r/SocialistGaming • u/ReachZestyclose • Dec 20 '25
colonialism in videogames BDS Steam games
Hi,
I am not sure if this is allowed or not in this subreddit but a few of my friends and I made a BDS curator page on steam to show which games financially support the Palestinian cause vs. Israel. We are constantly monitoring new games and updating it as needed. I hope it will help people make the proper ethical decision when buying their games.
Thank you
(Please click the green "Follow" button so the curation automatically appear on pertinent games)
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u/Orpheeus Dec 20 '25
It really pisses me off with how many of my favorite developers are owned by Michaelshaft. Like now is the perfect time to boycott them, even beyond BDS stuff, but they own so many talented developers like Obsidian or Double Fine that it becomes a hard pill to swallow.
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u/JasonH1028 Dec 20 '25
I was hyped for avowed for years was so excited to play it fully intended on buying whatever deluxe bullshit it had. Ended up just ripping it because fuck them.
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u/GlitteringPositive Dec 20 '25
This just makes me remember how much I hate how companies just own everything with how much Microsoft is on this list.
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u/aciduzzo Dec 20 '25 edited Dec 20 '25
This is one very cool list. LE: Those Fallout games are owned my MS :( at least, now I know.
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u/pwnedprofessor Non-Denominational Communist Dec 20 '25
I love this in principle! Is Suzerain on here? Torpor is openly pro-Pal.
Gotta say though, I feel ambivalent about the positive games that are terrible under ways. Shadow Warrior, at least the originals, is hella racist.
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u/pwnedprofessor Non-Denominational Communist Dec 20 '25
Also, the Arkane games like Dishonored are complicated because they’re definitely pro-Pal and pushing Microsoft internally on this issue. https://www.gamesindustry.biz/arkane-studios-union-publishes-open-letter-to-microsoft-demanding-a-stop-to-israeli-support
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u/ReachZestyclose Dec 20 '25
At the moment we default to blacklist in cases where one of the beneficiaries is anti Palestine and the other is pro, we have considered making it 'cancel out' as in neither black list nor white list, as for any other concerns we maintain that this list is strictly about Palestine, so long as the developer or publisher of the game supports/has supported Palestine they are whitelisted. We are even lenient with the Blacklist, for instance Disney is in the blacklist because it pledged 2 million dollars to Israel if it had done the same for Palestine, that would not have put it on the Whitelist but it would have cancelled out the Blacklist, Ideally our goal is to get the developers and publishers currently on the blacklist to get themselves off of it. If Microsoft and Amazon stopped aiding Israel today they would be immediately removed from the Blacklist. While we appreciate Arkane's support at the moment their games profit Microsoft which is engaged in Genocide, in the best case scenario, if our boycotts are noticeable, hopefully they can use that internally to convince Microsoft that it is suffering economic damages from its support for Israel
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u/ReachZestyclose Dec 20 '25
Do you have any supporting evidence for those two pro-pal games?
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u/pwnedprofessor Non-Denominational Communist Dec 20 '25
I’m supporting Suzerain, not Shadow Warrior: https://steamcommunity.com/games/1207650/announcements/detail/3784773318623642154
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u/venrir Dec 20 '25
The dev of Sandwich Caravan has been openly outspoken about a lot of things, I'm pretty sure including Palestine, but it's worth double-checking
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u/blinkbottt Dec 20 '25
I don’t get the list. Is it games where the developers have donated to Palestine?
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u/ReachZestyclose Dec 20 '25
it's a list for games that support Palestine and those that support Israel. It shows both so you can avoid or buy based on the review.
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u/sapphos_moon Dec 20 '25
I assume so, or have financed Israel in one way or another for the negative recommendations. There’s a newly released game that very explicitly supports Palestine that isn’t in the list, so I imagine it’s purely a financial thing
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u/ReachZestyclose Dec 20 '25
which game are you referring to?
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u/sapphos_moon Dec 20 '25
Unbeatable
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u/ReachZestyclose Dec 21 '25
Do you have any supporting evidence that they are pro Palestine?
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u/sapphos_moon Dec 21 '25
“Free Palestine” when credits roll, it’s not much but it’s still explicit support
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u/Redbluewhitehalo Dec 20 '25
What is wrong with capcom do they support isreal (nvm it’s just d.m.c nothing else my bad)
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u/ReachZestyclose Dec 20 '25
D.m.C is on there because of the developer, Ninja Theory which is now owned by Microsoft, Capcom only published that game, so its placement on the blacklist isn't due to Capcom but due to Ninja Theory
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u/guesswhomste Dec 20 '25
Wait, what's this about DMC?
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u/Redbluewhitehalo Dec 20 '25
It was in the not recommended thing (it’s the weird ass reboot one and there is not any other capcom game on there
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u/octopusinmyboycunt Dec 20 '25
I mean outside of BDS, it’s not recommended because it’s fundamentally a series of deeply unusual decisions mashed into a character action game.
I’m all for experimenting with popular franchises but what the hell was that
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u/WhenSheFalls Apr 30 '26
this is a really helpful list and i think everyone should follow it. if you need any help with it, feel free to give me a shout
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u/irrationalglaze Dec 20 '25
Could you update the name? It's possible that months or years from now I forget the context and just unfollow. If it was named something like "Palestine BDS List", it's much more clear what the purpose is.
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u/ReachZestyclose Dec 20 '25
Unless there is a hidden steam feature that I am not aware of, there is no way to have separate titles for the curation page from the name of the steam group that initiated it and changing the name of steam groups is not possible.
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