This isn't really Sexual Content, right?

[Lordofriva]

Just saying, it's a bit annoying that all games that have anime characters automatically are flagged with "sexual content"

Can it be confirmed that there is no actual sexual content in this game (same for nudity, before that one pops up). Nudity pertains to visible genitalia and secondary sexual characterisics eg. Fully naked breast with visible nipples et all. This shouldn't be used on skirts or bikinis or similar attire.

This is a problem pertaining to all anime style games and it is bothering me massively, not only isn't every short skirt sexual attire (imagine telling that a person in RL) but also we are making it harder to inform others about games that have actual Adult content.

There is a reason why we should definitely stop this from happening where it isn't applicable. Not only does this make the tags less helpful, it may lead to less sales for games that aren't sexual in nature.

This remains true if I err in this case, it would be nice of everyone if you could report a wrong tag if you see it.

Thanks.


EDIT: After a message to steam support, basically stating the general issue the following conversation occured:

Answer from steam support:

Hey there,

Thanks for your comments - we value feedback about the game tagging. Please keep in mind that the Steam Community and Developer are responsible for the tags. Either way, I'm forwarding your comments to the appropriate department.

Additionally, if you wish to share an opinion, suggestion, or idea with the community as well, please visit the Suggestions/Ideas section of the Steam Discussion forums.

This forum is regularly read by Valve's development team.

Best Regards,

(steam support agent)


My answer:

Hello (steam support agent),

thank you for your answer.

First of all I want to state that i've worked in support myself long enough to understand how this works, meaning while I will try to reiterate my point directly (there is a also a bit of a language barrier) I just want to assure you that any statement made is not intended to disrespect any employee at valve or valve itself.

You answered that valve values feedback and suggestions, while I hope that this is the case we all know how hard it is to have clear consentual feedback on something especially when it comes to things sexual in nature.

What I did however wasn't to suggest something or to give feedback, I reported an abuse of a system that directly influences sales on a product due to how steam handles the exclusion of material that is sexual or violent in nature per default options.

There are three aspects to this in my favor regarding this:

1. There is a Report function on the tags itself, which means that valve is interested in reported abuse of the system and seems to be aware that it can be misused in certain circumstances. What those are can no one say as the guidelines aren't really clear on that.

2. Valve has acted before on a System that is solely based on developer and user responsibility. In this case the User reviews, were steam, again per default, now treats reviews leaning heavily on the negative side on controversial games based on the fact if the factors pertaining to the reviews is external or not.

Therefore it is irrelevant that it is a system only the steam community or developers can influence.

3. I want to reiterate the statements I made in my first post regarding the fact that this is abuse of a system:

If the Developers are responsible to tag a game without nudity or sexual content with these tags to make the product more attractive to those seeking for mature/adult content than this is misleading at best, false advertising at worst and I would think that valve would agree that the tags should be used to help user find products they actually want, not that they are used for advertisement purposes.

If it's based on community feedback you let a certain group of people decide that a game, without adult content be flagged as such so that the game will be excluded for potential customers just because they feel that there is a morally correct reason to do so. The issue with this, especially in regards to sexual content, is that by excluding things like this on a basis like this the smaller portion of the customer base who is actually interested in a Product like this, again a product accepted by valve, are unable to view the content desired , if they exclude sexual content because they actually do not want, or are not old enough, to consume that or that they have to accept seeing adult content just so they can see the content they enjoy whcih isn't adult in nature at all.

How hideous this is becomes clear if you turn it around, let's assume that a majority of people would tag any game that includes mentions of homosexuality, even if this is just pertains to a couple that is mentioned without any sexual interaction at all as "sexual content" which excludes it from a lot of peoples storefront we all realise how discriminatory that is.

Another example, if the community tags every game mentioning the Islamic religion in a positive light with the sexual content tag so that it is excluded and blurred for many it becomes easily perceivable how this system can be abused and is abused as the game mentioned in this post has no "sexual content" or "nudity" in it, just like the example with the religion.

