Steam has made one of its policies that bans games that use paid advertising as a business model or use ads to "provide value to players" more visible.
Last night, GamingOnLinux spotted the policy on Steam's pricing page. It was initially assumed to be a new rule, but SteamDB pointed out it's been in effect for "at least five years," it's just now been made more visible.
The rule reads: "Developers should not utilize paid advertising as a business model in their game, such as requiring players to watch or otherwise engage with advertising in order to play, or gating gameplay behind advertising."
It also states: "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."
Forced ads or the option to watch ads to get power-ups or skip time-gated mechanics has become common in free-to-play mobile games. But Steam, which holds a fairly strong monopoly on PC gaming, doesn't seem to like the practice.
Steam recommends developers whose games rely on this to generate revenue simply charge for the games directly or add microtransactions. Microtransactions can also be controversial, but I think we can all agree it's the lesser of two evils.
Games are expensive to make, so I understand why developers and studio execs want them to make money beyond their launch, even if I dislike any non-cosmetic microtransactions. At least with most of them, you feel like you're getting something for your money. Either DLC that adds more to the story or a new stage in a fighting game, but when you have to watch ads just to play a game, it feels like you're wasting your time. I'm glad Steam has made its stance on this practice even more clear.
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