Google removes "Doki Doki Literature Club" from Google Play

4/12/2026 at 8:37:28 PM

Just want to drive by and mention - a friend told me to play DDLC and I was highly skeptical given the anime pin-up girl art style. I eventually gave in and gave it a shot.

It's an amazing "playable story" unlike anything I have ever played. Super creative and well worth the couple hours it takes to play. I think it could use a few trigger warnings and it should be rated PG-13 / R, but there's stuff on Netflix 10x more disturbing so I don't quite grok the Google push back on this one.

by bengotow

4/13/2026 at 6:30:07 AM

> I think it could use a few trigger warnings

Doesn't DDLC start with the following?

> This game is not suitable for those who are easily disturbed. Individuals suffering from anxiety or depression may not have a safe experience playing this game. For content warnings, please visit https://ddlc.moe/warning.

Then the plus version even added in-game content warnings?

https://teamsalvato.com/news/updates-to-content-warnings-in-...

Also, the game is rated PEGI 18, USK 18, M, CERO C, in various countries.

by Shank

4/13/2026 at 4:02:33 AM

If you want something just as surprising & good, I'd recommend giving "Slay the princess" a go - a really unique hidden gem. Or, if you're not into it, then check Euro Brady's playthroughs for this game ( he also did DDLC btw. ) - the commentary is awesome and gives insight into many things you wouldn't normally find out yourself.

by JayDustheadz

4/13/2026 at 8:57:59 AM

Slay the Princess is a very good one, can confirm. It's best to go in completely blind.

by hofrogs

4/12/2026 at 8:39:33 PM

This genre of games are called visual novels.

Doki Doki was created with the Ren'Py Visual Novel Engine by the way.

by oceansky

4/12/2026 at 9:52:38 PM

And it's also one of the most impressive displays of RenPy's capabilities you'll ever see.

Plenty of games do amazing things with ren'py that you wouldn't think were possible just by looking at the dialogue DSL. Maps, HUDs, minigames, incredibly dynamic pathways through the game. But DDLC takes it to a different level, partly by looking so "normal" on its surface.

In college I made some spare cash writing Ren'py games for some creatives online who had the writing and illustration chops, but needed programming help. At the time, DDLC was the model for great game design in Ren'Py. There are plenty of more technically impressive Ren'py games nowadays, but DDLC is still a terrific example of technical sophistication facilitating the story.

Ren'py is awesome by the way. A tour de force of software design, in my opinion.

by ryukoposting

4/13/2026 at 12:10:04 AM

I've played it, but what's impressive about this game (technically)? I don't remember its implementation being anything special as opposed its plot.

by mcmoor

4/13/2026 at 2:30:12 AM

I think it's mainly in relation to the constraints of the game engine, and also that the game engine being flexible enough to enable the gimmicks. I haven't played DDLC and probably never will, but from what I've read about it, like games with similar core themes (not dating sim) it has some gimmicks that tend to stretch the capabilities of a closed-down game engine, sometimes requiring patches to the engine itself. In this case the game engine Renpy offers an extensive DSL that makes it easy to add story scenes, media and dialogues, but allows you to fall back to python to do some tricky things.

by dchftcs

4/13/2026 at 2:20:25 AM

It does a lot of screwing with the interface and game data in ways most VNs do not.

by JoshTriplett

4/12/2026 at 10:43:23 PM

Isn't RenPy basically a game engine under the hood? So if you have the programming chops, you can make anything with Python.

by torginus

4/12/2026 at 10:21:17 PM

Any examples of other impressive Ren'py showcases?

by crashabr

4/12/2026 at 11:07:59 PM

I personally helped develop a game with an entire inventory/crafting system, and an isometric map. Final product never saw the light of day, sadly.

People have made some pretty slick turn-based combat systems. Some deck builders, others more spellcasting/mana oriented.

And it's renpy so like 80% of the games are straight up porn, so I'm not naming a single one here lol.

by ryukoposting

4/13/2026 at 1:37:05 AM

I really enjoyed Roadwarden. Interesting take on an old fantasy genre and gave me “this is ancient history” vibes. I’m not usually into visual novels but beat this game. It’s available for under $3 right now, I am showing 20 hours played, totally worth it.

https://store.steampowered.com/app/1155970/Roadwarden/

by wincy

4/13/2026 at 3:05:57 AM

Wait a minute, Roadwarden was made in RenPy? That's awesome, I never would have guessed.

by brendoelfrendo

4/13/2026 at 1:06:25 AM

"Analogue: A Hate Story" and its sequel do some technically interesting things, and they both also have interesting stories, I can recommend them.

http://ahatestory.com/

by TheDong

4/13/2026 at 12:04:15 AM

Yeah but its such a standout in there that i wouldnt even consider it part of that genre. It uses the same medium but does such crazy things with it that its nothing like any other visual novels

by samrus

4/13/2026 at 10:33:41 AM

DDLC is definitely not breaking its “baby’s first 電波ゲー” reputation in this thread.

by YurgenJurgensen

4/13/2026 at 1:18:37 AM

I really can't agree, there are so many great VNs out there and DDLC only really stands out in that it plays heavily to the English-speaking world's preconceived notions of VNs as "nothing more than simple dating simulators"

by Polycryptus

4/13/2026 at 7:09:18 AM

Classical Google removing things that are pretty normal while leaving actively harmful, scams, gambling etc. apps online.

by mastermage

4/12/2026 at 9:18:46 PM

TV shows have reached a point where the ratings are blurry and R content is becoming normalised and ubiquitous with little to no enforcement.

Games are still seen as something children engage in despite the average gamers being adults.

by politelemon

4/12/2026 at 11:58:44 PM

Games have ratings in virtually every country. The commercial version of DDLC, DDLC Plus is rated M in North America for 17+. The original free version lacks a rating because it was a free indie game. And the website has the line "This game is not suitable for children or those who are easily disturbed."

by chocochunks

4/12/2026 at 10:50:53 PM

The official website states on the front page:

    This game is not suitable for children or those who are easily disturbed.

by throwaway2046

4/12/2026 at 11:18:26 PM

We do not need our hyperscaler minders telling us what content we can and cannot consume.

This ought to be grounds to litigate antitrust. This should not be happening.

