Setilla: There HAS been at least a case at the end of 2019:
https://gamerant.com/hong-kong-protest-game-china-ban-steam/
I don't know if it was in the middle of their plan to build an exclusive Chinese Steam storefront, but it doesn't bode well for them.
Honestly, at this point I don't feel like spending my money on games, period. Feeling good about validating the work of an individual or a group of people only seems to be possible in music, physical series/movies, or the rare self-publishing game studio. The middlemen always manage to ruin media.
After brief research I am not versed enough with these cases to comment on that directly.
I will say just this: Steam has advanced content rules, some are debatable, it's execution is afaik strict tho.
I cannot comment if Valve's decision in regards to those 2 games was right or not since I simply don't have enough data and will likely not have insider data ever (not because I couldn't, just because they would not give me a reason for refusing another developer, for legal reasons I guess).
I am also having some trouble finding those 2 games in DB. Would you mind sharing at least their developers names? (I am having doubts if the names cited in the linked article are 100% correct, it may be that these are english translation of titles, I don't know).
Look, we live in a time when there is not much pure left.
People need to actively choose the "lesser evil" all the time.
While I recognize "Steam Platform" (official chinese name) to be not perfectly good thing I know that it's nowhere near the GOG case.
How I see it is that Valve just created offbranch to deal with CH in an contained manner, like I said before.
And according to wiki that's the intent:
[url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steam_(service)#Steam_China]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steam_(service)#Steam_China[/url]
[url=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfect_World_(company)#Collaboration_with_Valve]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perfect_World_(company)#Collaboration_with_Valve[/url]
Germany has "awkward" censorship laws? Steam makes developers release "special" versions for Germany.
China has some ludicrous censorship laws to the point where "containment" is needed?
Well Valve has stepped up and decided to put out a fire in early stage and decided to literally make a separate offbranch joint venture to contain that fire in it's source - they created "Steam China" that is implied to operate completely independently from Steam itself.
Is that a bad thing?
That way Steam international remains independent and there is far less possibility for such BS like GOG now.
Literally whatever CH wants gets contained within "Steam China" while normal Steam remains fairly independent.
That's my take on the case.
Meanwhile GOG
literally assists CH gov by bowing to their arbitrary WORLDWIDE censorship request.
They had all the technical means to just region lock the game in CH. No. Instead they chose to not release the game INTERNATIONALLY.
Let alone the fact that the "offending content" was removed long ago.
I really don't understand how people could not see the distinction between the 2 cases :/
In current situation I personally see Steam as more faitful to it's principles than GOG. Therefore lesser evil.
It's not perfect. But imo lesser evil atm. At least they don't do what GOG currently does.
This Devotion debacle, along with EGS ordeal, CP2077 "my rewards", spitting in the face of Linux users, lack of access to historical builds for 90+ % of games, and a bunch of other stuff made me reevaluate how I see GOG as a platform and where I place it in hierarchy compared to Steam.
Steam at least doesn't openly lie about it's principles. And at least for me right now I feel better treated as a customer ON STEAM.
I deeply care about DRM-free. But if a platform CLAIMING to be 100% DRM-free just up and lies about it I may as well back off to a platform that is OPEN about it's DRM or lack thereof (or if there are errors on Store page presense in regards to that I can still verify manually if game has DRM or not through console commands, DB queries and other technical means, it is possible on Steam while not on GOG [the tools may exist but they sure aren't public]) where I can make majority of games DRM-free by "other means" such as Steam API emulators and such.
I don't intend to buy ANYTHING on GOG at this point.
GOG has burned their reputation in my eyes.
That's just my 2 cents.
Nobody has to agree with it. You are free to have a different opinion. There's free speech internationally. But please don't step on me personally or I will start reporting every attempt at that.
GreasyDogMeat: Been 'boycotting' them for 4 years now... last purchase was December of 2016. They've been making bad decisions for years. Anyone remember GOGmixes?
It's been a while since they perished.