Valve has published a dedicated page that advises developers about what type of advertising is and is not allowed in Steam.
As Gamingonlinux and Steamdb pointed out, this policy has been in force for five years and was previously on its price page. Valve has now transferred his advertising guidelines to his own page in Steamworks, providing examples of what types of advertising are and are not allowed in the games.
“Steam does not contain any pay, nor the models admitted in games distributed in Steam,” he writes.
“There are different interpretations of what constitutes ‘advertising’ in a game, so the examples are destined to help guide developers about what is and is not compatible with Steam.”
An example is the placement of the product, which is allowed on the platform “provided that such representations are not harmful and are appropriate within the context of the game.”
Another is the cross promotions, which Valve says that they “encourage and many clients find value in them.” The company clarifies that “under no circumstances it is good to charge other developers to participate in a package or sell access to a sales page or other Steam page.”
However, Valve emphasizes that developers “should not use advertising pays as a business model”, such as “demanding players to see or get involved with advertising to play, or the purchase game behind advertising.”
If a developer’s business model depends on these aspects, it must be eliminated before a game is allowed to be sent on Steam. Valve also says that players should not be rewarded to see or participate with advertisements in the game.
Last week, Valve implemented a function in Steam that warns the players when the games released in early access have not recently been updated.
