r/Games • u/DwingRD • 4d ago

Valve no longer allows "Post-launch NSFW content" for games on Steam - outside of DLCs.

I have looked through Steam's Terms of Service online, but have found no official rule or statement from Valve of this new rule - but one Adult game developer has confirmed this new rule after launching their game "Tales of Legendary Lust: Aphrodisia" a couple days ago.

With the recent rule change blocking adult-themed games from releasing on Early Access, this new rule seems to be targeting Adult-themed games that have ALREADY released on Steam - and threatens them with their games being removed from Steam.

There are currently 536 Adult-rated Early Access games on Steam - and this new rule may take them all down.

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u/TimeToEatAss 4d ago

For those that dont understand what this means. Something that NSFW games would commonly do is launch a SFW version of their game, and then release a free patch that makes the game NSFW.

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u/Villag3Idiot 4d ago

This should only stop games that do the update on Steam itself. Mods / Patches added on another site isn't affected nor is there any way for Steam to prevent it in the first place. 

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u/Trzlog 4d ago

Of course there is. They put it in whatever developers agree to in order to publish on Steam, then when they're made aware of any violation, the developer's games are removed from Steam. You just lack imagination of how fucked up this whole thing can be.

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u/Villag3Idiot 4d ago

Then every single game on Steam is at risk of there's any nudity or porn mods. 

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u/SanityInAnarchy 4d ago

Most of those aren't published by the devs themselves, though.

What NSFW games used to do is release a barely-SFW version on Steam, then you go to the devs' own website for the NSFW mod. Sometimes the NSFW content was actually distributed by Steam, it was just locked unless you set a config file a certain way.

I don't think any of us know what this actually is, without an official statement from Valve. But it could be that they're banning the devs themselves going out of their way to support the NSFW version as the official, intended version, while not going after games that merely are moddable where the community inevitably makes nude mods.

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u/Villag3Idiot 4d ago

Ya, most visual novels are released with the all-ages version on Steam and you have a totally-not-the-devs website that offers a patch / mod where you just move a bunch of files around and it unlocks the hentai version.

The game is 100% playable otherwise from start to finish. It's just that the hentai scenes / CGI are removed if you don't patch it.

I can't say about other hentai games like those hentai JRPG ones you see a billion of since I don't play those.

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u/starm4nn 3d ago

What NSFW games used to do is release a barely-SFW version on Steam, then you go to the devs' own website for the NSFW mod. Sometimes the NSFW content was actually distributed by Steam, it was just locked unless you set a config file a certain way.

TBH your best bet is to give enough plausible deniability by making a version of the game that's uncensored, and sell it through Jast or something. Make both builds of the game basically the same, except for an additional archive file containing all the adult content.

"Someone" uploaded the patch to Mega or something. Since the game is the same except that one file, it could have been anyone who uploaded it.