Valve threatening to remove VNs with adult content from steam?

[bakauchuujin]

Kindred spirits got hit as well

Edited May 18, 2018 by bakauchuujin

[VirginSmasher]

21 minutes ago, Infernoplex said:

I agree with other points you made, but this one I just can't agree with. It sounds like you are implying that the official releases are always much better than fanTLs while that's not really the case. And not all fanTLs are "mediocre" either. Back in the day, official loc companies used to buy those same fanTLs.

Back in the day, companies also had worse TLs overall. Whether that's because of buying TLs or their own staff is up for debate. Plus, quite a few SP releases have involved fan TL teams and weren't good quality as a result. I've definitely had a better experience overall with official TLs, but that definitely doesn't mean they're flawless. That being said, I still think official TLs > fan TLs on average.

[Dreamysyu]

34 minutes ago, bakauchuujin said:

Kindred spirits got hit as well

Linking a related blog post.

And that after Valve explicitly told MG that this title is okay to be published as it is... What VN is going to be next, I wonder?

Edited May 18, 2018 by Dreamysyu

[r0xm2n]

....... why is Steam even doing this anyways? This doesn't seem related to profits at all...

Is the need to be so utterly politically correct that important, or something? Is the fear of being sued THAT ingrained?

[bakauchuujin]

9 minutes ago, Dreamysyu said:

And that after Valve explicitly told MG that this title is okay to be published as it is... What VN is going to be next, I wonder?

My gues would be momoiro closet and subahibi

Also assume Fureraba is going to get hit based on the amount of people trolling the discussion page that probably reported just because they love censoring things for others.

Edited May 18, 2018 by bakauchuujin

[Plk_Lesiak]

Shame about Kindred Spirits getting hit, but considering how the all-ages versions of most SP and MG games are made I wouldn't expect this to turn into some kind of global disaster (unless Steam starts actually going after patches 18+, that would be a massacre). I can imagine that the inconsistency will be off-putting for Japanese companies and publishers, but probably not enough to change things drastically.

I wonder if any Winged Cloud games got hit by this, it would be pretty funny if main smut-dealers on the platform were ommited. They always cover those SINFUL NIPPLES in the all-ages versions though. Bare breasts seams to be all this is about at this point. 

[adamstan]

10 minutes ago, Plk_Lesiak said:

 They always cover those SINFUL NIPPLES in the all-ages versions though. Bare breasts seams to be all this is about at this point. 

As was mentioned before, Witcher 2 and 3 are full of nipples (and they have sex scenes too, although camera is set to now show genitals) - yet it looks like they are not targeted. Or are they? That would cause some serious uproar I guess  

Easier to pick on a niche - but then again - if it's such small niche, then what's the point?

[Plk_Lesiak]

2 hours ago, adamstan said:

Easier to pick on a niche - but then again - if it's such small niche, then what's the point?

They might be responding to mass complains (the Maidens of Michael debacle is said to be initiated by a notorious troll) or just wish to defend their image of a "safe"/porn-free platform. Attacking niches is definitely an easier way to do that than acting against major titles/publishers. That Witcher nudity and sex scenes won't be touched because people would riot and not enough customers will defend Spirits or WinterWolves' stuff for Valve to care - and "anime" stuff is generally a convenient punching bad because of the stereotypes around it. 

It is that especially dumb/pointless and prudish kind of censorship though and I would love to see some real backlash against it. 

Edited May 18, 2018 by Plk_Lesiak

[Sayaka]

Gotta love the classic standards of "explicit violence is just fine, but depictions of our own unclothed bodies is sick and wrong"...

[Plk_Lesiak]

35 minutes ago, Palas said:

It'd appear they're only targeting games with sexualization of minors, which'd explain why we've heard nothing about Sakura games yet and why they won't touch games like GTA or The Witcher 3. And, if it's true, there's not really much we can say.