We need web-based app installs without scare walls ("downloading from the internet is dangerous"), without hidden settings menus to enable them ("Settings > Apps > Special app access > Install unknown apps"), and without any interference or meddling from the hyperscalers.

Tyranny of defaults = 0.00001% of users will ever fall into these buckets = Google knows exactly the evil shit they're doing. Apple not even allowing it is almost less evil by contrast as they're not pretending.

These devices are too important for two companies to lord over us and tell us what to do.

I hope Lina Khan comes back, and I hope she has some absolute urgency next time. I also hope our pals in the EU and Asia put this shit to rest as well. No citizen of the world should have their devices cucking them like this. This is not what computing is supposed to be. (And let's not discount the fact that competition on these devices is in no way, shape, or form fair anymore. You're taxed to hell and back if you do distribution or outreach on these garrison states.)

These our our devices, Google and Apple. You do not get to control what happens after we buy them. You are both monopolies. You are both allelopathic parasites. Invasive species that have outgrown your ecosystem and invaded all the other ones. Doing damage to everything you touch.

The world needs a cleansing forest fire to restore healthy competition.

by echelon

4/13/2026 at 12:42:36 AM

I’m generally with you, but I am not prepared to say companies should be forced to host and distribute content they believe reflects badly on them.

That and I don’t see how Google and Apple can both be monopolies in mobile. Is this the “Ford has a monopoly on Mustangs” argument? Never found that persuasive.

Now, reframe as duopoly, and maybe layer in that a platform owner who curates their App Store must allow alternative app stores on equal footing, and I’d be with you.

by brookst

4/13/2026 at 9:07:33 AM

> I’m generally with you, but I am not prepared to say companies should be forced to host and distribute content they believe reflects badly on them.

If Apple and Google are hell-bent on killing sideloading, and they control 99% of the mobile market, I think they have an obligation to host things they don't like, as long as it is legal.

by vman81

4/13/2026 at 4:56:58 AM

Remember the days when you could just run whatever software you wanted on your hardware?

by kstenerud

4/13/2026 at 6:12:02 AM

I feel like this is captures the point very well. Google removing this software, means that for 99% of the users on the platform, the choice to play this gets taken away from user.

by perbu

4/13/2026 at 7:10:35 AM

Pepperidge Farm Remembers

by mastermage

4/13/2026 at 5:45:49 AM

Well they are big enough to be called infrastructure now. Similar to payment providers. Them removing things essentially removes them from existence for 99 percent.

by Neikius

4/13/2026 at 12:50:51 AM

I don't think companies should be forced to do that in general, but there are some circumstances where I think they should.

A local printing company should not be forced to print things they don't want. But an ISP should be required to transport everything, with exceptions for legal requirements and legitimate network health measures, or get out of the ISP business.

App stores feel more like the latter to me. Especially Apple's where there's no way around it for the average user.

by wat10000

4/13/2026 at 1:08:37 AM

Agreed on the free speech versus common carrier aspects.

But I lean the other way with app stores. The companies hire reviewers, the listings appear in the App Store trade dress, it feels more like a museum or magazine than an ISP. But I get how reasonable people can disagree.

Maybe we need some formal choices: is this a curated App Store that reflects editorial judgment (in which case it must be possible to ship alternatives on equal footing), or is it a common carrier (in which case you can be the only game in town).

The ambiguity doesn’t help, and of course megacorps love shifting the frames depending on context.

by brookst

4/13/2026 at 6:02:05 AM

>I’m generally with you, but I am not prepared to say companies should be forced to host and distribute content they believe reflects badly on them.

There's platforms, and there's Apple and Google.

You don't need to say "platforms" when you talk about the two companies that control the 99.99999% of the mobile ecosystem.

by alterom

4/13/2026 at 1:08:02 AM

nah, companies should be able to put all the content warnings they want on their own products, full stop

by stronglikedan

4/13/2026 at 6:04:11 AM

They weren't talking about the warning.

The warning was cited as an explanation as to why that game was delisted.

The objection was to Google wielding the power of picking and choosing which controversial materials the users are allowed to see.

by alterom

4/12/2026 at 11:23:26 PM

This should already be illegal under the DMA. I don't know how Google is planning to get out of it.

by stavros

4/12/2026 at 11:32:43 PM

There hasn't been so much as a finger lifted against antitrust behavior since 2000. They feel as though they're invincible at this point.

by echelon

4/13/2026 at 12:46:17 AM

This is false and it weakens your position.

https://www.justice.gov/atr/case/us-and-plaintiff-states-v-g...

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/department-justice-prevails-l...

https://www.justice.gov/atr/case/us-and-plaintiff-states-v-a...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antitrust_cases_against_Google...

https://www.cnbc.com/2025/03/19/eu-orders-apple-to-open-up-a...

…and there are many more.

You can say those aren’t enough, but it is 100% fallacious to say there has been zero antitrust actions against Apple and Google since 2000.

by brookst

4/13/2026 at 3:48:46 AM

can you explain how someone being incorrect about something weakens their position? i assume the position in question is that their should be more trust busting. "there have been these antitrust actions" isn't actually a counter argument to "there should be more antitrust actions", so it doesn't weaken the position, unless i'm not understanding what you mean by that.

you know what my favorite fallacy is? the fallacy fallacy, the mistaken assumption that by showing an argument is invalid you've shown its conclusion is false.

by pasquinelli

4/13/2026 at 5:44:09 AM

Because the argument wasn't "there should be more" but was in fact "there have been none"?

It's pretty easy to weaken such a strong position if you can provide not just one but multiple pieces of evidence to the contrary.

by goodmythical

4/13/2026 at 6:06:24 AM

The argument was they feel they are invincible in their [monopolist] position, and that argument is only made stronger by the cases you cited as none of the outcomes really moved the needle in that aspect.

by alterom

4/13/2026 at 5:20:29 AM

If someone says 'the level of X is 0, and the appropriate level should be higher than it currently is', and if it turns out that the current level of X is higher than the claimed 0, that does indeed raise doubts about their position.

by eru

4/12/2026 at 11:35:27 PM

Apple got a lot of flak for their shenanigans, but here's hoping the EU puts the hammer down on both of them.

by stavros

4/13/2026 at 2:34:39 AM

DDLC borrowed a lot from YOU and ME and HER: A Love Story (Kimi to Kanojo to Kanojo no Koi), which I consider generally superior to DDLC. I say this not to diminish DDLC, which is excellent, but as a plug for anyone who enjoyed DDLC and wants more mind warping content like that.

by jquery

4/13/2026 at 7:33:15 AM

I believe Dan Salvato, the creator of DDLC, said he wasn't aware of YOU and ME and HER until late in development.

by debugnik

4/12/2026 at 10:01:35 PM

If you only played it once without knowing the ending, I strongly recommend a second playthrough. Some dialogues and poems have a wildly different meaning once you know things.

