Banned Steam game VILE re-released as a free Shareware title
Last month, digital marketplaces began removing NSFW content after caving in to pressure from payment providers like Mastercard and Visa. Both Steam and Itch.io were caught in this wave of censorship that saw thousands of titles being removed with little to no chance of appeal.
One of the titles caught in the crossfire was VILE: Exhumed, a game that had won accolades from various publications and was showcased at PAX East. It was scheduled to be released on Steam on July 22, 2025, but was instead banned and removed from sale.
What made this worse was that the game was not banned for its depictions of violence or gore, but for "sexual content with depictions of real people," which was only implied in the game and not actually shown.
The game contains a mix of Full Motion Video (FMV) and practical effects to create intense and disturbing visuals. It, however, doesn't have "uncensored nudity, no depictions of sex acts, and no pornography whatsoever."
Now the game has seen a resurgence, being offered as a free shareware title with the Creative Commons license, which allows users to share and modify the content for non-commercial purposes.
The game's publisher, DreadXP, and solo developer Cara Cadaver, believe this strong-handed censorship "actually results in is taking power and storytelling away from women, other marginalized artists, and ultimately, from everyone."
You can download the game for free, and optionally pay what you want to support the developers. Fifty percent of the profits will be donated to the Red Door Family Shelter, which supports women and children affected by domestic abuse.
What is VILE: Exhumed?
VILE: Exhumed is a throwback to old-school point-and-click horror games where you rummage through files on a computer to find out what happened to an actress called Candy Corpse.
It's an unsettling game that challenges you to piece together the narrative using realistic depictions of websites, chat logs, and emails to solve the mystery.
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