Future of Sex
tagline
  • Remote Sex
  • Virtual Sex & Entertainment
  • Robots
  • Human Augmentation
  • Sex Tech
  • Dating & Relationships
  • Bizarre Bazaar 18+
  • Future of Sex Community
  • Remote Sex
  • Virtual Sex & Entertainment
  • Robots
  • Human Augmentation
  • Sex Tech
  • Dating & Relationships
  • Bizarre Bazaar 18+
  • Future of Sex Community
  • The Future of Sex Is Mind-Reading AI That Reveals Your Deepest, Most Unconscious Fantasies

  • Sex Robots Are Getting Closer to Feeling Human-Like With Second Skin Materials

  • 2023: Innovating Sustainable Infrastructure for Sex Tech

  • Speaking Out: Red Umbrella Podcast Talks Sex Work

  • Sex Tech Predictions in 2023: Challenging Mainstream Supply and Demand

  • Coming to a Crescendo: MysteryVibe’s Crescendo 2 Vibrator Review

  • Sex Tech News: The VDOM places second at Black Ambition Prize, MYHIXEL surpasses crowdfunding target, and Lora DiCarlo shuts down

  • /R/gonewildaudio: An Array of Free, Inclusive and Categorized Audio Erotica

Future of Sex is supported by our readers. When you buy through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission.

Home > Virtual Sex & Entertainment > What Adult Content Creators Need to Know About the Steam/Holodexxx Controversy

Virtual Sex & Entertainment
Home›Virtual Sex & Entertainment›What Adult Content Creators Need to Know About the Steam/Holodexxx Controversy

What Adult Content Creators Need to Know About the Steam/Holodexxx Controversy

By Keats Iwanaga
May 26, 2021
576
0

Steam banned content created by adult game studio Holodexxx for the third time, and it's not clear why.

Steam Logo

Earlier this month, adult game studio Holodexxx announced that its newest game, Holedexxx Home, had been banned from the online game platform Steam. In a blog post, Holodexxx said that Valve, the company that runs Steam, banned the experience because of “pornographic” content. Holodexxx claims that it pressed Valve for further information, but received none.

This move comes after Steam had already banned two other experiences by the same company. According to Holodexxx, pornographic content was cited as the infraction both times.

Importantly, Valve announced a hands-off approach to policing content on Steam in 2018. Under the guidelines Valve outlined three years ago, each of Holodexxx’s experiences should be allowed to remain on the marketplace.

Holodexxx’s history of submissions

Adult performer Riley Reid appearing an interactive VR demo for Holodexxx.

The first piece of content Holodexxx submitted to Steam contained no explicitly sexual content and no nudity. The virtual reality experience featured a depiction of adult film actress Riley Reid that Holodexxx created based on digital scans of her body.

Ms. Reid’s likeness, wearing a bra and underwear, danced for the player in a sensual way. A video of other Holodexxx models dancing, with their genitals censored, played behind Ms. Reid.

Shortly after Holodexxx submitted it for review, the app was banned for violating Steam’s video pornography rules, with no further explanation. The team at Holodexxx assumed that the experience was banned because it included video content of a sexual nature.

Meet Marley

Virtual Adult Star Marley Brinx
Adult Star Marley Brinx appears in the Holodexxx VR experience Meet Marley.

For their second attempt, Holodexxx created a virtual reality experience, Meet Marley, that included no video content. The app allowed the player to inspect a nude virtual rendering of Marley Brinx, an adult film actress.

However, the app was once again banned for showing “pornographic” content.

Holodexxx Home

Holodexxx Reasons Banned from Steam

After assessing the potential reasons that the Riley Reid experience and Meet Marley were banned, Holodexxx decided to develop a game that relied on a narrative structure. Holodexxx Home, the latest release from Holodexxx, enabled a player to talk to, undress, and play with a fictional character before watching her masturbate to completion. Although the character, Lady Euphoria, is fictional, her figure was rendered from digital scans of Ms. Brinx.

Like before, Valve banned the app for including pornographic content.

Valve under scrutiny once again

Holodexxx’s experience with Valve’s opaque content rules is not unique. In 2018, Valve came under fire for a similar practice.

On May 17, 2018, three developers called Valve out for banning their games, “HuniePop,” “Tropical Liquor,” and “Mutiny!!” for containing pornographic content.

Lupiesoft, the developer of “Mutiny!!” wrote on Twitter, “After our Steam publisher @MangaGamer met with Valve in person, they were told that ecchi [a Japanese term that roughly translates to ‘sexy’ or ‘naughty’] content was fine on Steam.” However, Lupiesoft was abruptly and inexplicably given less than a month to remove the “pornographic content” from “Mutiny!!”

