said fuck you.

Yes they would lose sales for a while but if they publicly said it was the payment processors that are doing this they could have just tried to wait it out and generate public hate.

People would have been so angry at the payment processors that the Jews may have actually had to back off.

But alas, everyone gives in.

Nah, the payment processors would revel in the hate, and then speed up their Crusade against "harmful material".

 

[Mike Matei's Penis]

Valve kowtowing to Australians for refunds
Valve kowtowing to Australian feminists D:

 

[teriyakiburns]

Of course freetards are the ones screaming loudest about Child Rape Simulator 3 or whatever being taken off Steam.

Gamingonlinux has a vested interest in keeping up to date on what steam is doing. They asked for comment and got it. No screaming required.

Considering Steam cards I can buy at a retailer is a thing, I have no idea why they bent the knee, unless MC is the ones to process that transaction.

Two Three points:

1) The transaction is at the point you buy the card, so unless you use cash, MC has its finger in there.
2) not enough people will switch to using gift cards to keep the business viable.
3) MC can simply refuse to process any of valve's money transfers, so buying the gift card with cash doesn't mean valve will get the money.

 

[Ukraine is Big Gay]

A good handful of tards ITT that don't understand secondary effects or knock-on effects or looking into who is doing what and claiming what.
Tranime MFs are creeps 7 times outta 10 and I will not weep for their gooner content targeted and it's loss, but use your brain.

The moment you let a group like this flex power on global banking to dictate what you can buy, inevitably all the things you enjoy even if they frame bad things as bad are next on the chopping block because the house fire spreads fast.

It doesn't matter if the context is framing the depictions as a bad thing either or has negative consequences.
Don't forget the visa/mastercard pressure is coming from the exact same group that tried to get Detroit: become human banned because it depicts violence against a robotic woman and a child. Regardless of the message intent or framing.

For context the abuser in the game is even full on depicted in full as a drunk wifebeater wearing pig loser and your character's motivation is escaping with the kid that was being beaten. And you can fuck the abuser up for beating his kid and getting her out of there safely afterward, up to and including just shooting him or choosing to just get the kid out of there without violence yourself.

That's a prime example of what they went full retard trying to censor before.
---
BIG RETARD AWARENESS WARNING: I could also easily be retarded and wrong from here on out and I am just sharing what dramatic bread crumbs I managed to sweep from the internet as no one that I've yet found has provided the actual list/petition for freeing Aureum Lee that I've seen yet and they could just be false conflating and shit stirring.

So everything in spoilers is "It came to me in a dream" levels of reliability bits taken from other retards.

Collective Shout is (with spotty/bullshit heresay information) is intermingled or at least accessory involved with WOMAD which had a poster/user that was busted for abusing (a) young boy(s) and cheering it on back in 2017 and onward. By the name/pseudonymn of Aureum Lee.

WOMAD Context with a surprising amount of transparency for wikipedia

Two names that (allegedly) appeared on the Collective Shout petition to mastercard and visa have been claimed to also be signers on the Australian petition to free Aereum Lee despite admission and concrete evidence of her abuse.

One is Melinda Reist, and the other is Michael Salter.