Valve clarifies ban on in-game advertising on Steam

Steam Logo
(Image credit: Valve)

Yesterday, Valve made waves when it updated its Steamworks Documentation now to include a dedicated "Advertising on Steam" page, illuminating its anti-advertising-on-Steam stance— GamingOnLinux proceeded to report on this as a new policy. Still, this was just a dedicated page for an existing policy, as noted by SteamDB and later GamingOnLinux when it realized its error.

In any case, making and dropping a dedicated page just for this question communicates the restrictions more clearly and helps ensure that developers don't think they can get away with posting ad-laden, mobile game-esque slop on Steam. While the little regulation on Steam still allows for a lot, the most common freemium models from mobile gaming still are not welcome on the platform.

The official page under "Not Supported" states:

"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. If your game's business model relies on advertising on other platforms, you will need to remove those elements before shipping on Steam. Some options you could consider include switching to a single purchase 'paid app,' or making your game free to play with optional upgrades sold via Microtransactions or Downloadable Content (DLC)."

Other behaviors considered "Not Supported" on Steam include using "advertising as a way to provide value to players, such as giving players a reward for watching or engaging with advertising in their game" or charging "other developers for access to Steam features. These include sale pages, bundles, store pages, franchise pages, etc.".

A limited degree of advertising is still allowed on Steam and listed as "Supported." Still, these all describe your more typical product placements, cross-promotions, and paid ads for games available on Steam outside of Steam. Of course, advertising is a part of any publisher or developer's toolkit— it's just unacceptable as a core tenet of gameplay, as Valve has now made it extra clear by setting aside a dedicated page on the matter.

Previously, this information was relegated to a few brief FAQs on the existing "Pricing" documentation page. The relevant FAQs state:

"Steam does not support paid ads or referral/affiliate revenue from showing ads for other games and/or products or services. If your game's revenue relies on advertising on other platforms, you will need to find a new monetization model in order to release on Steam. Some options you could consider: Switch your game be a single purchase or make it free to play with microtransactions or additional content as DLC" and "Steam does not support models where a customer is blocked and needs to pay to continue playing. If you would like to have a free demo to show off your game, you're welcome to do so. Your demo and full game can share files as well to continue game play. To figure out if a demo is the right thing for your game, please check out the Demos Documentation".

To those who have monitored Valve or used Steam frequently over the years, these policies shouldn't be much of a surprise. Mobile titles with these business models that make their way to Steam inevitably change to either a one-time purchase or a more palatable Free-To-Play model, in line with titles that pioneered that model for PC players, like Valve's own 2007-launched, 2011-turned-live-service, Team Fortress 2.

As noted by GamingOnLinux in its coverage, Valve has also long banned games reliant upon blockchain technologies, including crypto and NFTs, being sold on Steam. Considering how often these ventures (particularly NFTs) end up being outright scams, this is still a very wise policy on their part, but it, of course, does not stop the likes of studios like Ubisoft from self-publishing abhorrent NFT-RPGs, either.

Christopher Harper
Contributing Writer

Christopher Harper has been a successful freelance tech writer specializing in PC hardware and gaming since 2015, and ghostwrote for various B2B clients in High School before that. Outside of work, Christopher is best known to friends and rivals as an active competitive player in various eSports (particularly fighting games and arena shooters) and a purveyor of music ranging from Jimi Hendrix to Killer Mike to the Sonic Adventure 2 soundtrack.

  • DS426
    Good on Valve. Their non-compromising posture for the sake of positive user experience over revenue is rare in the tech world.
    Reply
  • SocDriver
    This is a good no compromise position from Valve and one of the reasons I think Steam is still a place I am willing to trust and purchase from. There are plenty of garbage games on the platform but ultimately this will keep it from turning into what mobile device apps stores have become.
    Reply
  • hotaru251
    "advertising as a way to provide value to players, such as giving players a reward for watching or engaging with advertising in their game" or charging "other developers for access to Steam features. These include sale pages, bundles, store pages, franchise pages, etc.".

    wouldn't this effectively remove poe/poe2/ow/and other popular games that offer in game rewards for watching streams of their games (advertising)?
    Reply
  • tamalero
    hotaru251 said:
    wouldn't this effectively remove poe/poe2/ow/and other popular games that offer in game rewards for watching streams of their games (advertising)?
    Rewards are optional and not outright blocking the content of the main base (gaming) with a forced block in a similar way to Youtube's ads. Where they block ALL content until you watch the ads.
    Reply
  • kaalus
    Steam was and remains great, as usual. Ads are evil.
    Reply
  • ezst036
    Microsoft should learn from Valve and ban all advertisements inside of Windows OS.
    Reply
  • umeng2002_2
    I weep for the state of PC gaming when Lord Gaben passes away or retires.
    Reply
  • FHM Studios
    It's only because most game developers severely misjudge the overall expenses. They they start placing more ads for more revenue last minute. Whereas with my company, we have our sponsors send us their ads in advance. So we can place them throughout the landscape. Like on billboards, TV and computer screens, on a mobile device on a couch or on the floor. So the ads are still in plain sight but not interrupting any game play, and is actually part of the environment in game. Just set up a deal and contract for the length and pricing to run their ad. Once their contract is up, remove it from the environment, or replace it with the next one and send out an update.
    It's pretty sad that so many people try to create a game only for the monetary gain. Those are usually the games that have an ad every time you click on anything on the screen. It's best to uninstall and report those ones. Even take note or block that developer to avoid accidentally getting another one of their cash grabs
    Reply
  • spongiemaster
    ezst036 said:
    Microsoft should learn from Valve and ban all advertisements inside of Windows OS.
    Apples to oranges. Valve gets a percentage of every game sold on the platform. Their revenue is unaffected by the removal of ads from games sold on their platform. MS does not charge developers to releases applications for Windows and most of us probably paid nothing for our legal copy of Windows by upgrading a previous version. Advertising is how MS generates a revenue stream from windows.
    Reply
  • salgado18
    hotaru251 said:
    wouldn't this effectively remove poe/poe2/ow/and other popular games that offer in game rewards for watching streams of their games (advertising)?
    No, because streams are not advertising, they are content. Advertising would be open to any product, like showing a Pepsi ad to gain benefits. They are only promoting their own content and community.
    Reply