Valve has removed Earth: Year 2066 from Steam following revelations that its developer had lied about features of the game and altered its Steam forum posts to make comments sound more positive than they actually were.
The game launched on Steam as an early access title last month, and described itself as a “first-person sci-fi apocalyptic open-world game where your main aim is to survive.” It got on Steam through the platform’s Greenlight voting apparatus.
Players, like one group of redditors (via Gamasutra), discovered that the game had been using stolen artwork and that its developers were altering negative comments left on the game’s forum to sound more positive.
Valve’s Chris Douglass has since posted on the Steam forums with word that Earth: Year 2066 has been removed from the store, and that anyone who bought the game will receive a full refund, if they so choose.
"On Steam, developers make their own decisions about promotion, features, pricing and publication," he says. "However, Steam does require honesty from developers in the marketing of their games."
