Latest news with #GamingOnLinux
Time of India
07-08-2025
- Entertainment
- Time of India
GTA 6 at risk of delisting? Adult games debate heats up for titles like Grand Theft Auto, Saints Row; netizens say 'It is Soviet stuff'
GTA 6, a.k.a. Grand Theft Auto VI, the most anticipated game of all time, is scheduled to be released in May 2026; however, as the time of the launch nears, the rumours and leaks are also growing rapidly. Last week, a leak suggested that Rockstar Games is planning to delay the game even further to May 2026, leaving fans disappointed and furious. While the second lead says that the Rockstar is planning to roll out an age verification rule starting in the UK. Now, a new leak suggests that games like GTA VI and Saints Row are at risk of being delisted in the adult games debate. 'Adult games debate' has grown amid the gaming community recently In the past few weeks, a few topics in the gaming community have sparked discussions, and one of them is the 'adult games debate'. According to Insider Gaming, it was recently revealed that payment processors for some gaming outlets are cracking down on adult and NSFW (not safe for work) games. Amid the growing discussion, some activist responses have emerged in reaction to what is being called 'financial censorship' by certain payment providers and processors. One such example is GOG, which is a digital shopfront that briefly offered a bundle of adult-themed games for free as a form of protest. Following this, now there are growing concerns that titles like Grand Theft Auto, Saints Row, and Duke Nukem might also come under scrutiny, with payment processors potentially pushing for their removal from shopfronts. Risks that the adult gaming community may face According to GamingOnLinux, it was highlighted that a retro digital shopfront had come under pressure from payment processors aiming to restrict adult content. In a statement, the platform in question, ZOOM Platform, confirmed it had been 'targeted' as a part of this broader crackdown. The report went on to note that GamingOnLinux reportedly received an email from the ZOOM Platform team stating that they anticipate the delisting issue to widen. They specifically mentioned that games like Grand Theft Auto, Duke Nukem, and Saints Row could be at risk. While Grand Theft Auto has long been a controversial franchise, its adult content comprises only a small portion of the game. It's certainly not one of those explicit titles tucked away in the collections of some niche Steam users. Netizens react to the 'Adult games debate' As soon as the update surfaced on social media, it quickly went viral, and fans shared their reactions. One said, "Wouldn't the attempt be the best-case scenario? Generally, adult game publishers don't have the financials to take this to court against the big payment once you start taking on big game companies, they have entire legal teams to fight this out." "Might be. I can see some indie porn games being delisted without much fuss, but there is no fucking way Rockstar and Take Two are going to sit quietly if GTA games are delisted," one replied. "GTA is "worse" in what you can do than most of the delisted games." "Between the UK adult content needing an ID and this visa mastercard shite im absolutely worried for the future" One joked, "Never thought I'd be alive to see this sort of censorship. Even if it's just an attempt. It's honestly Soviet stuff, this. Freedoms are genuinely being attacked here."
Yahoo
10-02-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Valve Bans Forced In-Game Ads From All Steam Titles
If you, like most people on Earth, a frequent mobile gamer, you'll be all-too aware of the bane of in-game ads. Because the freemium model proves by far the most successful way to release games on telephones, you pay by sitting through agonizing ads with fake countdown timers, 'x' buttons that don't close anything, and faux-interactivity designed to trick you into tapping through to the store. Valve has now made it abundantly clear that anything like this on their PC store means an instant ban. As spotted by GamingOnLinux, Valve's encyclopedic Steamworks Documentation has been updated to refuse to sell any game that relies on in-game advertising for its business model. That means no games can require players to watch ads to be able to play, nor hide any elements of a game behind a commercial. And it goes further, banning the use of viewing ads to gain in-game advantages, rewards, or time. 'Developers should not utilize paid advertising as a business model in their game,' say Valve's instructions, 'such as requiring players to watch or otherwise engage with advertising in order to play, or gating gameplay behind advertising. If your game's business model relies on advertising on other platforms, you will need to remove those elements before shipping on Steam.' The company suggests switching to an up-front payment, or keeping the game 'free' but keeping upgrades as paid DLC. The rules then say, Developers should not use advertising as a way to provide value to players, such as giving players a reward for watching or engaging with advertising in their game. For people who never play games on mobile, these might seem quite bizarre things to need to rule out: while video games have, for decades, included in-game ads (or even existed to be advertising), gatekeeping actual play behind commercials has only been a very occasional, very egregious matter. On mobile, it's the norm. If you've played a match-3, or a merger game, or any number of mock-RTS games, you'll be very familiar with the requirement to sit through 30 seconds of a puzzle game being played infuriatingly badly, or a flashing icon begging you to tap on an army unit, or the most extraordinarily high-quality CG animation promoting a game that plays like it was made on a VIC-20. A tiny circle counts down from 30 seconds, after which the advert doesn't end, and then it cuts to a new screen with a new timer, replaced by an 'x' so tiny that if you don't tap it with a tungsten needle it'll take you to the store page. After all that, you've now got enough imaginary energy to take two more turns at the game you wish you were allowed to enjoy. This is, however, extraordinarily profitable, and while you and I might scream into the void that we just want to pay $5 to own the game outright, the moment you put a price on an unknown mobile game it's doomed to obscurity. And while Steam may not have been plagued by the same issues, it makes a lot of sense for Valve to make these rules clear for those hoping to just port their game and business model over to PC, wholesale. If anything, it's very surprising that this isn't already a fire that needs putting out, rather than some preventative measures. The mobile market proves that are squillions of people who are content to sit through countless ads to play games, so you'd think there would have already been a bigger push to see if the same could happen with PC's free-to-play audiences. Small mercies, I guess. Valve makes clear companies can still advertise in games. Those awkward billboards and real-world brand cosmetics are still fine to include, although Steam does stipulate that these must not be 'disruptive' and are 'appropriate within the context of the game.' It's worth noting this does also block previous gross behavior we've seen from the biggest names, the likes of 2K, filling basketball games with unskippable ads and so on. . For the latest news, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
