The first "100% uncensored" adult game has been approved for the Steam version

A game that developers call the first "100% uncensored" adult game from Steam is about to be launched Friday on the popular PC platform, with "sexual interactions and nudity" previously blocked by black bars .

Neglected: Stories of love was part of a group of erotic "visual novels" and other games that have been removed from service or have been withheld for approval in recent months in the midst of a "sexually repressed" content explicit "on the store. Many developers have responded to this restriction by adding black bars of "censorship" to the Steam versions of their games, and then directing players to external sites for downloadable patches to remove these bars.

Now, however, Neglected According to developer Dharker Studios, an uncensored version of the game "has completed the steam review process" and will be available without the need for correction on Friday, 14 September.

Valve announced in June that it would take a more frank approach to curating Steam games for anything that would not be "illegal or live". The lists for adult games, however, were still blocked while the company was working on new filtering tools to prevent users from seeing these explicit games unintentionally.

This "Adults Only" filter was launched last week and is now enabled for default Steam users. It means games like Neglected will not show in the recommendations of a Steam user, unless the filter is unchecked in the storage preference settings.

In addition to filters, Valve now requires developers to describe "violent or sexual content" in games submitted to the Steam Showcase to give potential players more information when browsing the store. "We think that the context in which the content is presented is important, and giving a developer a place to describe and explain what's going on in his game gives you even more information during your browsing and buying ", wrote Valve.

Loading the NSFW Steam page for Neglected: Stories of love requires users to log in and read a detailed description of the explicit content of the game before seeing the full list of stores or buying the game. This description includes warnings of illustrations featuring nudity, undressing and sexual interactions … topics related to sex under pressure … [and] themes related to abusive marriages and adultery. "

"Overall, what Steam did was not exactly what we wanted, it's not perfect," wrote Dharker Studios in a recent Kickstarter update for Neglected. "But it's a big step in the right direction."

Curiously enough, Valve's Steam Direct guidelines always quote "pornography" as one of the types of content that "you should not post on Steam" next to "content that is obviously insulting or intended to shock or disgust viewers. ". This raises the question of whether there is a line between permitted "adult" content and "obscene" prohibited content on the platform and how that line could be determined. We contacted Valve for clarification and we will update if we hear your answer.