Updated: 8/1/2025 4:18 p.m. ET: In a statement to Kotaku, a spokesperson for Valve said that while Mastercard did not communicate with it directly, concerns did come through payment processor and banking intermediaries. They said payment processors rejected Valve’s current guidelines for moderating illegal content on Steam, citing Mastercard’s Rule 5.12.7.

“Mastercard did not communicate with Valve directly, despite our request to do so,” Valve’s statement sent over email to Kotaku reads. “Mastercard communicated with payment processors and their acquiring banks.  Payment processors communicated this with Valve, and we replied by outlining Steam’s policy since 2018 of attempting to distribute games that are legal for distribution.  Payment processors rejected this, and specifically cited Mastercard’s Rule 5.12.7 and risk to the Mastercard brand.”

Rule 5.12.7 states, “A Merchant must not submit to its Acquirer, and a Customer must not submit to the Interchange System, any Transaction that is illegal, or in the sole discretion of the Corporation, may damage the goodwill of the Corporation or reflect negatively on the Marks.”

It goes on, “The sale of a product or service, including an image, which is patently offensive and lacks serious artistic value (such as, by way of example and not limitation, images of nonconsensual sexual behavior, sexual exploitation of a minor, nonconsensual mutilation of a person or body part, and bestiality), or any other material that the Corporation deems unacceptable to sell in connection with a Mark.”

Violations of rule 5.12.7 can result in fines, audits, or companies being dropped by the payment processors.

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[–] 318 points 1 year ago (10 children)

"Nonconsensual mutilation of a person or body part" includes just about every fighter or shooter game. They really want to have COD delisted over this?

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  • [–] 63 points 1 year ago (4 children)

    you're missing some context in that.

    "The sale of a product... which is patently offensive and lacks serious artistic value... (such as... images of... Nonconsensual mutilation of a person or body part"

    insert joke about COD lacking artistic value, but clearly there is more to COD than just body mutilation.

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    [–] 203 points 1 year ago (21 children)

    I don't think they realize how much worse their brands look now, after starting all this shit...

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  • [–] 185 points 1 year ago (30 children)

    nonconsensual mutilation of a person or body part

    I feel like a strict reading of this rule would also put a lot of fighting games, shooters, horror games etc in the not approved category

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  • [–] 123 points 1 year ago (6 children)

    I think some christian items could also be affected, like the bible. Cane and Able, crucifixion, etc are all in that book

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  • [–] 32 points 1 year ago (8 children)

    Right now in Rimworld I am sending child soldiers to bring more ammo to the mortars that are busy pounding away at some primitive tribesmen that are angry at me for dumping a few tons of toxic waste on their home or something.

    Those that survive the mortar bombardment will be lobotomised and enslaved. If they have enough limbs remaining to be useful to me I will probably use a few of them as slaves and the rest will be sold to the empire. Any that the empire don't want will be harvested for organs and dumped in a corpse pit.

    I didn't ask if the tribesmen consented to any of this.

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    [–] 162 points 1 year ago (36 children)

    Brilliant, just make your rules vague and force everyone else down the chain to self-censor. Surely this will result in the best outcome.

    Fucking mastercard

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    [–] 141 points 1 year ago (3 children)

    I love how this has damaged Mastercards brand much more than anything Valve sells. MC would rather pressure Valve for selling NSFW games, than clean up billionaires buying and trafficking children.

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    [–] 115 points 1 year ago (4 children)

    Collective Shout says it wasn't their fault, MC and Visa say it wasn't their fault, Steam and Itch say it wasn't their fault. Conclusion? No one is to blame! No one did it! What's more, it didn't even happen!! it was all a figment of our imagination!

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    [–] 112 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (6 children)

    Tl;dr: Mastercard says they didn't "force" Valve to remove nsfw games. They just told them that if they didn't remove the games that were complained about by Collective Shout, they'll block them.

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  • [–] 108 points 1 year ago (5 children)

    “Mastercard did not communicate with Valve directly, despite our request to do so,” Valve’s statement sent over email to Kotaku reads. “Mastercard communicated with payment processors and their acquiring banks. Payment processors communicated this with Valve

    This whole thing reads like a telephone game where nobody wants to take any responsibility.

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    [–] 93 points 1 year ago (7 children)

    Ok furry artists, you know what to do, I wanna see the filthiest Visa x MasterCard art you can dream off. Payment process me baby

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    [–] 91 points 1 year ago (2 children)

    Put simply, we allow all lawful purchases on our network.

    As Valve correctly points out, this is a blatant & outright lie. They have cut off any number of legal entities over pressure from politicians or groups. Now they have to own it.

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    [–] 84 points 1 year ago (4 children)

    So obviously somebody is lying. I really don't understand why Valve or Itch would be the ones lying about this. My money is on the group of self righteous censorship soldiers with too much time on their hands, and the payment companies. I could always be wrong I though.

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  • [–] 36 points 1 year ago (1 child)

    MasterCard is so big they don't even know what all their departments are doing. The PR department probably asked a couple of the top level execs if they were pushing for this and they said no so they claimed it didn't happen.

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    [+] 81 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 week ago)
    [–] 70 points 1 year ago (10 children)

    Isn't every game NSFW? Funny how language works.

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    [–] 60 points 1 year ago

    Fuckers are just propagating the fury without providing a fix. Are the censored games back or not? Because right now they aren't. Put them back and make Mastercard do something about it now that they have staged their position. Collective Shout is playing both sides.

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  • [–] 59 points 1 year ago

    Gotta love it when companies put something in their legal agreements that just says “we can do whatever the fuck we want.” Is the rest of the wall of text just there to hide that somewhere someone won’t read?

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  • [–] 55 points 1 year ago* (4 children)

    so it was about potential brand damage that doesn’t exist? and/or has this actually brand damaged visa and mastercard more than ignoring collective shout?

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  • [–] 52 points 1 year ago* (3 children)

    What I see is Mastercard hiding behind their generic rules for processors and being fine with the processors taking unilateral action that could damage their brand.

    Mastercard should demand they rescind the decision based on a flawed interpretation of their rules since the content IS NOT ILLEGAL where Steam provides it, or drop those processors entirely due to the brand damage their unilateral decision has caused. If Mastercard lets this sit, that signals that they agree with this decision, regardless of what they say, and they should be treated as such.

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  • [–] 51 points 1 year ago (1 child)
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    [–] 48 points 1 year ago* (1 child)

    We have seen the same behavior out of the credit card companies before. Its pretty clear that they do pressure companies to remove content they don't approve of. Its censorship and its legal since the companies are not the government. They are just tied in at a high level to the banking industry. Its a good example of how lack of regulation harms both creators and consumers.

    It lets a bunch of poorly adjusted individuals force their personal mental problems on us all.

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    [–] 43 points 1 year ago* (3 children)

    I guess turn the boobs butts and dicks up to 10,000 then. In every game.

    Its time for Gordon freeman to do unholy things with a headcrab!

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    [–] 39 points 1 year ago

    So much fucking censorship and agenda-pushing on the internet.

    It makes me sick how many useful idiots are being herded like sheep just to satisfy those with more money than them.

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  • [–] 26 points 1 year ago

    Maybe the payment processors lied?

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