Company cites compliance with payment processors, card networks, banks, internet providers
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Steam added an update to the Rules and Guidelines section of the onboarding document for Steamworks, Valve’s tools and services that assist developers in publishing games on the platform, outlining stipulations around adult content. The update notes publishers should refrain from publishing content that violates rules of third party services used by Steam, such as payment processors.
The “What you shouldn’t publish on Steam” section lists: “Content that may violate the rules and standards set forth by Steam’s payment processors and related card networks and banks, or internet network providers. In particular, certain kinds of adult only content.”
The update follows Manga Planet‘s announcement in January that its account with payment method provider Stripe was suspended and banned due to R18 (Restricted 18+) content on the subscription service.
Over the past few years, numerous sites and services in Japan have had to disallow payments from various services such as Visa and Mastercard, due to customer payments being refused through those services. Such sites include, but are not limited to: Nico Nico, Melonbooks and Toranoana, DLSite (which also disallowed American Express), Fantia, Manga Library Z, and Fanza, among others.
Niconico ended its Niconico Shunga mature illustration service on January 29. The company explained that it would be difficult to continue the service due to the current social environment and international situation.
Cietan Kitney, President of Visa Worldwide Japan, confirmed in December that while Visa wants to make its payment service available to legal and legitimate products and services as much as possible, it may sometimes decline purchases to “protect the brand.”
Source: Steamworks via Hachima Kikō