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Banks in Japan are blocking Steam payments for sex games, leaving Japanese adult game devs cut off from income | Stalled Steam profits are prompting free speech concerns.
Stalled Steam profits are prompting free speech concerns.
"If the game in question is for adult audiences," Yamada said via machine translation, "their remittances from abroad are rejected by Japanese banks, meaning they are unable to receive the profits." Those concerns echo ongoing disputes in the US over restrictions on adult content, in which activists and organizations like the ACLU have argued that the "vague and ambiguous policy requirements" of companies like MasterCard and Visa, alongside growing state efforts to regulate access to pornography, threaten the livelihoods and free speech rights of sex workers and adult content creators. After three years freelancing for PC Gamer, he joined on as a full-time News Writer in 2024, bringing an expertise in Caves of Qud bird diplomacy, getting sons killed in Crusader Kings, and hitting dinosaurs with hammers in Monster Hunter.
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