Back in 2018, the people behind Steam, the world’s top online store for digital PC games, shocked the world when it announced that it would be adopting a “hands-off” policy regarding content on the digital storefront. This meant that games of an adult nature would theoretically be able to be sold on Steam without restrictions…
This led to something of an outrage, with adult only games such as Negligee: Love Stories getting banned in many countries around the world in response to Steam’s new “anything goes” policies.
But last year (and perhaps in response to the negative reaction and outgoing outrage regarding the matter) Steam updated its rules and guidelines, directly mentioning that games including “sexually explicit images of real people” are not allowed on the store.
This is the reason why Super Seducer 3, a seduction simulator featuring live action video, was not allowed to sell on Steam, despite there being a censored version of it, and its creator offering to make any changes necessary for it to hit the Steam store.
And it seems the same fate has befallen on Holodexxx, a virtual reality game for adults that tried to get Valve’s (the people behind Steam) approval to be sold on the platform, but failed after three attempts.
The team behind Holodexxx explained their ordeal with Steam in a recent blog post (via PC Gamer). Holodexxx’s first submission for Steam was banned with an “explanation that video pornography was not allowed on Steam”. According to the blog post, this was a censored experience featuring a virtual model of Riley Reid (a well-known adult movie star), who performs an erotic dance for the player in her underwear.
They followed up with another submission titled “Meet Marley”, which according to Holodexxx’s blog post allowed the player to inspect one of their digital characters (based on adult star Marley Brinx) in the game’s environment, but the team was once again met with frustration when Steam rejected the submission.
“We asked the submissions team for a brief outline of what would be allowed on Steam, considering our content — but they simply replied that they will judge our next app when they receive it”, said the people behind Holodexxx in the blog post.
Next the team submitted Holodexxx Home, an interactive experience which allowed the player to interact with Lady Euphoria, which according to the blog post is a fictional character based on Marley Brinx. This featured a dialog system, and had some adult content as it let players undress Lady Euphoria in a virtual reality environment, after which she “teases herself to a climax”.
Unsurprisingly, and taking into account that this final entry had some adult content in it, it was also banned by Steam, meaning it’s almost a certainty that Holodexxx will not be available for purchase on the platform.
And while this may seem controversial to some, Holodexxx featuring on Steam was unlikely from the get go, especially taking into account that the team behind this virtual reality game admits that “we unabashedly create pro-lewd content” and that “our experiences will only become more explicit in the future”.
Of course, one can also point to the fact that other games such as the controversial House Party do feature animated characters based on real people: YouTuber and model LetyDoesStuff was added to the game’s cast a couple of years ago as PC Gamer points out.
This, of course, is different to having “sexually explicit images of real people”, as Holodexxx does, especially if those people are real-life porn stars.
The debate goes on, of course, even if Holodexxx is still available on other places besides Steam for those (who are old enough) and willing to dive into the kind of adult experience this VR game offers…
Read more: Top 5 controversial adult games on Steam