I thought Huniepop didn't have any, but then someone reminded me of the catgirl. I wish they'd remove that character anyway if it meant more scenes with the other characters (especially Audrey)

 

Games like Roommates also got the same warning and I don't think that one has any characters that are minors, let alone sexual content with those.

[bakauchuujin]

Tropical Liquor was also hit and looking at vndb all the chars are 20+ years old.

[bakauchuujin]

4 minutes ago, Palas said:

...Does this game have sexual content at all?

I have not played it myself but on vndb it says it is all ages, also most characters seems to engage in off screen sex. I would assume they they just want to remove it for crude jokes or something else, it does have LGBTQ tag so maybe some anti gay people mass flagged it.

Edited May 18, 2018 by bakauchuujin

[littleshogun]

It's easier to imagine that Steam will more or less is like console, so as long as any company who can provide VN for the console will be more likely survive in the midst of Steam unstable policy. Ironically it mean that Pulltop will have more advantage to market their VN in Steam, because they already experienced in regard of cutting the H scenes. That said for VN with H scenes, more or less they the company can go either sold the VN at their own store or Nutaku. I know that the latter was more controversial in regard of the censorship, but so far their recent censorship after changing the policy is in regard of cutting the trap route, so maybe it wouldn't be that bad if some developer want to sell their VN through Nutaku. In the end, what I can say is that the situation here might be not changed at all, only that the localization company would more aggressively sell their all age VNs at Steam. I'll just wait for the future development here.

PS - Keep in mind that in the end Steam is more or less operate like the community, so maybe there's a lot of people who disliked the porn entry on Steam (Like Sakura Games VN) and therefore report it.

Edited May 18, 2018 by littleshogun

[bakauchuujin]

A theme that seem to be common is that they feature homosexual relationship, Mutiny!! seem to be girl on girl according to tags, Roommates  has LGBTQ tag, Kindred Spirits on the Roof is a yuri, Huniepop lets you choose either male or female, if female then that would be yuri, Battle Girls has the tag bisexual heroine, Galaxy Girls is a yuri. There was also A Kiss for the Petals - Maidens of Michael that faced this problem not too long ago. The only one that doesn't seem to fall into this category is Tropical Liquor

[adamstan]

13 minutes ago, Palas said:

The theory I'm seeing on ResetERA is that some group of people mass flagged all games they didn't like, and Valve is rolling with it.

And maybe even it's not "Valve" but automatic system, similar to that utilised by FB? Meaning, if something gets flagged enough times, it gets pulled down (and nobody even checks it personally), or in the case of Steam - system generates generic warning to the developer - "Your game doesn't meet our standards. Change it or we remove it"? That would explain the vagueness of warnings, and lack of proper explanation what needs to be changed mentioned on Mangagamers blog.

 

The pitfalls of "Vox populi - vox dei" approach

Edited May 18, 2018 by adamstan

[Shinoa]

5 hours ago, Hetzer123 said:

 

 

There will be problem about maximizing profit due to other storefront not having payment benefits of steam (like regional pricing and payment options). This also VN which has plain nudity without patch. I hope steam don't wipe out half of the visual novel from existence.

That is not really true, JAST for example has regional pricing and even pay pall.

[sanahtlig]

From a pure pragmatic standpoint, Steam is nice because it forces publishers to compete for attention.  This drives deep discounts and is a key reason why I'd prefer a Steam release + adult patch over a standalone adult version.  I don't see that being replicated on a respectable adult platform in the forseeable future.

[Hetzer123]

.

Edited October 2, 2019 by Hetzer123

[Shinoa]

1 hour ago, sanahtlig said:

From a pure pragmatic standpoint, Steam is nice because it forces publishers to compete for attention.  This drives deep discounts and is a key reason why I'd prefer a Steam release + adult patch over a standalone adult version.  I don't see that being replicated on a respectable adult platform in the forseeable future.

Both JAST and MG do sales tho. Now is the time to bring back my idea, you may remember it back from the JAST forums when I was calling for a joined MG-JAST store. I think that would solve most of the communities problems.

