Erotic game ‘Seduce me’ pulled from Steam Greenlight

By: Moses Abaortae

  |   September 6th, 2012   |  

Uncategorized

No Reply Games, the developers of the title, were outraged as they discovered the fact that their game had been removed from Valve’s Greenlight service on Steam.

Steam in essence is online platform that allows PC Gamers to meet and greet, play together and even purchase content and games. The service is a trendsetter as a number of major publishers such as Ubisoft and EA have released their own platforms as well.

Valve is planning on expanding the Steam portfolio, of services it has to offer, by launching Greenlight, which allows gamers a space to upload, share and sell their titles to other Steam users. However, the launch of the service has not been as smooth as the publisher would have wanted.

Greenlight seemed to be attracting a lot of joke titles and ‘clutter’, which was taking away from the experience that Valve had for the service and it imposed a $100 submission fee to ensure that only serious developers would be inclined to use the service and it would dissuade the clutter-ers and jokers. The move seems shrewd, although the $100 fee may be a bit high, even though it will be given to charity.

However, the service has come under the spotlight once again as Valve has taken an initiative to censor the content on offer as well. ‘Seduce Me’, an erotic title developed by No Reply Games, has been removed from Greenlight, much to the displeasure of the developers who have gone all ‘Freedom of Speech’ on Valve’s behind.

The game revolved along players choosing between different dialogues as they attempt to seduce the in-game character after which ‘the party started’.

Miriam Bellard, the co-founder of No Reply Games, went public with her outrage. She raged, “We submitted the game on Thursday, when Steam Greenlight launched…(Valve) took it down almost straight away.”

At this point she threw in a few facts and figures to support her stance as well, “Many people still view games as ‘for children’ in spite of the fact that the average gamer is 30 years old.”

Another employee from the studio added, “The gaming establishment is fine with violence and gore but is uncomfortable with sexual themes.”

However, Valve responded clarifying that they wanted Steam and Greenlight to maintain a certain image. Doug Lombardi, the spokesperson for Valve, said, “Steam has never been a leading destination for erotic material. Greenlight doesn’t aim to change that.”

It is an interesting subject and we want to know what the reader thinks; did Valve do the right thing to maintain its image or do they have no right to remove games based on their content? Let us know in the comments section below.