Another Case of Steam Withholding a VN Release Indefinitely Over Petty Nonsense

[Nier]

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):

 

Edited August 8, 2018 by Nier

[Plk_Lesiak]

Steam also seems to be messing with their search algorithms, assuming WinteWolves is not an isolated incident. I guess they might be making some modifications in preparation to adding the filtering tools we heard about before. Considering they're letting Newrin in, filters might show up really soon - I don't think SolPress would actually delay, or especially cancel the 18+ patch to appease to Steam, it would bring them massive amounts of hate, so if they're allowed to publish their game now, something must've happened on Valve's part. 

Edited August 8, 2018 by Plk_Lesiak

[Fiddle]

This topic is just a clever ploy to get me to watch Married with Children. I won't fall for it. That show sucks.

[Nier]

7 minutes ago, Plk_Lesiak said:

I don't think SolPress would actually delay, or especially cancel the 18+ patch to appease to Steam, it would bring them massive amounts of hate, so if they're allowed to publish their game now, something must've happened on Valve's part. 

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.

 

10 minutes ago, Fiddle said:

This topic is just a clever ploy to get me to watch Married with Children. I won't fall for it. That show sucks.

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:

 

[kokoro]

19 minutes ago, Fiddle said:

This topic is just a clever ploy to get me to watch Married with Children. I won't fall for it. That show sucks.

Did it hit close home?  BEST SERIES EVER!

[Ranzo]

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

[Yuuko]

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

Steam marketing is a bad meme

[Nier]

31 minutes ago, Kiriririri said:

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

Steam marketing is a bad meme

Everybody wants to use Steam, I am guessing it's because it will get their games the most coverage and sales. Sol Press ABSOLUTELY wanted Newton to release on Steam first and foremost, you can see it in their wording on their twitter and kickstarter updates when asked about it, as a matter of fact as of now they have no plan to release it anywhere else.

Edited August 8, 2018 by Nier

[Formlose Gestalt]

2 hours ago, Plk_Lesiak said:

Steam also seems to be messing with their search algorithms, assuming WinteWolves is not an isolated incident. I guess they might be making some modifications in preparation to adding the filtering tools we heard about before. Considering they're letting Newrin in, filters might show up really soon - I don't think SolPress would actually delay, or especially cancel the 18+ patch to appease to Steam, it would bring them massive amounts of hate, so if they're allowed to publish their game now, something must've happened on Valve's part. 

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.

Edited August 8, 2018 by Formlose Gestalt

[VirginSmasher]

Relying on Steam to get sales is starting to bite companies in the ass. And since the VNs don't show up anymore because of Steam's erratic nonsense, they're gonna have to actually try and market their VNs properly or find a different option to prevent poor sales. 

[Yuuko]

I think it was the sexual content that removes titles from the search.

 

Anyways absolutely no reason to use Steam as a shop if they stop you from releasing stuff. Steam gives absolutely nothing for devs unless their game somehow magically becomes a meme among normies.

 

Also fuck off mitch

Edited August 8, 2018 by Kiriririri

[Formlose Gestalt]

Update: The titles that I listed above seem to show up for me again in the search function.

[mitchhamilton]

4 minutes ago, Kiriririri said:

I think it was the sexual content that removes titles from the search.

 

Anyways absolutely no reason to use Steam as a shop if they stop you from releasing stuff. Steam gives absolutely nothing for devs unless their game somehow magically becomes a meme among normies.

 

Also fuck off mitch

<3  

2 minutes ago, Formlose Gestalt said:

Update: The titles that I listed above seem to show up for me again in the search function.

your thread did it!  

[Formlose Gestalt]

6 minutes ago, mitchhamilton said:

your thread did it!  

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.

Edited August 8, 2018 by Formlose Gestalt

[Suzu Fanatic]

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.

Edited August 9, 2018 by Suzu Fanatic

[kyrt]

Got a solution. Going to make a main post. Essentially it's hidden until you enable otherwise.

[Hetzer123]

.

Edited October 2, 2019 by Hetzer123

[Mr Poltroon]

2 hours ago, kyrt said:

Got a solution. Going to make a main post. Essentially it's hidden until you enable otherwise.

The issues with hidden search content were a bug, not a feature. This bug has since been fixed. The settings regarding extreme content that Steam currently has and has had for years had nothing to do with the bug, and the bug ignored them.

[kyrt]

3 hours ago, Mr Poltroon said:

The issues with hidden search content were a bug, not a feature. This bug has since been fixed. The settings regarding extreme content that Steam currently has and has had for years had nothing to do with the bug, and the bug ignored them.

