{"id":50224,"date":"2025-07-18T22:00:00","date_gmt":"2025-07-18T13:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/?p=50224"},"modified":"2025-07-18T16:40:29","modified_gmt":"2025-07-18T07:40:29","slug":"detective-game-mysteriously-taken-down-during-steams-sex-simulator-purge-was-not-a-victim-of-crossfire-devs-confirm-other-reason-for-deletion","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/detective-game-mysteriously-taken-down-during-steams-sex-simulator-purge-was-not-a-victim-of-crossfire-devs-confirm-other-reason-for-deletion\/","title":{"rendered":"Detective game mysteriously taken down during Steam\u2019s sex simulator purge was not a victim of crossfire. Devs confirm other reason for deletion\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>On July 16, Steam made a <a href=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/steam-rules-updated-to-prohibit-content-that-violates-rules-set-forth-by-payment-processors-and-banks\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">big change to its rules about what\u2019s allowed on the platform<\/a>, with a new clause that prohibits content in violation of any standards set forth by payment processors, banks, or network providers. The timing of the update coincided with what appears to be a crackdown on games that violate the new rule. One deletion \u2013 of the Ace-Attorney inspired detective game called <strong>Trials of Innocence<\/strong> \u2013 particularly raised concerns as players struggled to identify what part of it could possibly warrant suspension. Fortunately, it has since been confirmed that this case is unrelated.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As can be tracked on <a href=\"https:\/\/steamdb.info\/history\/events\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">SteamDB<\/a>, a large number of titles have been taken down from the platform in the past few days. While Valve does not specify or give examples of what kind of content the new clause in their guideline targets, a common characteristic of titles deleted so far is that they focus on explicit sexual content \u2013 particularly tropes like incest, non-con, dub-con, hypnosis, brainwashing and slavery.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-rich is-provider-reddit wp-block-embed-reddit\"><div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\">\n<blockquote class=\"reddit-embed-bq\" style=\"height:316px\" ><a href=\"https:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/AceAttorney\/comments\/1m1tkbm\/sad_news_trials_of_innocence_has_been_banned_on\/\">[Sad News] Trials of Innocence has been banned on Steam<\/a><br> by<a href=\"https:\/\/www.reddit.com\/user\/ninjastarforcex\/\">u\/ninjastarforcex<\/a> in<a href=\"https:\/\/www.reddit.com\/r\/AceAttorney\/\">AceAttorney<\/a><\/blockquote><script async src=\"https:\/\/embed.reddit.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"UTF-8\"><\/script>\n<\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Among such titles, the courtroom drama adventure game Trials of Innocence was deleted from Steam on July 16. This caused a lot of confusion in the title\u2019s <a href=\"https:\/\/steamcommunity.com\/app\/2983140\/discussions\/0\/501704956628193687\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Steam forums<\/a> and Reddit \u2013 fans <a href=\"https:\/\/steamcommunity.com\/app\/2983140\/discussions\/0\/595154681972427046\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">pointed out<\/a> that the game does not include any nudity or hate speech, which brought up the alarming possibility that Trials of Innocence may have been deleted \u201cin the crossfire\u201d of the sweep due to some minor trigger.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Thankfully, this does not appear to be the case, as the game\u2019s developers <a href=\"https:\/\/steamcommunity.com\/app\/2983140\/discussions\/0\/595154681972527401\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">announced<\/a> on July 18 that they have received an explanation from Steam. Trials of Innocence was temporarily taken down due to a DMCA claim \u2013 which means the suspension was related to some kind of copyright infringement. In an odd twist of fate, the incident has helped boost the game\u2019s visibility, as one commenter notes, \u201cOn the plus side, I found out about your game due to this issue and can&#8217;t wait to be able to buy and play it! Someone remind me when it&#8217;s back up.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1258\" height=\"701\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1258px) 100vw, 1258px\" src=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/20240118-50224-002.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-50227\" srcset=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/20240118-50224-002.jpg 1258w, https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/20240118-50224-002-380x212.jpg 380w, https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/20240118-50224-002-768x428.jpg 768w\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Meanwhile, the issue of Steam\u2019s updated policies remains divisive. While many of the games deleted so far appear to be pornographic shovelware, the problem lies not in what was removed, but the implications of Steam being obligated to act based not on their own rules and values, but that of third parties such as payment processors and banks. Moreover, the standards of these third parties are completely lacking in transparency, which means they could be subject to change without notice, making it a concern for consumers and a risk for game publishers.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The whole confusion has boosted the game&#8217;s visibility, though.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":55,"featured_media":50226,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_gspb_post_css":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[18],"class_list":["post-50224","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-global-news"],"blocksy_meta":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.2 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Detective game mysteriously taken down during Steam\u2019s sex simulator purge was not a victim of crossfire. Devs confirm other reason for deletion\u00a0 - AUTOMATON WEST<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Steam recently sweeped games that violate rules set forth by payment processors and banks from the platform, leading to confusion.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/detective-game-mysteriously-taken-down-during-steams-sex-simulator-purge-was-not-a-victim-of-crossfire-devs-confirm-other-reason-for-deletion\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Detective game mysteriously taken down during Steam\u2019s sex simulator purge was not a victim of crossfire. Devs confirm other reason for deletion\u00a0 - AUTOMATON WEST\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Steam recently sweeped games that violate rules set forth by payment processors and banks from the platform, leading to confusion.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/detective-game-mysteriously-taken-down-during-steams-sex-simulator-purge-was-not-a-victim-of-crossfire-devs-confirm-other-reason-for-deletion\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"AUTOMATON WEST\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2025-07-18T13:00:00+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/20240118-50224-header.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1449\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"810\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Amber V\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@AUTOMATON_ENG\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@AUTOMATON_ENG\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Amber V\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Detective game mysteriously taken down during Steam\u2019s sex simulator purge was not a victim of crossfire. 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Devs confirm other reason for deletion\u00a0 - AUTOMATON WEST","og_description":"Steam recently sweeped games that violate rules set forth by payment processors and banks from the platform, leading to confusion.","og_url":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/detective-game-mysteriously-taken-down-during-steams-sex-simulator-purge-was-not-a-victim-of-crossfire-devs-confirm-other-reason-for-deletion\/","og_site_name":"AUTOMATON WEST","article_published_time":"2025-07-18T13:00:00+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1449,"height":810,"url":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/20240118-50224-header.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Amber V","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@AUTOMATON_ENG","twitter_site":"@AUTOMATON_ENG","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Amber V","Est. reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"NewsArticle","@id":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/detective-game-mysteriously-taken-down-during-steams-sex-simulator-purge-was-not-a-victim-of-crossfire-devs-confirm-other-reason-for-deletion\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/news\/detective-game-mysteriously-taken-down-during-steams-sex-simulator-purge-was-not-a-victim-of-crossfire-devs-confirm-other-reason-for-deletion\/"},"author":{"name":"Amber V","@id":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/#\/schema\/person\/fdc6517a00e35b6917ffdb02e8b574d9"},"headline":"Detective game mysteriously taken down during Steam\u2019s sex simulator purge was not a victim of crossfire. 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She grew up playing Duke Nukem and Wolfenstein with her dad, and is now enamored with obscure Japanese video games and internet culture. Currently devoted to growing Automaton West to the size of its Japanese sister-site, while making sure to keep news concise and developer stories deep and stimulating.","url":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/author\/amber-vjestica\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50224","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/55"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=50224"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50224\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":50229,"href":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/50224\/revisions\/50229"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/50226"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=50224"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=50224"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/automaton-media.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=50224"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}