The next day, however, Valve sent an apology and an update to the three developers, with the explanation that the games were being re-reviewed, but not banned.

In early June of the same year, Peter “Taosym” Rasmussen of LupieSoft told Gamesindustry.biz that he hadn’t heard from Valve since they issued their apology.

An abrupt change of policy

On June 6, 2018, Valve abruptly announced a new censorship policy in a blog post on the Steam website. Under the new policy, only content that was illegal or clearly trolling would be censored or banned.

“As we mentioned earlier,” Valve wrote in the blog post, “laws vary around the world, so we're going to need to handle this on a case-by-case basis. As a result, we will almost certainly continue to struggle with this one for a while.”

The developers who had been briefly banned reacted with cautious optimism and without full forgiveness.

Lupiesoft tweeted:

We all fought for games to be on Steam, we fought to be able to put mature games on Steam, and we fought to keep those games on Steam. This medium is only growing and we've proven that VNs can endure, and that year after year we're just getting better.

When is pornography considered illegal?

With this in mind, Holodexxx could only have been banned for creating illegal content, or a product that was specifically designed to troll others. So is Hollodexxx’s sexual content illegal?

Based on the Supreme Court precedent set in Miller v. California, pornographic content has to fail one or more of the three-pronged Miller tests to be deemed illegal. In the Court’s words, the three tests prohibit content that contains “patently offensive hard core sexual conduct.” While quite broad, the tests were implemented to allow nudity and a wide swathe of pornography.

Only child pornography and pornography that contains images or likenesses of children, is excluded from the Miller test. The PROTECT Act, signed into law in 2003 and upheld by the Supreme Court in 2008 (United States v. Williams), criminalizes child pornography in any form. This includes virtual renderings, illustrations, and so on.

Based on Holodexxx’s description, each of the three pieces of content that were banned on Valve did not violate the Miller test or the PROTECT Act. By disallowing these games under the guise that they include “pornographic” content, Valve has violated its own policy of hands-off censorship.

Holodexxx is voicing its frustration

The question remains, then—why did Valve ban Holodexxx’s offerings?

Valve’s silence has left the answer in Holodexxx’s hands. Based on their own comparisons of the content they created, Holodexxx has concluded that “the common denominator for all of our submissions was the inclusion of adult entertainers.”

This answer is not, of course, actually conclusive. Until Valve releases the reasoning behind their decision, speculation is the only viable option.

For developers like Holodexxx, this guessing game proves to be a costly deterrent to vie for a space in the virtual market. Holodexxx reportedly spent over $20,000 “in development time creating builds tailored for Steam,” lost their submission fees, and “went without to make these submissions happen.”

The future of adult content on Steam

In its silence, Valve leaves Steam’s opaque content moderation policy open to criticism. It may not be long before Holodexxx, and other adult content developers, band together to boycott the platform.

Despite the repeated rejections by Valve, it hasn't been all bad news for Holodexxx, says Chief Creative Officer Michael Wilson.

“A nice ending to this story was the massive reaction to our story in PCGamer, we raised nearly $10,000 of dev money in three days. The world wants adult games to exist!”

Image Sources: Steam, [email protected], Elixa Voss, Holodexxx

Keats Iwanaga

Keats Iwanaga is a passionate writer and reader who strives to use her voice to uplift marginalized communities through writing and volunteer work. This is a focus of the articles she writes for FutureofSex.net and SexforEveryBody.com.

She authors stories with a focus on destigmatizing discussions of sexual health and wellness. A passionate volunteer, she serves as an administrative assistant at a local LGBTQ+ counseling center.

Keats graduated from the University of California, Berkeley, in 2019 with a BA in Art History and a minor in Race and Law. She was awarded High Distinction in General Scholarship and from the Art History department.
Previous Article

Dating App Culture May Be Responsible for ...

Next Article

Predicting the Day Remote Sex Is As ...