I think part of it had to deal with the fact a recent update automatically unchecked the boxes. Unless what you are mentioning is a different bug? 

[Mr Poltroon]

39 minutes ago, kyrt said:

I think part of it had to deal with the fact a recent update automatically unchecked the boxes. Unless what you are mentioning is a different bug? 

The bug ignored whatever preferences were set there. It excluded all titles with certain tags from searches, regardless of preferences. That's all it did.
I don't think it unchecked the preferences, as at least it did not do so to me, but it might have for others.

[Fred the Barber]

21 hours ago, Kiriririri said:

Anyways absolutely no reason to use Steam as a shop if they stop you from releasing stuff. Steam gives absolutely nothing for devs unless their game somehow magically becomes a meme among normies.

I think you're mistaken here. My understanding is that Steam sales dwarf sales on other platforms, and that even if you release uncut content on other platforms and cut content on Steam, a Steam release brings in a lot of extra sales. Obviously the effect is larger for things that blow up, like Nekopara or IMHHW, but this is true even for releases that don't do that well.

As much as people love to meme about them, collectively, the VN localization companies aren't utterly irrational. They wouldn't keep jumping through all these hoops for their releases if they weren't making money off it (at least not all of them; and yet all of them are still releasing stuff on Steam, even though it's a pain in the ass).

Edited August 9, 2018 by Fred the Barber

[Yuuko]

2 hours ago, Fred the Barber said:

I think you're mistaken here. My understanding is that Steam sales dwarf sales on other platforms, and that even if you release uncut content on other platforms and cut content on Steam, a Steam release brings in a lot of extra sales. Obviously the effect is larger for things that blow up, like Nekopara or IMHHW, but this is true even for releases that don't do that well.

As much as people love to meme about them, collectively, the VN localization companies aren't utterly irrational. They wouldn't keep jumping through all these hoops for their releases if they weren't making money off it (at least not all of them; and yet all of them are still releasing stuff on Steam, even though it's a pain in the ass).

I'm not sure if delaying a game that is release ready for something like 6 months is too healthy for a small VN company. It's not like they can't release the game later on Steam when they finally get the permission.

Do you think that if they put the game on something like GoG for example and then months later on Steam, it would bring them less total sales than if they just release it on Steam.

Of course more shops means more sales but what I meant that Steam doesn't have any magical power that makes people buy the game from there any more than from any other shop assuming they are regular customers for both.

[Stormwolf]

On 8/8/2018 at 3:13 PM, Nier said:

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 hope you one day understand that nudity does not equate porn. Witcher is the typical example i see, but that's not porn. If anything it's super softcore to the point of being irrelevant as it's done in good taste. No focus on vaginas/penis, no commenting about how good his/her genitalia feels, no inside/outside selection. These are very, very different.

[Fred the Barber]

7 hours ago, Kiriririri said:

I'm not sure if delaying a game that is release ready for something like 6 months is too healthy for a small VN company. It's not like they can't release the game later on Steam when they finally get the permission.

Do you think that if they put the game on something like GoG for example and then months later on Steam, it would bring them less total sales than if they just release it on Steam.

Of course more shops means more sales but what I meant that Steam doesn't have any magical power that makes people buy the game from there any more than from any other shop assuming they are regular customers for both.

Oh, you're totally right on that one, and I've actually offered that exact opinion to the Newrin folks. That last paragraph makes me feel like you're missing the point, though... sure your statement is true, but it's predicated on this silly assumption: "assuming they are regular customers for both". Steam has vastly more regular customers than other game storefronts.

Edit: Sorry, realized I forgot to make the other half of my point... I'm sure that at no point did they think they were six months away from a release. If I had to guess, probably at no point did they think they were more than a month away from releasing. But a constant string of one-month delays turns into a six-month delay before you know it, and you can't fault them for not having perfect foresight. It's easy to call this a bad decision now, but at each point in time where they made the decision? Definitely not so easy.

Edited August 10, 2018 by Fred the Barber

[Nier]

On 8/9/2018 at 8:02 PM, Kiriririri said:

I'm not sure if delaying a game that is release ready for something like 6 months is too healthy for a small VN company.

It's not, here is a quote regarding this matter from the developer of said VN:

Quote

A week passed... And another... More emails... No replies...

Then, a week before the Steam Summer Sale, they told us they would contact us soon!

But as you can see, we are still waiting...

It's really frustrating because our game is done and ready to sell, and we need the money to pay our bills and taxes so we can keep up working on our projects!

To make things worse, we had to deal with issues like the recent floods in Japan.

But we don't give up! Until Steam let us distribute Bloody Chronicles, we work hard every day on its bonus content.