Also, I fully recommend DDLP+ too. The extra stories don't have any real gameplay, but they are really good, and add.some depth to the characters.

by surgical_fire

4/13/2026 at 2:48:31 AM

I'm not sure I could tolerate a second play through. One part in particular that just goes on and on and on for what feels like forever is really tough to get through and resume the plot.

by shawn_w

4/12/2026 at 8:51:41 PM

The poems are pretty good too.

by senkora

4/12/2026 at 10:10:57 PM

It’s hands down R to be clear lol but yes amazing experience.

by Forgeties79

4/13/2026 at 12:39:25 AM

> I think it could use a few trigger warnings

There is no scientific evidence whatsoever that trigger warnings have a positive effect and growing evidence they are either ineffectual or actually negative.

by KennyBlanken

4/13/2026 at 1:33:21 AM

If you've ever had trauma, especially recent, you'll appreciate well done content warnings. You don't want the dramatic plot twist to happen to be exactly the topic you've been trying to avoid so that you can slowly get better.

If you've experienced a certain kind of trauma, it's not a matter willpower. It involves a loss of control over one's emotional response and thoughts which can be triggered by things that relate to your trauma.

Don't knock on content warnings just because they lack rigorous evidence or because "trigger warnings" became the butt of jokes for a while. They have a genuine utility.

by Anvoker

4/13/2026 at 7:14:09 AM

The problem is they are explicitly arguing that all of our best science is that trigger warnings are counter productive for getting better. Just a quick google search of 'scientific support for trigger warnings' will get you all sorts of meta analysis, RCT results, etc. on this. At best they don't seem to actually do anything, and at worst, they actively impede your ability to get better.

That doesn't mean it's a matter of willpower, but it does suggest that avoiding your triggers or trying to use trigger warnings to prepare you for dealing with them provides no benefit. Your use of the word avoid pretty much sums up the core problem here - on a personal enjoyment of day to day life level, avoiding your triggers makes perfect sense. On the long term healing and not being traumatized by them level, you don't want to do that. (Edit: This isn't to say try taking exposure therapy into your own hands and just surround yourself with the stuff. None of this is a replacement for guided therapy. But specifically going out of your way to avoid these things is 'avoidant behavior' and is pretty much universally recognized as being a bad thing when it comes to dealing with PTSD etc.)

That being said, I believe everyone should be able to disclaim what they want and that people can choose how they approach their own self-care, even if it isn't supported by the science.

by cthalupa

4/13/2026 at 10:32:28 AM

Before we had Trigger Warnings as a term, we had movie and game ratings that said what you'd see if you watched/played: violence, blood/gore, nudity ... steam still does this, and as long as you don't use the politically charged TW expression, no-one seems to mind. For example, "Skyrim contains Blood and Gore, Intense Violence, Sexual Themes, Use of Alcohol, and Language."

"TW 1.0" as I remember it - the first time I heard the TW term - was a thing where professors told students in advance if a lecture contained material that could upset some students, I think it started when someone teaching a course on criminal law in a law degree told students in advance "[TW:] next week we will have the lecture on the law around rape and sexual assault". Properly practiced, that's not exposure therapy that's being polite to your students (though why not put your whole syllabus up at the start of term, if you can?) It was also not intended to let you skip that topic - it's pretty important to know about if you're training in criminal law! - just to let you know in advance when it's coming up.

If you're teaching a course on the history of the British Empire in India, you're at some point going to need to cover the Bengal famine, the Amritsar massacre, the mutiny (aka. first war of independence), the practically-a-civil-war during partition, and a lot of other things. Mind you a "content note: British Empire" at the start of the course would probably cover all bases.

The choice of "trigger" that already means something in therapy was perhaps unfortunate, and nowadays I think "content warning" or even "content note" is preferred.

The real problem though was how students, who were neither trained therapists nor seemed to have consulted any, redefined and enforced their version of TW to the point that the term got tainted in the public view.

Basically, if you have anything like PTSD, you need an actual therapist not the collective hivemind of twitter (instagram these days?).

by red_admiral

4/13/2026 at 9:02:00 AM

They are a tool like anything else.

Exposure and Response Prevention therapy works. You will never get fully well without exposure. However, it requires that you find stimulus of a magnitude that makes you uncomfortable, but doesn't send you outright spiraling. You need to keep steady while experiencing it for a while.

Content warnings give you the ability to estimate what intensity of negative stimulus you will experience, and this is important when dealing with actual triggers.

Not everyone is yet at the phase where they can handle a certain level of exposure. For some unfortunate cases it takes a long time to be well enough to start being able to handle exposure.

That being said, I do think content warnings need to be specific, not generic. The most useful ones are spoilers, not generic messages to put you on guard. Careful Ao3 authors do a better job at this than most games. There are technical solutions that allow interested parties to get this information without having to spoil the default audience, but we live in a busy world that has a lot of things to care about other than this.

by Anvoker

4/13/2026 at 8:41:53 AM

"it does suggest that avoiding your triggers [...] provides no benefit"

This is the part I'm sceptical of. When I look this up, I mostly find articles like https://theconversation.com/proceed-with-caution-the-trouble... (and the underlying studies), which mainly address the question of whether reading a trigger warning and then consuming the potentially triggering content is better than just consuming the potentially triggering content without a warning.

(The article also mentions a finding that trigger warnings have "no meaningful effect on an individual's [...] avoidance of this content"; but I think that's entirely compatible with a world where most people consume the content regardless of the warning, some are more drawn to it because of the warning, and some (including the few who are truly vulnerable) avoid it because of the warning. The effect on those vulnerable few is what's most relevant here. The article does briefly mention "unhealthy avoidance behaviours", but in the context of one university's opinion and without supporting evidence.)

