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'Active Shooter' Game Developer Is Banned From Steam -- Again

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Days after a heated controversy erupted surrounding an upcoming PC game called Active Shooter -- which would have allowed players to simulate both the role of a mass murderer inside school walls and the S.W.A.T. trying to stop him -- Valve has permanently banned the game and its developer from its Steam platform.

The reasoning behind this action, however, may not satisfy those who perceived Active Shooter as a reprehensible product that sought to glorify such tragic events.

ACID / Change.org

As I'm writing this, a petition on change.org pleading with Valve to block publication of the game has reached more than 180,000 signatures. Many of the petition's most vocal supporters were grieving parents who've lost children in recent deadly shootings like the one in Parkland, Florida.

The simple existence of a game like Active Shooter sparked some healthy and heated conversations within my own community circle. Some called out the shameless and morally bankrupt way its developer was seemingly capitalizing on all too frequent trending tragedies. Others pointed out that we've been virtually shooting at all manner of people (including innocents) in video games for decades, whether with hyper-realistic graphics or sprite-based ones. Still others argued for the developer's First Amendment right to create the game, and subsequently for Valve's right not to publish it.

That brings us to Valve's decision. In a statement to Kotaku, a Valve representative says "This developer and publisher is, in fact, a person calling himself Ata Berdiyev, who had previously been removed last fall when he was operating as ‘[bc]Interactive’ and ‘Elusive Team.”

This came to light as a result of Valve's investigation into Active Shooter, likely a direct result of intense media coverage and the Change.org petition.

ACID

The developer now operates under the name Revived Games, and its products are published by ACID (likely the same entity). You'd be challenged to find a very strong web presence for either.

The Valve representative went so far as to call Berdiyev a "troll" and accused him of review manipulation, customer abuse and publishing copyrighted materials.

“We are not going to do business with people who act like this towards our customers or Valve,” he says.

So, justice has been done based on the developer's reputation and clear policy violations. But not necessarily because of the thematic elements of Active Shooter.

Valve is very aware of the controversy surrounding this game, and tells Kotaku they'll be having deeper conversations about their content policies shortly.

All this being said, there's nothing stopping the developer from self-publishing the game. This may or not be the end of Active Shooter.

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