After scandal about Steam curators: Frostpunk developer no longer gives Steam keys to curators

Steam apparently has a problem when it comes to curators. They should normally help the developers to make their games known to a wider audience and thus also pick up one or the other buyer. At the same time, however, the system also represents an invitation to less serious reviewers and apparent scammers.

The latter group caused major waves on the platform last week after an indie developer drew attention to any grievances. The curator groups in focus obtained additional game keys from the developers, which were then apparently resold by unofficial key resellers. As a result, Valve also became active and has so far banned 20 apparently fraudulent curator groups from the platform.

For 11 Bit Studios, the creators of This War of Mine and Frostpunk, however, Valve’s intervention is not enough to continue using the curator system on Steam. Effective immediately, no more keys will be sent to Steam curators. According to a statement, the decision was based on our own experiences and those of other developer studios.

Most requests come from fake accounts that are simply used to steal keys in order to then resell them. One is not worried about a lack of reviews from curators, because they would not offer the community any added value anyway. After all, there is hope for improvements to the feature, according to 11 Bit Studios in a tweet. At least that shows the intervention of Valve. The developer from the indie studio Cowcat Games, who got the ball rolling, made it clear in an update that the keys distributed to fraudulent curators were ultimately for sale at G2A and some were also activated on accounts without reviews.