Valve point to Mastercard restrictions as the payment firm deny influencing adult game removals
Financial service giants Mastercard have denied accusations that they sought to influence the recent removal of adult/NSFW games from Steam and Itch.io, claiming that they have “not evaluated any game or required restrictions of any activity on game creator sites and platforms,” and that they allow all lawful transactions. It’s a brief and unequivocal statement, but Valve themselves have since suggested it might not be entirely accurate, telling PC Gamer that Steam’s payment processors objected to the availability of law-abiding adult games by citing one of Mastercard’s specific rules.
Rule 5.12.7 is one of hundreds governing what Mastercard’s customers, merchant partners, and “service providers” – the actual payment processors who use Mastercard’s network – can and can’t do with its tech, and forbids any transaction “that is illegal, or in the sole discretion of the Corporation, may damage the goodwill of the Corporation or reflect negatively on the Marks.” In other words, a game doesn’t need to be breaking the law for its sale to break Mastercard’s rules, and Valve claim this is what allowed payment processors – potentially on Mastercard’s behalf – to push for removals.
“Mastercard did not communicate with Valve directly, despite our request to do so,” Valve told PCG. “Mastercard communicated with payment processors and their acquiring banks. Payment processors communicated this with Valve, and we replied by outlining Steam’s policy since 2018 of attempting to distribute games that are legal for distribution. Payment processors rejected this, and specifically cited Mastercard’s Rule 5.12.7 and risk to the Mastercard brand.”
It’s yet another direction in which blame-laced fingers have been pointed since Steam and Itch, ostensibly under pressure from payment processors, cracked down on games with adult content last month, with many non-sexual games – and especially those with LGBTQ+ themes – getting caught in the cull. Not that these payment firms have been any keener than Mastercard to admit to being a driving force: Stripe, one of the processors that pressured Itch, say they themselves were acting under restrictions imposed by unnamed banking partners. That leaves the only organisation to have readily claimed responsibility as, rather miserably, the religious-backed activist group Collective Shout, who are probably pleased as peas that this whole thing went better than their previous attempts at misinformation-led game bans.
In the end, of course, Valve folded, though Itch have at least relisted numerous free games that were previously removed, and are actively searching for alternative payment processors who aren’t so restrictive about handling transactions for paid games.
