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posted by chromas on Friday September 07 2018, @05:30PM   Printer-friendly
from the [Deleted] dept.

What makes a "troll game"? Valve tries for a Steam-wide definition

Some of Valve's definitions of trolling seem relatively clear-cut. Most everyone would agree that Steam should remove developers that are "trying to scam folks out of their Steam inventory items" or those "looking for a way to generate a small amount of money off Steam through a series of schemes that revolve around how we let developers use Steam keys," for instance.

There's a little more subjectivity in determining if a Steam title is what Valve calls "a game shaped object." The company defines this category as "a crudely made piece of software that technically and just barely passes our bar as a functioning video game but isn't what 99.9% of folks would say is 'good.'" There may be some edge cases where a game some people consider "broken" is one that others consider brilliantly deconstructed "art." For the most part, though, a game that only 1 in 1,000 people would consider playable sets a good rule-of-thumb threshold for what deserves removal from Steam.

Where the "troll game" determination begins to get squishy is in games and developers that Valve says are "just trying to incite and sow discord." This is similar to the justification Valve used in June to remove Active Shooter, an unreleased game that planned to let players take on the role of a school shooter or the SWAT team trying to stop him. [...] The Active Shooter case gets into the one thing that Valve says unites all of these different troll developers: their malign motives. A troll developer is one that isn't "actually interested in good faith efforts to make and sell games to you or anyone," the company writes. While good-faith developer efforts can obviously lead to "crude or lower quality games" on Steam, Valve says that "it really does seem like bad games are made by bad people." And it's those bad games from bad people that Valve doesn't want on Steam.

Pool's closed, no AIDS Simulator for you.

Also at Motherboard.

Previously: "Active Shooter" Game on Steam Sparks Uproar
Valve Still Lives in the Waking Nightmare of Web 2.0


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  • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday September 07 2018, @10:28PM (4 children)

    by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Friday September 07 2018, @10:28PM (#731954) Homepage Journal

    Yeah, because only hearing stuff you agree with is totally the best way to make sure your critical thinking skills get engaged.

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    My rights don't end where your fear begins.
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  • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Saturday September 08 2018, @10:41AM (3 children)

    by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Saturday September 08 2018, @10:41AM (#732133) Journal

    Yeah, because only hearing stuff you agree with is totally the best way to make sure your critical thinking skills get engaged.

    Yeah, because there's a serious lack of occasions to engage your critical thinking in today's real world.
    Thanks God S/N is providing a ground for it, even if the variety of trolls is limited to the point of being predictable boring.

    (grin)

    --
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
    • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday September 08 2018, @02:06PM (2 children)

      by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Saturday September 08 2018, @02:06PM (#732192) Homepage Journal

      Yeah, because there's a serious lack of occasions to engage your critical thinking in today's real world.

      There absolutely is. Between our politicians and media constantly trying to polarize us for money and power, it's amazing rational discussion happens at all anymore.

      --
      My rights don't end where your fear begins.
      • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Sunday September 09 2018, @05:48AM (1 child)

        by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Sunday September 09 2018, @05:48AM (#732399) Journal

        Yeah, because there's a serious lack of occasions to engage your critical thinking in today's real world.

        Between our politicians and media constantly trying to polarize us for money and power,

        Me thinks you are mixing up the opportunities (which abound) with the frequency these opportunities are taken (very low).

        it's amazing rational discussion happens at all anymore.

        Ummm... maybe it's just a subjective impression, but it's not like S/N shows a high frequency of rational discussions (this is apropos yours "make sure your critical thinking skills get engaged.") Granted, car analogy and cocktailed metaphors, "one can drive the chevy to the levee, but can't make it drink" .

        Cheers, mate, you can keep your rye and I can have me rum and still have a good time together.
        Maybe we can get rational after washing away the real-world's insanity, eh?
         

        --
        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
        • (Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday September 09 2018, @11:31AM

          by The Mighty Buzzard (18) Subscriber Badge <themightybuzzard@proton.me> on Sunday September 09 2018, @11:31AM (#732455) Homepage Journal

          Opportunities aren't as common as you think. For there to be one the other party or parties must be receptive to ideas that conflict with their own, otherwise you've got multiple monologues not discussion.

          Around here we like to do our part to make this available but, yeah, you can't make someone use their brain if they're dead set on a specific narrative. All you can do is give them chance after chance to until they forget one day and accidentally start acting like a sentient human being instead of a lesser animal.

          --
          My rights don't end where your fear begins.