Image via Valve

It appears that Steam, Valve's market-dominating PC gaming platform, has been banned in China equally of today. Gorging Chinese gamers can at to the lowest degree take solace in the knowledge that the Chinese version of the storefront remains active, just the underwhelming library of just over 100 games may prove little comfort in comparison to the tens of thousands of titles lost.

The news was shared by an anonymous Redditor, amongst others, early this morning, who discovered that the Steam'due south website domain (shop.steampowered.com) had been added to the Chinese national ban list, barring entry to the site for anyone using a Chinese Isp. It'due south unclear at present why the action has been taken or whether Valve was consulted or warned alee of time. The Chinese version of Steam (store.steamchina.com) remains unaffected at the time of writing.

There is even a possibility the whole thing may take been an error or a co-ordinated attack: TheGamer'southward Stacey Henley updated her story with the caveat, "Some conflicting reports claim this is the issue of a DNS attack and not a deliberate ban." Still, whatever the reason, many Chinese gamers may well notice themselves needing to utilize a VPN to go effectually the government-imposed firewall.