New Steam rules: this is how age controls change

Valve introduces mandatory age checks on Steam for UK players via credit card.

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August 29 marks a before and after in Steam, as Valve has activated a new age verification system on the platform. This change, which for now only affects users in the United Kingdom, comes after months of external pressure and directly affects access to certain games within the digital store.

According to Game Rant, British players will have to link a credit card to confirm their age and unlock the entire Steam catalog. The measure aims to restrict access to titles with adult content, including explicit violence or sexual themes, and is applied as an additional step to the classic date of birth selector, which until now proved insufficient.

How Age Verification Works on Steam

• The user must enter a valid credit card, with real name and address.

• Once verified, access to all game pages is unlocked, including those with sexual or graphic violence content.

• The measure only applies in the United Kingdom, although it could be extended to other territories in the future.

Valve justifies this decision as a way to comply with regulatory requirements and companies like Mastercard, which recently pressured to limit the presence of NSFW games on the platform.

With this move, Steam becomes the first major digital store to apply a mandatory age control system using a credit card, a change that opens the debate on user privacy and the possible expansion of the measure to other countries.