To consider this ticket to be answered I would need a clear answer on what valve intends to do with this report, that includes ignoring it, it may simply not worth it for a company I understand that.

So please tell me who the "appropriate department" is, if I can contact them for details or an answer and how long it will take to get an answer.

Thank you again for your time,

Best Regards,

Riva

[Emmy ツ]

“ The developers describe the content like this:

Azur Lane includes battle gameplay utilizing stylized military weaponry and includes some suggestive character designs. “

From what I have seen there is no sexual content, a bit of fan service here and there but that pretty much it
I already contact Idea Factory on that, I am just waiting on a message back to confirmed is there any of it in game.

[Lordofriva]

appreciated

[Renfrew]

If it's anything like the mobile game, then the sexual content would refer to the attire (the attire is fully there with the intent of "fan service", so there is no way to justify it as anything else), and clear use of "flirty" (debatable) remarks. Based on this I would argue the tag is justified, and has nothing to do with this being an "Anime" game.

Here are a random game from the store (don't play it, it randomly) comes under the "Anime" tag:
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1211650/Cirnos_Perfect_Summer_Vacation/

It doesn't have the "sexual content" tag, compare to Azur Lane and the reasoning is obvious. So there is no vendetta against Anime games.

Before anyone says anything silly in response: I am a dedicated supporter of Azur lane, and have spent a lot of money and time on it, so I have nothing against the game.

[Emmy ツ]

I also did a bit of digging and Idea Factory put those tag themselves, I do not know why
Source: https://steamdb.info/app/1150080/history/

[Lordofriva]

I am not a supporter of azur lane and don't plan to be.

However I do not think that suggestive themes or flirtatious aspects is inherently sexual content, in fact it's quite a bit distance from that.

And i really do not understand the logic here, i can go out in summer and see more Attire in this style on actual humans than i would see in any of these games.

It's not that these things can't be perceived as sexual but at the same time there is quite a community that fetishizes Feet (no problem with that, btw you do you) but we need to differ between things that can be perceived in a certain way and things that are perceived in general.

And it bothers me massively that attire, just because it's short or is a bikini is automatically seen as sexual.

I can see more breasts in Advertisements on the childrens program than in a lot of games flagged "sexual content".

This is also not really fair for the adult content creators here, why would it be good to muddy the waters?

EDIT: @Renfrew, it's good that you deleted two of your examples not all tags are visible directly on the store page, even IF your position on this is different, which is fine, we need to realise if these thing aren't applied arbitrarily.

Again, clarity in this, gives more information to the costumer and that is what counts in my book.

[Lordofriva]

Originally posted by Emmy ^-^:

I also did a bit of digging and Idea Factory put those tag themselves, I do not know why
Source: https://steamdb.info/app/1150080/history/

Thanks for digging this up. From what i gathered in discussions with clearly more adult oriented material steam forces devs to adopt both "Adult only" and "sexual content" on specific games.

But regardless, we should still debate and act on what should be conclusive.

[Renfrew]

@Lordofriva

People may get embarassed to have a game in their library that has those tags, but that's not the developer's issue. The developer must clearly communicate what the game is like. In fact when it comes to the mobile game if you compare the Chinese version to the English Version and then the Japanese Version, you'll find that the Chinese and English Version have to be censored when it comes to specific skins and loading screens. There is no greater evidence than that of sex appeal playing a huge role in Azur Lane. But of course you don't know about Azur Lane, so it is not your fault you wouldn't know this.

Either way, this is a pointless discussion that won't go anywhere, feel free to have it, but in the end you are just wasting your time and anyone else's who bothers to discuss, this is where I unsub.

[Lordofriva]

Originally posted by ꧁Renfrew꧂:

@Lordofriva

People may get embarassed to have a game in their library that has those tags, but that's not the developer's issue. The developer must clearly communicate what the game is like. In fact when it comes to the mobile game if you compare the Chinese version to the English Version and then the Japanese Version, you'll find that the Chinese and English Version have to be censored when it comes to specific skins and loading screens. There is no greater evidence than that of sex appeal playing a huge role in Azur Lane. But of course you don't know about Azur Lane, so it is not your fault you wouldn't know this.