What's the best evidence against trigger warnings as a means of enabling traumatised people to make an informed decision on when (and whether) to confront their triggers?

by retsibsi

4/13/2026 at 10:32:14 AM

> The article does briefly mention "unhealthy avoidance behaviours", but in the context of one university's opinion and without supporting evidence.)

There's not much additional context here because avoidant behavior is basically universally understood to be a bad thing when it comes to the long term treatment of PTSD (this is separate from immediately/short-term after the event - different situation there) - there's no real serious argument against this idea, so when avoidant behavior is discussed it doesn't require context on why that behavior is a bad thing, in the same way that a an article targeted at cardiologists isn't going to explain why poor ejection fraction is an issue - it's baseline knowledge for the target audience.

The results are mixed on whether it encourages avoidance - some studies like https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00221... indicate that it does, others found no effect or negligible increases.

To be clear, I'm not definitively stating it causes avoidant behavior - I am saying that it might, which would be one of those 'worst case' scenarios.

Trauma groups have been part of the meta-analysis that indicate no real change in avoidance, and some have had the 'forbidden fruit' impact even in trauma groups, but it's in similar quantities as the ones that show an increase in avoidant behavior.

Fundamentally, trigger warnings just don't make a lot of sense to try and argue in favor of from a 'helping people with their PTSD' standpoint if you believe the science.

1) For them to have the effect you claim is desirable, they would need to avoid the content - but avoidant behavior is a negative when it comes to overcoming PTSD

2) The science largely indicates that it doesn't cause them to change their behavior at all in this manner - so the desired effect, it doesn't seem to do anything.

3) There's some evidence that it might increase avoidant behavior (science would call this bad!) and some evidence it might increase people exposure due to the 'forbidden fruit' effect (which would be bad from the supposed desired effect, and not necessarily good from the scientific standpoint - unnaturally being pushed towards something might also be negative vs. more 'natural' exposure, particularly when coupled with the upcoming point)

4) A variety of studies have shown that they increase anticipatory anxiety in people when they appear, which is of course a negative for anyone. I haven't been able to find any studies particularly engaging on this specific topic of anticipatory anxiety from trigger warnings + follow up exposure from the 'forbidden fruit' effect so this isn't something backed by science like the rest, but my gut instinct is that it would be more likely to be negative vs. something more organic. I could very well be wrong there.

I don't see any combination of piecing together these studies that could lead to a belief that trigger warnings provide value from a therapeutic standpoint.

by cthalupa

4/13/2026 at 9:27:32 AM

> At best they don't seem to actually do anything, and at worst, they actively impede your ability to get better.

No, trigger warnings do not actively impede your ability to get better. That argument rests on random trigger being framed as "exposure therapy like" event. The exposure therapy is not done by random unprepared exposure to the triggering material with no follow up. Nor by random exposure in public setting.

by watwut

4/13/2026 at 10:05:37 AM

Except we have some studies that show they lead to and reinforce avoidant behavior, e.g. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S00221...

Some also showed no evidence of this, but avoidant behavior is pretty much universally considered to be a specific maladaptive behavior when it comes to treating PTSD in the long run. It has nothing to do with the idea that it is the same as exposure therapy.

by cthalupa

4/13/2026 at 2:49:42 AM

Teaching people to not let emotions get to them, and offending them to build up that immunity, used to be a normal part of life. I wonder what happened.

by userbinator

4/13/2026 at 5:25:24 AM

trigger warnings are not there to prevent people from being "offended" or to avoid emotions they may "get to them." trigger warnings are so folks who have experienced traumatic events can avoid having a panic response triggered unexpectedly.

traumatic events are not a normal part of life and fortunately most people are never forced to experience something truly traumatic. Uncontrolled exposure does not build up "immunity" or help individuals work through or process the trauma. if the warnings seem unnecessary to you, then they're probably not for you.

by mrexroad

4/13/2026 at 7:35:17 AM

Trigger warnings have been quite heavily researched at this point and at best they seem to have no positive impact to overcoming traumatic events and a some of the studies have shown them to be a negative.

Put 'scientific support for trigger warnings' in your favorite search engine and you'll find meta-analysis, RCTs, other types of studies, reviews, as well as discussions from the APS, other psychology and psychiatry related publications, etc.

This isn't to say removing trigger warnings is a replacement for actual guided therapy, exposure therapy or otherwise, but it doesn't seem like it would be a negative outcome for long term mental health and would be a benefit for anticipatory distress and potentially in combating avoidant behaviors (though not all studies universally found them to increase avoidant behaviors - just some)

This is a separate question than when it comes to general polite society and social expectations and what is and isn't considered a courtesy. The studies also aren't dealing with people that have just gone through the traumatic experience, so you could make a reasonable argument that exposure to something still fresh could have a very different impact.

by cthalupa

4/13/2026 at 3:50:16 AM

People gained more exposure to eachother and realized it was kind to warn eachother of things that might bother them a lot.

There’s quite a difference between the popularized image of what trigger warnings are and the common sense use-cases like “this media contains depictions of graphic sexual assault that some viewers may find disturbing”.

by devmor

4/13/2026 at 9:31:50 AM

I mean ... when exactly? Dueling was all about "you said a thing that makes me uncomfortable, so I have to at least pretend to want to kill you". Domestic violence used to be defended with variants of "he felt bad". When you look at history, people overreacted in all kinds of ways at all kind of small impulses. The only difference is that the impulses were slightly different.

by watwut

4/13/2026 at 6:39:02 AM

I think its reasonable to know what you are getting into before you buy.

E.g. if i'm planning family movie night, i probably don't want an R movie. There is nothing wrong with R movies its just sometimes not what I'm looking for. Its nice to be able to see at a glance if the product is what i am looking for. Its really not that different than labelling something as sci-fi or rom-com, etc.

by bawolff

4/13/2026 at 5:18:39 AM

Trigger warnings are not there for some scientific effect. I view them as courtesy for consumers to have an chance to opt out of possibly unwanted experiences beforehand.

by jack1243star

4/13/2026 at 7:40:30 AM

I think that's a reasonable argument.

A whole lot of people do make the argument that they are beneficial from a mental health perspective, though, and that's what isn't backed by the science. You can see discussion of it in-thread, even.

by cthalupa

4/13/2026 at 8:13:07 AM

I've seen evidence that reading a trigger warning and then consuming the content might be worse than just consuming the content without a trigger warning.

