Last week, Valve cracked down on a number of explicit games on Steam, citing concerns from payment processors as the driving force behind the policy change. Now, Itch.io, the platform that pitches itself as "an open marketplace for independent game creators," has followed suit, with game developers initially noticing their games being pulled from the platform without notice, followed by an announcement by Itch.io explaining the removal and clarifying the marketplace's stance on NSFW and sexualized content on the platform. Itch.io blames the crackdown on the same campaign that initially affected games on Valve's Store—an open letter titled "Open letter to payment processors profiting from rape, incest + child abuse games on Steam" signed by numerous executives from major payment processors. In the letter, numerous valid concerns were raised, specifically surrounding imagery of minors and non-consensual sexual activity. In a response issued by Itch.io, the platform explained that it had to make the urgent decision to temporarily de-index all games that contain NSFW or explicit content while it conducts an audit in order to "protect the platform's core payment infrastructure." Once the audit is conducted, Itch.io will provide NSFW game developers with new guidelines and changes that need to be made to their games in order to be reinstated, and some games will be permanently removed from the platform in order to comply with the demands of the payment processors. Games that have been removed from the platform are currently unavailable to purchase or even be downloaded by those who purchased them previously.

On sites where now-removed games used to live, Itch.io is displaying a message to its users that reads: "We don't allow hosting content that includes sexualized images or videos of real-life humans. Fictional, illustrated, and rendered content is generally fine, assuming it's legal. AI-generated imagery that is designed to resemble photographic content of real people is not allowed. Content glorifying sexual violence is not permitted. Depictions of minors, minor-presenting, or suggested minors in a sexual context are not allowed and will result in account suspension. If you plan to collect money for your content, then you must adhere to the acceptable use policy of all respective payment processors that your account utilizes." Although this leaves some room for interpretation, it clearly still allows for some NSFW and sexualized content. Itch.io is also directing users to read its NSFW content policy and the policies of its payment providers by linking those policies on the same page.