Either way, this is a pointless discussion that won't go anywhere, feel free to have it, but in the end you are just wasting your time and anyone else's who bothers to discuss, this is where I unsub.

Embarassment is good and fine, however i fail to see how the argument is adequate. I could be embarassed by a game that includes homosexuals (really not the case, on the contrary), should we now start tagging it in a way that it can't be seen anymore?

Personal feelings are really not a great basis for information.

Compared to America the European way of looking at sexual things is vastly different , so is the outlook on violence.

This is not an argument for or against if the censorship you describe is warranted or not, i mean in china undead characters are censored/cut all the time since it does have some implications there, is that a reason now to not include skeletons in your games?




No, really as you leave any way let us detach from a discussion about values and censorship as this is a massive escalation of what is actually the problem here:

1. A person looks for material with sexual content, buys this game and the best he/she gets are some bikinis. Here the company gets money out of someone who actually does not really want the game.


2. A Person would like to play a game like this, she/he may even like the ecchi stuff (or can tolerate it) but the person draws a clear line on actual sexual content because it's against the values or something. In this case the dev also looses a potential sale.

In the end a tag like this is inappropriate when it comes to INFORMATION and that IS the reason why these tags exist. If they fail to do that they are useless.

So i would ask anyone who understands what I am saying and agrees that there is a difference sex and short skirts to report on the sexual content tag, at least after Emmy gets a response from IF. I will contact Steam support in the meantime

[Hassat Hunter]

Originally posted by Emmy ^-^:

I also did a bit of digging and Idea Factory put those tag themselves, I do not know why
Source: https://steamdb.info/app/1150080/history/

The devs don't put up the tags, that's an automated Steam system at work.

And yes, it's there due to people tagging the game as such due to pre-conceptions. Just like "psychological horror" was there due to edge-lords, but atleast Valve took care of that one.

[Firehawk]

It's easier to tag everything with sexual content indisciminately as it would be to explain the difference to people who can't or don't want to understand it. I don't agree with them, but you can't force narrowminded ones to act reasonably.

[gilde.gothic [Elite_Man]]

Well since nowadays everything is considered Sexual Content .. i think thats the big why but who knows. The only Sexual Content which might have been meant is Cute Hit Sounds xD

[Firehawk]

Might be the paranoid thinking that anything and everything can be seen as sexual in the US and they don't want to risk offending anyone. Which in itself is offensive.

[gilde.gothic [Elite_Man]]

Originally posted by Firehawk:

Might be the paranoid thinking that anything and everything can be seen as sexual in the US and they don't want to risk offending anyone. Which in itself is offensive.

Well in the US its always like better say it first or get troubles later xD (just my feeling)
But how would it be offensive?

[Firehawk]

Offensive because they treat people like children who are too immature to handle even the mildest suggestive content, and who need to be protected from such content. I find that offensive, because it opens the path to censorship, and stems from ignorance. This only gets worse if it is the reason why Graf Zeppelin was cut out from this version.
Furthermore, if we are so weak that we need to be protected despite being legally adults, how can they even sell games like this in the first place?

[gilde.gothic [Elite_Man]]

Originally posted by Firehawk:

Offensive because they treat people like children who are too immature to handle even the mildest suggestive content, and who need to be protected from such content. I find that offensive, because it opens the path to censorship, and stems from ignorance.

Well but its also an safety against lawsuits who the US somehow is famous for, anyhow just think of it that way Kids plays AL, sees Crosswave and Crosswave would have Sexual Content, Dad or Mommy sees oh just like his Phone game okay here you are, Kid sees that Content such stuff ends up in drama so better be safe then sorry right?

But sure ppl will get offended from that and i can see why tho. its not that much of a Problem if we are honest not as big as big censorship paths which some other games take.