But is there any good reason to doubt that trigger warnings can be helpful in the obvious way: someone sees the trigger warning and makes an informed decision to avoid the content?

by retsibsi

4/13/2026 at 1:39:59 AM

Please elaborate.

by r-w

4/13/2026 at 5:26:14 AM

can you please cite some sources for your claims?

by mrexroad

4/12/2026 at 8:30:18 PM

1bil+ people have surrendered their right to artistic expression to Google, and another 1bil+ to Apple, and another 1bil+ to Microsoft. Many more billions have surrendered it to Visa and Mastercard. The world will only continue to get worse for the foreseeable future as five corporations assert global control over what is allowed to be published. It is mournful knowing that humanity's peak is behind us.

by anonymous908213

4/12/2026 at 9:23:40 PM

Hey, on the other hand, zero malware! It is zero, right? Please say it's zero...

Just today I found a malicious version of Ledger on the macOS app store. It's been there for five weeks, and there are already some anecdotes out there of people losing their coins.

I guess that's somehow the developer's fault for not "staking their claim" to their name, as Apple seems to only monitor for malicious duplicate submissions if the original is in the App Store to begin with...

by lxgr

4/13/2026 at 5:18:46 AM

A year or so ago I had to speedrun turning on developer mode on Android because my grandma had somehow installed an app that did a ransomware-like fullscreen popup after about 10-20 seconds after bootup. Could've factory reset it and called it, but wanted to try to rescue it for my grandma. Used adb to figure out what app was doing it and removed it. I might be misremembering details, but I think one of the reasons it could do what it was doing was it was using Samsung-specific permissions, which Google shouldn't allow on the store. I reported the app and looks like it's gone now.

by iguessthislldo

4/12/2026 at 11:41:01 PM

And only 30% fees, just for being on the app store!

by cubefox

4/13/2026 at 5:30:59 AM

Only if you charge for your app - and how much free labor and bandwidth do you give away? Apple gives away millions.

by NetMageSCW

4/13/2026 at 8:49:08 AM

$99 per year for your developer account required to distribute applications. At AWS pricing, that's a bit over a TB of traffic. At any normal pricing, that's anywhere from 10TB to a few hundreds. At volume pricing, that's even more. How many apps are paying for traffic they don't use? Apple pockets millions.

by Sayrus

4/13/2026 at 9:46:46 AM

> Only if you charge for your app - and how much free labor and bandwidth do you give away? Apple gives away millions.

I guess a ~2% fee would cover those costs.

by cubefox

4/13/2026 at 3:28:35 AM

15 for most

by peterspath

4/12/2026 at 9:40:37 PM

Sure, and zero ads and total privacy, as well

by g-b-r

4/12/2026 at 11:23:35 PM

Ads would never be used for malware either, thankfully.

by ddtaylor

4/12/2026 at 8:40:31 PM

Brazil and India have created alternatives to Mastercard/Visa duopoly. EU is seeking to do the same.

by oceansky

4/12/2026 at 9:14:39 PM

Many European countries have had viable online alternatives since forever, and a lot of them are being consolidated into Werk, which will also enable physical payments

by dtech

4/12/2026 at 11:41:51 PM

I think you mean Wero

by cubefox

4/13/2026 at 7:13:20 AM

also it seems like the digital euro is getting forward.

by mastermage

4/12/2026 at 9:38:11 PM

I'm pretty sure that I know what the answer is (sadly), but I'll try anyways:

Any chance folks in the US can use these, in the US?

This is a genuine question, although I don't have my hopes up. It would be nice to have some actual competition / choices

by MikeTheGreat

4/13/2026 at 12:41:26 AM

It costs you nothing but a few hours (heck, you may even make money on the points) to get a Discover card, which you can use on Japanese game sites that don't apply the Visa/Mastercard censorship (they have a partnership with JCB). It's a small move, but most people can't even be bothered to do that much for competition.

by lmm

4/13/2026 at 12:12:44 AM

Hope you like carrying cash.

by NewJazz

4/13/2026 at 12:52:20 AM

China has cleverly replaced the Mastercard/Visa duopoly with an AliPay/WeChat Pay duopoly.

by wat10000

4/13/2026 at 2:38:17 AM

They'd like to. Vending machines will no longer sell to you unless you can pay that way.

For more significant things, you can still use cash. I'd go down to my landlord's bank every three months to pay the rent.

by thaumasiotes

4/13/2026 at 2:52:57 AM

Was that like, enforced? Or did your landlord potentially just prefer cash? I know very little about how land-ownership works in China, except that nobody really ever owns their land.

by kulahan

4/13/2026 at 3:07:07 AM

My landlord preferred to be paid through Alipay. I had to pay in cash because Alipay wouldn't let me make payments that large. (Because my Alipay account was backed by a foreign credit card as opposed to a Chinese bank account, I assume. If you're curious, the rent was about US$700 / month, so the payment would have been about US$2100.)

I don't see that landownership is really relevant. Mostly it's done on the basis of notional 70-year leases from the government. Since the government dates to 1949, the first round of those recently expired. There was a lot of curiosity beforehand as to what would happen, but it doesn't seem to have made enough of a splash that anyone commented about it (where I could see) afterwards. So I don't know how it turned out.

I understand that rural peasants may sometimes own their land outright. In this case, I was renting one apartment in a building with 5-6 floors and I think 4 apartments per floor.

by thaumasiotes

4/12/2026 at 9:02:08 PM

Many countries have alternatives already. In Poland Blik is ubiquitous and very very easy to use. And I love how it's implemented, Visa and MasterCard could learn from it.

Tldr - you open the app on your phone and it gives you a 6 digit BLIK code, you give that code to the seller, then a notification comes up on the app saying "seller X is trying to debit your account by amount Y, agree?". It's brilliant because then the seller gets nothing identifiable about you. Even if someone overhears the code, it's only valid 60 second so it's useless. Unlike with regular cards there is no risk of losing one or using a fake terminal that scans your card instead. And any transaction has to be explicitly rather than implicitly approved. Love it.

by gambiting

4/12/2026 at 10:59:59 PM

This is indeed one of the biggest weaknesses of "pull-based" payment cards, and something most if not all natively phone-based methods do better.

The best credit and debit cards can do is PIN verification or biometrics (for Apple/Google Pay), but even there you still trust the terminal to not show you a different amount than you'll be charged (assuming the screen is even pointing towards you; I've often been asked to tap without seeing what I'm even consenting to).

