Valve's silence on Black Lives Matter leads devs to remove games from Steam

Indie developers have started to remove their games from Steam over Valve’s silence on the Black Lives Matter movement following the murder of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor and countless others at the hands of police.

Despite most major gaming companies – from Microsoft to Sony, from Call of Duty to Bethesda – openly supporting the passionate Black Lives Matter protests, Valve hasn’t said a single word about the movement at all.

Due to Valve’s silence in the face of this important human rights movement, indie developers have started to request the removal of their products from Steam.

Julian Glander, developer of Art Sqool and Lovely Weather We’re Having took to Twitter to explain his disappointment with the company saying:

“Over the past few weeks, Steam and Valve have chosen not to address the Black Lives Matter movement, failing to make even a broad and generic statement about racial justice.

It’s clear than ever that the owners of this platform feel beholden to a base of angry white male gamers. This makes me especially sad because I feel that some of these people are the people who most need to hear the message of Black Lives Matter. Obviously as a company you guys do whatever you want but I find having my games associated with the Steam platform to be embarrassing and a little nauseating.” (via VG247)

https://twitter.com/glanderco/status/1271290270441598982?s=20

It’s even more unusual that Valve has remained quiet on the topic whilst its competitors have been more than active. Indie storefront Itch.io recently sold an absolutely gigantic bundle of over 1000 games for just $5 to support the movement; the bundle raised an amazing $8.1 million.

While Steam has been keen to touch on other political movements, including Pride, the company remains quiet.