Steam‘s Long Way to German Youth Protection Compliance
From 15 November onwards, games without age rating will no longer be available to German customers on Steam. The road up to this point has been long, and Valve as well as agencies have fought for solutions, including potentially better ones for consumers.
Valve Corporation, the gaming software giant from Bellevue in the US state of Washington, has a crown jewel in its catalogue: Steam, the biggest digital sales shop on PC for games. Critics and admirers alike provide the argument that Steam is the de-facto monopol for game sales on PC, even if other platforms do exist. Developers want their games to be sold on Steam, while analysts constantly research and game the algorithm of the shop showcase system to bring their customers’ games to the front page. Some big publisher has given up on the endeavour to establish their own game launcher apart from Steam, Bethesda for example, while others have rolled back their proprietary store exclusiveness to be back on Steam, most recently Ubisoft.