 

1 hour ago, Hetzer123 said:

Regional pricing of Jast is not large as steam (currency should be in MYR not USD in my country) and steam has more payment options than paypal(some people complain about Jast rejecting local debit card due to not using international credit/debit card or paypal. Jast is blocked in more countries than steam discourage people from accessing it (although steam has region lock on some games). Some people cannot access due to staying in Japan or government mandate ISP to block website such as Jast. It also depends on ISP whether changing DNS or using VPN( which makes regional pricing pointless). This makes paid patch pointless because they either buy the full version outside steam(some publisher has with steam key) and those which cannot buy the full version(or don't like the price outside steam) won't buy the paid patch. Steam has other features compare to JAST  such as review, steam community, achievements, trading cards,etc) which makes it more attractive than buying outside steam or piracy. Physical products are not good for some customer due to shipping cost, importation tax and legality issue enforced by custom officer.

Actually JAST is still working on the regional pricing, so it is not fully implemented for all nations but it should be soon. You should write them a support ticket about it and they will probably fix it.

[snowbell55]

Happening to Re;Lord 1 as well apparently

 

[sanahtlig]

15 minutes ago, Shinoa said:

Both JAST and MG do sales tho. Now is the time to bring back my idea, you may remember it back from the JAST forums when I was calling for a joined MG-JAST store. I think that would solve most of the communities problems.

While a one-stop shop for eroge is definitely a goal worth pursuing, my experience with both stores has been poor.  JAST's 16-file manual download (plus bugfix patch that was only available on my site, plus huge unofficial uncensor patch that only worked if you followed a very specific series of steps) for Shiny Days was utterly ridiculous.  MangaGamer's DRM was extremely inconvenient.  Neither store to my knowledge supports the advanced features (e.g., automatic download management and updates) that users expect nowadays.

[Hetzer123]

.

Edited October 2, 2019 by Hetzer123

[tahu157]

30 minutes ago, Hetzer123 said:

Mangagamer is still using DRM for newer titles or not?

None of the MG games I've bought have had DRM. I've only been buying from them for ~3 years though.

[Templarseeker]

38 minutes ago, sanahtlig said:

While a one-stop shop for eroge is definitely a goal worth pursuing, my experience with both stores has been poor.  JAST's 16-file manual download (plus bugfix patch that was only available on my site, plus huge unofficial uncensor patch that only worked if you followed a very specific series of steps) for Shiny Days was utterly ridiculous.  MangaGamer's DRM was extremely inconvenient.  Neither store to my knowledge supports the advanced features (e.g., automatic download management and updates) that users expect nowadays.

In terms of game technicality, yeah I agree its pretty inconvenient and a nightmare to the average consumers in having to manually patch the games they've already purchase on day one just to resolve some glitches

Veterans Visual Novels readers/players such ourselves would not consider this a big deal since we need to be a little techno savvy in running up our games or apply a English patch in making a VN readable, however how about the common folks who just wants to get the good stuff but does not possess the necessary skills therein

More time should be spend in playing and enjoying the games that we buy instead of worrying regarding any possible bugs that would ruin the experience 

Steam seem to make life a little easier thanks to their automatic patches and updates that installs silently in the background while we play around with our games... Although given a choice, I rather stick and choose JAST USA and Mangagamer stores than to contend with a hypocrite of a company who instantly condemning visual novels due to their suggestive contents?! 

At least the company mentioned above are honest with themselves and the products that they sell!

Their customer service is already bad enough, this situation only adds to the list of atrocities inflicted upon humanity itself! More reason to hate Steam!

 Nevertheless, like it or not, we NEED Steam since they're the ones who started digital game distribution revolution in the first place and somehow help give Visual Novels a noticeable presence in the gaming community more or less by making it available on their store...............

Just a thought, is it possible to make Fuwanovel a store front for Visual Novels?  

 

Edited May 18, 2018 by Templarseeker

[tahu157]

What about that Mirror game? Anyone know if it got hit?