Warning: This Piece of News Centers on a Matter of Sexual Assault and May Be Triggering to Survivors
How on Earth did developer Desk Plant decide on this name for their game? First of all, their studio is called Desk Plant. How do you go from that to Rape Day? It should go without saying, this game is stirring up controversy. Desk Plant wanted to release Rape Day on Steam, which Valve has recently denied. Desk Plant says that their game should be allowed to be sold on Steam based on their Policy Guidelines.
The most famous excerpt from Steam’s Policy Guidelines is the denial of games that are “illegal or straight up trolling”. While the visual novel in question is not an attempt to troll, the sexual assault depicted is not anymore illegal than the murder or assault in any of the other games on Steam. At least that is what Desk Plant is claiming. In that sense, a good point it made. The depiction of explicit violence can be jarring for some players while normalized for others. Sexual assault in video games has not reached that level of normalization. When it is present in video games, it is often used in a way to make the player uncomfortable.
The game’s setting is a post-apocalyptic world where zombies roam the Earth. The Steam description called it a game where the player could “verbally harass, kill people, and rape women”. The game’s website has a rather disturbing FAQ section. The creator sites his personal beliefs of morality being “subjective” as inspiration for the game. They also say that the inclusion of horror books, the perspective of villains, and porn in Rape Day “combines the best of all of this.” Another FAQ calls this game a “dark comedy”, siting his own sense of humour for this categorization.
Source: Steam Blog