Online, there's 3DS, but that's not required everywhere and for every transaction.

There once was a vision to extend both positive cardholder approval and cardholder authentication for each card transaction, but it turns out the friction of that is higher on average than just letting everything but the most egregiously suspicious fraud go through by default and handle the rest via the disputes process.

Out of curiosity:

> you open the app on your phone and it gives you a 6 digit BLIK code, you give that code to the seller

Is this the flow for online payments as well, or only for in-person payments?

by lxgr

4/12/2026 at 11:10:38 PM

> Is this the flow for online payments as well, or only for in-person payments?

On-line, too. Or should I say, first, because AFAIK on-line came first. I've been using it for years as my default on-line payment method where available, before noticing it becoming an option on POS terminals.

by TeMPOraL

4/12/2026 at 11:07:28 PM

>>Is this the flow for online payments as well, or only for in-person payments?

works for both

by gambiting

4/12/2026 at 11:10:35 PM

Interesting, I wonder if there is some other initiation channel then? The chance of collisions with random 6-digit codes seems non-negligible.

by lxgr

4/12/2026 at 11:17:17 PM

I've been wondering this too. As I understand it, BLIK codes are generated on the back-end, so I imagine they have some clever anti-collision measures in place. What I know is:

- The TTL of the code is variable; on some days I've noticed it to be as low as 60 seconds, on others around 3+ minutes. Not sure if it depends on the type of transaction or time of day.

- After entering the code in charging widget/terminal, or giving it to a merchant, you still get a screen on which you need to explicitly confirm the transaction; it displays the amount and name of charging entity, so this would presumably reduce the impact of possible collision.

- Sometimes the codes generate instantly, sometimes it takes a few seconds; I always assumed it's network connection lag and/or usual webshit performance issues, but it would also be consistent with an anti-collision measure - if you run out of 6-digit codes, wait a second or two, some will free up.

- Not once I've heard any report or rumor about a collision.

by TeMPOraL

4/13/2026 at 5:28:52 AM

IIRC a few years ago I saw some store asking for 6 or 8 digit BLIK codes, I guess the latter was how they were planning to expand from supporting just Poland to supporting whole EU. But that effort seems to have died out.

by pzmarzly

4/13/2026 at 2:57:49 AM

BLIK rocks. In addition to being a payment system for goods and services it can be used for instant private money transfers between individuals.

by ArekDymalski

4/12/2026 at 11:14:12 PM

That's the problem. Every country has an alternative or ten, but what people actually need is one system that works across borders. That's the only way it reaches enough critical mass to be useful internationally beyond the EU, which nowadays is a requirement for it to be able to replace Visa/Mastercard in a decade or so.

by tgsovlerkhgsel

4/13/2026 at 2:39:19 AM

There's never been a system like that. Given this reality, it seems like a stretch to say that people need one.

by thaumasiotes

4/13/2026 at 6:54:09 AM

Visa/Mastercard is the system right now. European banks issue these US debit cards often as the primary card for an account.

by tgsovlerkhgsel

4/13/2026 at 1:44:52 AM

I misread blik as “bilk” which is… probably the last word you’d want associated with your credit card or payment processor in English.

by wincy

4/13/2026 at 2:54:10 AM

There used to be a beer designed to be mixed with milk called bilk. Last I heard, it was terrible. Maybe it's still around - I think it's Japanese, so it's unlikely I'd happen across it.

by kulahan

4/13/2026 at 12:04:58 AM

Yeah but approving every purchase from a merchant I trust, like Amazon, would be annoying. Gotta allow for one tap to purchase, like eg apple pay does

by iknowstuff

4/13/2026 at 3:18:22 AM

IIRC BLIK asks you if you want to skip the verification next time you buy from the same merchant.

by snicky

4/12/2026 at 10:57:33 PM

6 digits effectively the time salted … the other digits are your lat long lol.

by floam

4/12/2026 at 10:46:13 PM

Bitcoin exists. Completely permissionless, anyone on earth can use it. Easier to accept as a merchant than any third party integration. Doesn't require you to trust any government at all.

by anonym29

4/13/2026 at 3:26:58 AM

Cool, but unfortunately, it has the same same drawbacks as cash. If you get scammed, accidentally pay too much or lose your wallet you will never get it back. I sleep safer knowing that there is some protection in the banking system against losing money all of sudden.

by snicky

4/12/2026 at 10:52:33 PM

Unfortunately it's also pretty clunky for tax reasons in many places and inherently deflationary (and as such problematic from an economic point of view).

Sure, great if you don't trust your government or whoever issues your local currency, but if you can, there are better alternatives. Trust is an asset, not just a liability.

by lxgr

4/12/2026 at 11:01:24 PM

Well-placed trust is a small asset, but misplaced trust is a massive liability.

by anonym29

4/12/2026 at 11:09:09 PM

It might not always be warranted, but where it was, increased trust in society, institutions, and systems has been the enabler for economic growth and human development in the past centuries. Talk it down at your own (or more accurately, at all our) peril.

by lxgr

4/13/2026 at 12:47:37 AM

Economic growth and human development over the last several centuries has been the result of a complex web of interleaved prerequisites, that said, trust wasn't one them.

People trusted institutions for thousands of years prior to the scientific revolution. Europe had plenty of trust in religious institutions between the collapse of the Roman empire and the scientific revolution, and you know what it got them? Superstition, witch hunts, barbarism in the name of proselytizing, failed pandemic responses, and a near complete stall in technological and scientific breakthroughs for a millennium.

What the scientific revolution brought us was the decision to not trust, but to reason, to measure, to hypothesize, to verify. Facts matter. Humans are stupid and it is human nature to place trust exactly where trust is least warranted.

by anonym29

4/13/2026 at 2:04:12 AM

"Economic growth and human development over the last several centuries has been the result of"

Fossil fuels...most of the growth from 1800-1970 was due to fossil fuels. Not sure why this is such a mystery to so many. Makes sense when you think about it from a physics POV. You use energy to move things, to make things, to travel to buy things, etc. Heck, the middle class wasn't a concept until the industrial revolution which was caused by...say it with me...fossil fuels.

by hunterpayne

4/12/2026 at 11:24:44 PM

People are downvoting you, but I can literally pay for my meal using CashApp at a diner in the middle of nowhere using Bitcoin.

by ddtaylor

4/12/2026 at 9:38:58 PM

The EU 'seeks' to do a lot of things but is notoriously ineffective.

by 0x3f

4/12/2026 at 11:04:42 PM

The EU already managed to make card payments significantly cheaper and more secure within a few years than they'll probably ever be in the US (still no PINs and no 3DS, and interchange will probably never get regulated because everybody freelances as a severely underpaid lobbyist thanks to frequent flyer miles), to say nothing of regulating a free and instant bank payment scheme into existence while FedNow is still rolling out.

