Nier

Too lazy to read through the thread, so I'll just chime in my two cents (having read the OP at least)
 
The anti-anime thing that often rears its head is more of a general society thing, than Valve specifically (as you see it often being a scape-goat for all manner of things).  I'll hesistantly call it a form of racism - or at least, "personal interpretations being misconstrued as objective truth". Someone that doesn't typically watch anime or pay attention to the styles used often make assumptions on a characters age, mistaking various characters as being younger then they actually are (and I don't just mean "legal lolis", I mean characters that DO look 17-18 to you and I - but not to an outsider).
People often forget that not every group will have the same features or builds as the avrg white person. And while anime characters are obviously exaggerated and moe-blobbed a lot of the time, they typically retain the traits of the demograph it's based on~
 
Long story short: Baseless assumptions from outsiders - abusing their power to sate personal, arbitrary opinions.

I never insinuated any of this, however it is clear that they try not to talk about it at all, I am guessing they won't talk nor mention anything about it until the game releases on the 15th, then at that time they'll just release the patch like if it's the most natural thing in the world, it's all pretty hush-hush, probably because they just don't want to take any risks especially when Steam isn't clear at all about their do's and don'ts policies.
 
I don't get why Americans hate the show, I am guessing it hits too close to home, eh? This show is pretty popular in Germany and France, here's a sample of the german version:
 

Newton and The Apple Tree release had been withheld by Steam for 3 months or so, now it will finally release on the 15th August, still no word on 18+ support as Sol Press is remaining silent on that matter (looks like they really are afraid of Steam using that as an excuse to remove the game).
Now another VN who has been the victim of the anti-animu Steam policy where Steam takes months to try and find faults in anything and everything about it, the development of the game has been completed since the beginning of this year, and it has been trying to be approved for release on Steam since March, it's release has since been withheld and still nothing is known about the game release date, one issue that Steam pointed to the dev was over the fact that there is a CG where the protagonist is wearing speedos and a part of his back can be seen:

Meanwhile non-anime western games with upfront nudity and gratuitous sex scenes are still on the store, uncensored and uncut.
Steam really hates anime don't they?
This nonsense reminds me of that Married with Children episode (skip to 12:30 for the relevant part):
 

I knew it! All those Steam engineers where lurking here to see if they could get away with this.
 
But jokes aside it's good that it's fixed/changed again. And hopefully this is not a sign of what is to come with steam.

Sekai Project Titles are also affected.
I just tested it and titles like Muv Luv (Alternative), the 3 main Grisaia titles, Chrono Clock don't show up if you search them.
 
And after searching some of Mangagamer titles, it's the same problem. Titles like Like Kindred Spirits on the Roof, Mutiny!! or D.S. -Dal Segno- don't show up in the search function.
And from Jast USA I can confirm that Eiyu*Senki isn't showing up when you search it.
I  haven't looked up all titles but some titles show up just fine. (The Phantom Trigger releases for example or Tokyo Babel)
They are also specific for games because the Muv Luv Wallpaper pack or the Kindred Spirits on the Roof Drama CDs show up despite the actual VN being omitted.
 
I hope this gets fixed soon because otherwise its pretty bad. Or maybe this it's just steams new way to get the games out that they don't want to see.

These devs could just like...
I don't know use a fucking different store and release there instantly.
Steam marketing is a bad meme

Yet another example of steam being steam which means being really shitty

Did it hit close home?  BEST SERIES EVER!

Or perhaps I view the removal of honorifics as a remnant of cultural imperialism, given that honorifics from other European languages are not treated the same way?

"Heres something we've already released, but different!" thats how theyre treating denpa. instead of releasing physical copies at the same time as their titles, theyre releasing them later so people whove already bought might be compelled to buy them again when they didnt have the option. 
 
its your money so of course i cant stop you but really, sp doesnt care. theyre getting their money, theyll make half ass promises and a small majority is getting screwed by them while they move onto the next project to kickstart and sell. i just cant see them as anything but a dishonest company that takes advantage of their customers.

Subrashiki Hibi only sold about ~2k copies.
Also there was the confirmation from SCA-DI himself way back then:
Basically Subarashiki Hibi that came out on the 30th August 2017 sold ~4.5k copies less than the All-Ages version of Littler Busters which came out on the 1st November 2017, in any case if it's not obvious it should be mentioned that both are terrible sale numbers.
After this, I don't think that Makura are gonna be too eager to release in the West the definitive version of Subarashiki Hibi anytime soon, nor one of the other best VN ever made, Sakura no Uta.

It make sense I guess if we consider that it was released by the original company before it was finally released by Sekai, so most likely the developer themselves were work together with Sekai in regard of the translation resulting the awkward translation there. I don't know though if it might be deliberate or not, but as for me I would say that I'm fine with 2236 translation here even though I might not have the time to read this later.

It's sakuuta. My dad works for MG.

Always remember the core idea of moege: The girls you don't pick, will die lonely, unloved and depressed by their traumas and issues. 

The description itself has me raring to read this. I now have an urge to go out to my shed and find out where all my tools came from.

>thinking that they have editors and tlc's

>editors not doing their job at SP
That's definitely news.

Honestly, I never had this problem when reading it. I think that's just the style of writing the VN has in general. It's sorta vague and has you reading more into it than what's on the surface level.
Then again, it could be worse than I imagined it to be. It is Sekai Project after all.

I'm a professional editor. I prefer keeping honorifics for stories in a Japanese setting.

Good point. Anybody talking about removing honorifics should try reading Hercule Poirot.

I'm just going to note the double standard that allows foreign honorifics from Western cultures, such as 'Monsieur' or 'Herr,' to exist in English translations, while non-Western honorifics such as '-san' are shunned.

A very idealistic (and unrealistic) look on things. No internet poll can be the way you picture it. The only way to randomly sample customers would be if all the localization companies (and Steam) made a poll together. Not that doing it that way wouldn't be "useless" (according to you) as well. Every poll on the internet is completely voluntary. Things don't work like in real life, where you get called out to at a subway station and agree to take part in a poll before you even know what's going on. In that scenario, it is also much harder to walk away from something you already agreed to. That is not the case on the internet. You likely know the contents of a poll before you decide to click on it, and even if you don't, closing the tab if you don't care about the subject is very easy.
 
That is a myth. Let's take a look at this year's releases.

It's all about Japanese being the language of the non-White "other," therefore unacceptable. Also, recent translations of Japanese literature have started including honorifics.

Fuurinkanzan is very old and Jutai Hen seem to just be an eroge about school stuff, Elf at least uses a more original setting and would probably sell more and be more popular, it's just the kind of game that catches your attention.
The anime adaptation is also one of the highest rated 18+ anime on anidb:
https://anidb.net/perl-bin/animedb.pl?show=animelist&orderby.rating=0.2&orderby.name=1.1&noalias=1&h=2
It has spot number 5.

The real answer is that the translator translates faster than anyone else at the company can keep up with. Arunaru is a beast.