Many were outraged this summer when House Party, a controversial sex video game, was pulled off Steam, the world’s leading digital distribution platform for PC games.
Actually, this game by developer Eek! Games had become a hit since its launch in June, selling thousands of copies, and drew much media attention when its removal from Steam was announced in late July.
This is because Steam did not provide clear reasons for taking off the game from their catalogue, despite the fact that many had charged against the game, calling it “pornographic” amongst other things.
“The game has been a target for a certain group of people since the day it launched, and said people were posting very aggressive, distasteful and hateful comments directed toward the game and its community of players”, wrote Eek! Games in a blog post on its website.
And it’s clear the people behind the game were frustrated by Steam’s lack of clarity when it came to stating the reasons behind removing the game from their platform, adding that “I know there are many games with nudity, and there are also games with sex scenes as well, including really popular titles, so it’s all rather confusing and I don’t know exactly where the line is or what in particular I should be censoring”.
Also as PC Gamer points out, a visual novel titled “Ladykiller in a Bind” came out on Steam uncensored and wasn’t a target of the Steam censors despite the fact that it promises “explicit, consensual, kinky lesbian sex” and features several bonus sex scenes too.
Although it’s clear that House Party is by no means a tasteful game: amongst other things, this lets players put their private parts on a charcoal barbecue, blackmail women over nude pictures and engage in dirty talk at the titular house party in order to get laid.
The game, though, has recently been reinstated on Steam, with Eek! Games expressing their appreciation for their fans and those who stood against the Steam ban, which has thankfully now been lifted.
“It was really cool to see a lot of people who didn’t really care for the game still getting behind it and expressing that they didn’t feel that it should have been banned”, said Eek! Games on its website.
Of course, Eek! Games was forced to censor some of the game’s content in order to get House Party back on Steam, and this had to do “with the portrayal of sex acts” according to the dev, even though Eek guarantees the story has not been cut in any way in this modified version.
Even then, it’s clear some people might be pissed off at not being able to play the game in its original form, and for these people Eek! Games will now be providing a patch which will allow you to restore the censored bits and let you play the game as originally intended.
This is not the first time a game has been removed from Steam due to its content, though. Back in late 2014, Hatred was taken off Steam due to its supposedly excessive levels of violence as it rewarded players for killing civilians in the game, although it later made it back to Steam after many disgruntled users complained about the matter.
Of course, Hatred’s removal was about violence and not sex, which we still think is a mostly pointless addition to video games, even if sometimes it can help flesh out the game’s characters and their relationships.
So all’s well that ends well, then, and those who were looking forward to play House Party will be able to get the game normally through Steam now.