Say what you will about EU inefficiency and regulations, but in my view, at least their financial ones have been largely on point.

by lxgr

4/12/2026 at 9:56:49 PM

Wirecard was pretty good. Assuming you're Jan Marsalek.

by philipallstar

4/13/2026 at 12:58:47 AM

The walled garden approach stifles creativity and robs talented artists of the opportunity to express their work and get paid fairly.

Hope the EU or another progressive regulatory body allows users to fully control what they can/can't download and from where on to the phones they purcahsed.

by DiffTheEnder

4/13/2026 at 2:04:51 AM

Sellers across every marketplace have to rise up and demand interoperability and then these rent seeking marketplace will fade.

by theturtletalks

4/12/2026 at 9:28:52 PM

I wonder if this was coerced by Visa/MasterCard yet again, as they have done against many Japanese styled games in the past years. Despite some motions from the current administration, the payment processor monopoly seems keen on policing the public, which is one reason why crypto must still exist as a plan B payment method.

by Ferret7446

4/12/2026 at 11:12:26 PM

Monero, or honestly any cryptocurrency is a huge improvement on trad payment processors.

by Cider9986

4/12/2026 at 9:30:47 PM

Maybe regulators can be bothered this decade to do something about these corporations abusing their power over mobile app distribution and payment processing.

The EU's DMA has been a step in the right direction, even if it's yet been fairly toothless with Apple and Google flouting it.

by user34283

4/12/2026 at 11:03:05 PM

They could be bothered if they weren't indirectly (or directly, I imagine) on the dole.

by fuzzy_biscuit

4/12/2026 at 9:20:15 PM

Not Microsoft. "Sideloading" is not even a term in Windows culture the way it is with Apple and Google because it's not a second-class citizen.

by add-sub-mul-div

4/12/2026 at 10:34:48 PM

Old windows yeah. Now they also require code signing, etc.

by groundzeros2015

4/13/2026 at 2:39:49 AM

Not required

Source: I use Windows and Windows VMs sometimes and install whatever I want without hassle.

by Aurornis

4/13/2026 at 4:54:30 AM

On a regular consumer version of windows what happens when you open an unsigned exe?

by groundzeros2015

4/13/2026 at 8:38:50 AM

Assuming no false-positives from Windows Defender, you just click through a "scary" SmartScreen warning. Note that signing the exe isn't enough to remove the warnings, you then need to build up reputation for your cert by having enough users click through the warnings.

by debugnik

4/13/2026 at 7:35:08 AM

It asks "do you really want to run this?", you click yes, it runs and never asks again?

by Shish2k

4/13/2026 at 8:09:39 AM

I think a better question, rather than a point about unsigned exes, was: "on a regular consumer version of Windows, what happens if you run literally any program that was not downloaded from the Microsoft Store?". In which case the answer is "you cannot run it, there is a pop-up directing you to the Microsoft Store, and the only way to find out how to run it is it to google the information which will point you through several layers of system menus to disable nanny mode". This will happen to you for something as common and widespread as downloading Chrome or Firefox. Attempting to disable nanny mode will result in an ominous screen warning you about how bad the thing you're about to do is, and telling you that the action is irreversible.

Microsoft is not as bad as Google and Apple, yet, but they absolutely have the power to be as bad and are flirting with how to accomplish greater and greater control of their platform without triggering too much backlash.

by anonymous908213

4/12/2026 at 10:24:00 PM

> Not Microsoft

No Steam on Xbox Series X/S, last I heard.

> Apple

Steam still works on macOS, last I checked.

by musicale

4/13/2026 at 12:04:45 AM

macOS and Xbox are rounding errors compared to iOS and Windows.

by chocochunks

4/12/2026 at 9:25:04 PM

That’s not for lack of trying, though: remember Windows RT?

by girvo

4/12/2026 at 9:47:51 PM

MS has mostly abandoned that approach now. But during Windows 8 days? Yeah. There was a legitimate concern that MS will lock down Windows and try to funnel everything through Microsoft Store, establishing an Apple-style walled garden.

The concern was serious enough that Valve took a defensive posture and started investing into Linux support. Which, at first, largely failed - but eventually resulted in Steam Deck.

by ACCount37

4/12/2026 at 10:26:53 PM

For sure, and I'm glad they backed off from it. I'm also glad they did it because of how it pushed Valve into making Steam OS so good. But Microsoft really did want to go down the same path, and I do not trust them not to try it again.

by girvo

4/12/2026 at 9:58:19 PM

WinRT wasn’t locked down.

by wiseowise

4/12/2026 at 10:28:37 PM

The Surface RT that I tried absolutely was, and everything else I'm seeing to make sure I'm not misremembering shows that Windows RT was still locked down. So you should expand on what you mean.

Windows S Mode shows that Microsoft still thinks this is a good idea, too.

by girvo

4/13/2026 at 8:43:30 AM

You might be mixing up Windows RT and WinRT. The former was Windows 8 for ARM with the Store as the only software source; the latter was the new set of APIs.

by debugnik

4/12/2026 at 9:47:07 PM

Sad day for freedom of expression.

[Spoilers] For those who haven't played, DDLC has subject matter related to self-harm, mental health, suicide that sort of thing. It generally treats the subjects seriously. It has content warnings on it, so people know what they are getting into.

Its weird how we seem much more hung up on censoring video games we are than books or movies. There is way more disturbing books and movies out there. If this was a book i doubt anyone would care. There probably wouldn't even be content warnings on it.

On the other hand, maybe someone trying to ban you is how you know you have achieved the status of "great literature" like all the other banned books.

by bawolff

4/13/2026 at 3:15:55 AM

Binding of Isaac is a game that takes hundreds of hours to beat, and worked well on iPad. It cost $15. It was removed and so Edmund McMillen the creator resolved to never publish on Apple platforms again. Disappointing for me because his new game is Windows only, but I can’t blame him.

