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Valve removes 173 'fake' games' from Steam storefront

Valve removes 173 'fake' games' from Steam storefront

Nearly 200 ‘fake games’ by developer Silicon Echo Studios have been axed on Steam.

That’s according to Polygon, which reports that 173 titles under the Silicon Echo and Zonitron Productions labels, have been removed for being low-quality shovelware designed to sell trading cards.

These titles were made from pre-made Unity assets, which means a developer can churn out content exceptionally quickly. Furthermore, the developer behind this was able to push multiple projects through under on Steam Direct application, meaning they only paid $100 in total rather than per title.

According to YouTuber SidAlpha, who has been researching Silicon Echo, ten per cent of all titles released on Steam in July and August were made by this company. The firm managed to publish 86 games.

This is quite a big move for Valve, who – since the launch of Greenlight – has been unwilling to 'curate' the Steam store page, rather letting the market decide. 

Anyone paying attention to the Steam market will have noticed the sharp uptick in games released on Steam since the launch of Steam Direct in July; Thomas Bidaux from Ico Partners was kind enough to share the below data with us at PCC Helsinki: 


PCGamesInsider Contributing Editor

Alex Calvin is a freelance journalist who writes about the business of games. He started out at UK trade paper MCV in 2013 and left as deputy editor over three years later. In June 2017, he joined Steel Media as the editor for new site PCGamesInsider.biz. In October 2019 he left this full-time position at the company but still contributes to the site on a daily basis. He has also written for GamesIndustry.biz, VGC, Games London, The Observer/Guardian and Esquire UK.