Valve Cracks Down on Custom Game Developers; Demands End of Monetization

Valve has decided to crack down on monetization in so-called Custom Games, or player-created alternative gameplay modes in Dota 2, such as Custom Hero Clash, Overthrow 3.0 or World Of Dota.

1. Valve sent a letter to the developers of many Custom Games, in which they were reminded that monetizing mods for Dota 2 is against the terms of the EULA.
2. Valve is demanding an immediate halt to the monetization of Custom Games. This includes such things as selling skins and other items, subscriptions, paid season passes or microtransactions that enable us to buy virtual currency.
3. By August 17, developers of such Custom Games must also send Valve all monetization information, including how much was earned in this way, broken down by region, as well as what services were used to charge players.
4. For now, it is unclear whether the goal is to remove monetization from all such fan projects altogether, or to redirect payments through Steam (rather than PayPal, for example) so that Valve can make money from it as well.

Source: Twitter.

Valve's move is not surprising, as it seemed only a matter of time. Many popular Custom Games in Dota 2 currently have very aggressive monetization. Some of them can safely be described as pay-2-win projects, where winning almost requires spending real money.

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July 9, 2013

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• Dota (franchise)
• Valve
• microtransactions
• mods / fan projects (games)