Related articles More from author

  • Virtual Sex & Entertainment

    Sex Is Better in Lockdown for Many US Couples: Survey

    August 17, 2020
    By Miss Doll
  • Virtual Sex & Entertainment

    OnlyFans Sidelines Sex Workers with Nudity-Free OFTV

    August 29, 2021
    By Keats Iwanaga
  • A screenshot of the online sex game Yareel shows two players getting intimate on a bed.
    Virtual Sex & Entertainment

    Sex Gaming Is Ready to Get Disrupted by Tech That Shares Emotions

    October 28, 2020
    By Stan Pupkin
  • Virtual Sex & EntertainmentImmersive Entertainment

    Nightlife Has Been Changed Forever — Here’s What Lies Ahead

    September 9, 2021
    By M. Christian
  • AugmentationRemote SexRobotsVirtual Sex & EntertainmentImmersive Entertainment

    Power Exchange: The Future of BDSM Sex

    July 29, 2016
    By M. Christian
  • Virtual Sex & Entertainment

    Adult Performer Riley Reyes Loves the Intimacy of VR Porn [VIDEO]

    May 8, 2019
    By Jenna Owsianik, Editor-in-Chief of FutureofSex.net

  • Data Privacy Breach
    Dating & Relationships

    Norwegian Consumer Council Says Ad Tech in Dating Apps is ‘Out of Control’

  • Zoom spokesperson
    Virtual Sex & Entertainment

    Zoom Says Get Off Elsewhere, Using AI to Crack Down on Virtual Sex Parties

  • Robots

    Old Beliefs in a New World: Majority Says Robot Sex Is Not Okay for Married Folks

Virtual Lust is a 3D interactive sex game.
3DXChat
Discover the best virtual sex parties and 3D sex worlds.
  • TOP REVIEWS

  • The future of sex is mind-reading AI that reveals your deepest, most unconscious fantasies

    The Future of Sex Is Mind-Reading AI That Reveals Your Deepest, Most Unconscious Fantasies

  • Sex Robots Are Getting Closer to Feeling Human-Like With Second Skin Materials

    Sex Robots Are Getting Closer to Feeling Human-Like With Second Skin Materials

  • R/gonewildaudio's gender inclusive audio erotica

    /R/gonewildaudio: An Array of Free, Inclusive and Categorized Audio Erotica

  • Fantasy Inspired Sex Toy by Tentickle Toys

    Out of This World: How Fantasy-Inspired Sex Toys Could Be the Next Big Trend

  • Virtual Sex in the Metaverse

    Virtual Sex Will Soon Become a Reality in the Metaverse

  • OnlyBans Game Play As A Sex Worker

    Play as a Sex Worker in New Onlybans Game

  • Black chess pieces laying across an orange background.

    Teledildonics and Chess: The Unexpected Possibilities That Could Enhance Sex

  • A couple with a woman sitting on a man's lap. They each are holding the Tenuto 2 with one hand.

    Tenuto 2 Erection-Enhancing Vibrator Rises To The Occasion

  • Woman looking at a laptop in a bed. You can see a blurry European city outside of the window.

    Here’s How Often Each European Country Is Searching For Sex Toys Online

  • A Woman Showing Her Smartphone.

    Disclosing Trans-ness on Dating Apps

  • Image of Emma the AI bot.

    Will Young Women of the Future Feel Pressure to Perform Like Robots?

  • Realistic Sex Games

    Review of the Best Sex Games and Most Realistic Sex Simulators of 2021 [UPDATED]

    0
  • Multiplayer Online Sex Games

    Review of the Best Massively Multiplayer Online Sex Games

    0
  • Sex Games for Mac

    The Best Sex Games for Mac

    0
  • foot-fetish-sex-games-girlvania

    Foot Fetish Games That Will Knock Your Socks Off

    0
  • The Best RPG Sex Games of 2021

    0
Fantasy sex game Dream Sex World lets you explore your wildest desires.
Multiplayer sex world Red Light Center continues to impress with its massive userbase and incredible sex graphics.
A blonde and light-skinned love doll face sppears next to the text Go now realdollxthe future is real.
  • 27KFollowers

Like Us on Facebook

Newsletter Subscription

Sign up for our monthly newsletter sharing the very best of the future of sex from our publication and others across the web.

DreamSexWorld offers a stunning XXX 3D world filled with incredibly interactive erotic experiences.

Like Us On Facebook

Facebook Pagelike Widget

RLC_ad_v2

Tweets by @FutureofSex
Future of Sex Report

Follow us

  • Home
  • About
  • ADVERTISE
  • Contribute
  • Story Ideas
  • Sitemap
  • Privacy Policy
  • Terms and Conditions
© 2011 - 2022 Future Exploration Network
This website or its third-party tools use cookies to improve user experience and track affiliate sales. To learn more about why we need to use cookies, please refer to the Privacy Policy.

By clicking the agree button or continuing to browse through the website, you agree to the use of cookies. Accept Privacy Policy
Privacy & Cookies Policy

Privacy Overview

This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these cookies, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may have an effect on your browsing experience.
Necessary
Always Enabled
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. This category only includes cookies that ensures basic functionalities and security features of the website. These cookies do not store any personal information.
SAVE & ACCEPT