Gamers Fight Back: Protests Erupt Over Credit Card Giants’ Role in Game Censorship

The gaming platforms Steam and ITCH.IO have removed hundreds of games after printing from Visa and Mastercard. Users are now organizing themselves against the credit card companies and their censorship measures that go back to an Australian lobby group.

Users start campaign against censorship

Steam and ITCH.IO have removed hundreds of games from their online shops in the past few weeks – not on the basis of legal requirements, but after printing from payment service providers such as Visa and MasterCard. Now resistance is formed: Gaming communities organize coordinated protests against the credit card companies and their procedures. The controversy began with a campaign by the Australian anti-pornography group Collective Shout, which in July 2025 directed an open letter to payment service providers such as PayPal, MasterCard and Visa.

A little more than a thousand people took part in the campaign and contacted the payment service providers to request the removal of games with adult content. How The Gamer reports that both platforms have justified their decisions by the fact that they would have to protect their payment infrastructure. The power of credit card companies about digital content is not a new phenomenon: In the past, Visa and Mastercard have exerted similar pressure on platforms such as pornhub or only fans, which led to drastic changes to the content guidelines.

Steam and ITCH.IO reacted

The mass deletion of games on Steam began on July 15, after Valve had confirmed that this was due to the pressure of payment service providers. ITCH.IO continued and temporarily removed all NSFW content from the search and browsing, which also concerned games with LGBTQ+issues. The developers concerned criticize the measures sharply. Developers of erotic games and journalists see a pattern in which financial institutions use their control over transactions in order to silence “taboo” sexual forms of expression.

Local transparency is particularly problematic: many developers did not receive any clear explanations of why their games were removed. Developers fear a domino effect: If payment service providers can successfully put pressure on gaming platforms, this could lead to far-reaching censorship that goes far beyond sexual content and could also capture political or socially critical issues. The indie gaming scene, which often relies on experimental and controversial topics, sees itself particularly threatened.

Coordinated resistance

The gaming community reacted with a remarkable counter-campaign. On Reddit, Bluesky and other platforms, users organize themselves to overload Visa and Mastercard with emails and calls. One Change.org petition who asks the payment service providers to “stop checking what we can see, read or play,” collected over 175,000 signatures. The strategy of the gamer is well thought out: users should consciously clog the queues of the customer service hotlines in order to exert economic pressure on companies. Visa has already reacted to the symptoms, but with a generic standard answer that many users find insufficient.

The company emphasizes that it is prohibited “expressly illegal activities”, but at the same time feels committed to the “protection of legal trade”. The company explains not to make moral judgments about legal purchases – a statement that is described as contradictory in view of the current events of many users. So far, Mastercard has not publicly commented on the protests, although the company is also the focus of criticism. The reluctance of both corporations could indicate that they have not yet fully recorded the scope of the protests. The protests show that gamers cannot be taken without a fight.