Malaysia Shuts Down Steam Over a Game That Let’s Players Beat Up Jesus

PQube Games, the developers of the newly released 2D brawler Fight of Gods, just learned that their game will not be selling in Malaysia anytime soon. Why exactly?

You can beat up Jesus.

After discovering that this was possible in Fight of Gods, the Malaysian government immediately blocked Steam access. Malaysia’s Communications and Multimedia Minister Datuk Seri Salleh had this to say about it, “Malaysians respect all cultural and religious sensitivities, and the sale and distribution of the religiously insensitive and blasphemous games must be stopped immediately.” Since there is no way to block the individual sale of a game on Steam without the assistance of Valve, the Malaysian Government was forced to block Steam entirely.

News first broke of the situation when gamers in Malaysia reported issues with accessing the platform. These issues quickly made their way over to Valve who have been working hard to fix the situation ever since:

Right now players in Malaysia can access the games they own on Steam, but the Steam Store is being blocked by some local telcos in Malaysia. From reports we are reading, this is due to a single game that conflicts with local laws. We have contacted the developer, removed the game, and are attempting to make contact with the officials in Malaysia to remove the block. We apologize for any inconvenience.

Currently there are no reports of Fight of Gods having problems with local governments anywhere else. PQGames continues to promote their new brawler on their Twitter account by offering chances for gamers around the world to win Steamcodes.

Well, as long as you’re not in Malaysia.

Mark Rotondi: Gaming has been a core part of my existence since I've been a kid. Some of my favorite games along the way have been Zelda BoTW, Counter-Strike, Metroid Prime, Braid, Mega Man 3 and Turtles in Time for the SNES. In 2011 I graduated from UMass Boston with a degree in English, but have worked mainly in tech in San Francisco, including a job at a large free-to-play company where I worked in live-operations and community management.
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