I could have sworn there was a discussion about this years ago but I went looking for it on HN and just found a comment I made years ago, funny how that shakes out.

by wincy

4/13/2026 at 6:18:25 AM

> Edmund McMillen the creator resolved to never publish on Apple platforms again

It was only temporarily banned. It's currently still on the App store since 2017.

by EagnaIonat

4/13/2026 at 6:30:54 AM

FWIW I witnessed a friend of mine playing Mewgenics via Proton on his Arch desktop. Seemed to work fine. So, only Windows-only to the usual degree, it doesn't seem to have any sort of problematic DRM or anti-cheat to worry about.

by opan

4/13/2026 at 8:02:17 AM

Binding of Isaac runs great via steam/Proton haven't even thought about if its native Linux or not.

by tapland

4/13/2026 at 5:31:59 AM

There is a windows emulator called gamehub which can run this game on Android. Android is still leas restrictive than ios

by catlikesshrimp

4/12/2026 at 8:23:41 PM

DDLC is a disturbing (good, but disturbing) game that opens as a bright cheerful one. So long as the description explained what the user is in for later on, I think Google shouldn't have done this. I haven't seen the Android version; I played it on PC, but as it is basically a "visual novel" I doubt there was very much difference between them.

by jhbadger

4/13/2026 at 12:33:13 AM

I downloaded the Android version yesterday to see what everyone is on about. It's absolutely stuffed with trigger warnings. I had to click through about 4 screens saying that yes, I'm definitely ok with seeing disturbing content, and there's even a setting that will warn you before each individual disturbing screen.

I played 30 minutes and realized my personal trigger is sickeningly "cute" anime girls, and there's no warnings for that. Maybe I'll keep going and try to treat it as an artistic experience but I'm definitely not enjoying it so far and I'm just in the introduction.

by esperent

4/13/2026 at 6:09:21 AM

I wouldn't recommend trying if you don't like it already. In order for the twist to have any impact the game needs to pretend to be something else and the developer have chosen it to be a visual novel with 0 substance. It would be cute anime girls yapping about nothing in the most non interesting way possible for a couple of hours before anything worth your attention happens. I'm somewhat of an anime slice of life trash enjoyer and even I couldn't force myself to watch a full let's play of this part (even with commentary adding something to latch to) and had to skip a half of it to get to the twist faster. Doesn't worth it.

by jllyhill

4/13/2026 at 12:48:44 AM

Oh dude, this game is going to rock your world. I'm like giddy for you experiencing this for the first time with no spoilers.

I was like "meh" too at first ("what are people TALKING about?") and, then, it just gets incredible.

by nickv

4/13/2026 at 3:35:30 AM

I played it years ago and sorry, it didn't rock my world even for 5 minutes. It's a very naive story with a jump-scare sort of ending that totally didn't work for me, because it was well expected. The story felt very underwhelming comparing to most books, movies or games even. IMHO a complete waste of time.

by snicky

4/13/2026 at 7:13:09 AM

That's an understandable point of view, but besides the easy to spot main plot twist, there are several minor issues woven into the story. The hints are sometimes quite subtle and spotting them early is not trivial, but is made possible through their well-made representation and consistency in the game. There is actually little fluff in a game that overtly shows almost purely random idle talk.

by mafuy

4/12/2026 at 8:35:19 PM

that's valuable info.

wikipedia actually makes the game sounds interesting unlike a typical dating sim.

WARNING possible spoilers, don't read if you plan to play, but just know it's not just a dating sim.

> while it appears to be a light-hearted dating simulator, it is a metafictional psychological horror game that extensively breaks the fourth wall.

> Reviewers pointed out that the game's horror was built on the destruction of a sense of control over what happens in the game and the feeling of helplessness that stems from the distortions in the game's world

by throwaway290

4/12/2026 at 8:53:03 PM

I played this game recently and you have to click through several screens telling you that it's disturbing to open and play it

by YawningAngel

4/12/2026 at 8:40:43 PM

It's worth the experience to play that game once.

And I guess it's not worth porting games for adults to walled gardens.

Note that i said games for adults, not adult content. If you're expecting porn, move along.

by nottorp

4/12/2026 at 8:38:29 PM

It's totally free, give it a try if you're interested! It's also been ported to a variety of platforms unofficially (Wii and 3DS ottomh)

by mghackerlady

4/13/2026 at 4:33:00 AM

My first reaction to this was that someone made a mistake somewhere. They saw the game title and the front page, assumed it was a porn game due to it's rating or whatever, or made some other assumption that doesn't hold up to even cursory research, which would confirm the game's had two releases, the former of which has 100k+ reviews on Steam, and the second of which was even physical on consoles.

But no. The post mentions it was pulled due to a TOS violation with regards to its depiction of 'sensitive themes'. That would seem to suggest the problem lies with the game depicting suicide or just its other depictions of mental health problems in general. It could still be a mistake, in that they researched it to the point that they figured out it was dealing with those themes, but not to the point of figuring out it's a successful darling of a game. This seems rather unlikely.

Either way, fact that it's even possible to pull from the store, several months after it was first published without issue, without at least having a chat with the publisher first, is worrying.

by Telaneo

4/13/2026 at 2:40:06 AM

Which fringe puritanical lobbbyist group is going to step up and take credit for this one

(reference https://www.engadget.com/gaming/steam-now-bans-games-that-vi...)

by ro_bit

4/12/2026 at 10:40:19 PM

It's a relatively old game, so I'll put up here a spoiler so to remove potential confusion:

DDLC is a __horror__ game that contains some gore, death, and self harm content, as well as small fourth wall breaking, disguised as a Japanese Visual Novel style soft/hard porn game. The entire game is a figurative jumpscare. Which makes it technically true to call it a "disturbing and shocking" game, but not as in """disturbing and shocking""" as in the euphemism for pornographic. It is technically correctly rated and marked as such. It just doesn't say viewer discretion of what kind is recommended.

And also: a lot of these Japanese pastel colored things, Visual Novel games included, are in fact not intended for kids, especially under 15. It's not like picture books for 6-12 year olds. Audience gender distribution is often closer to 50:50 than what many assumes.

by numpad0

4/12/2026 at 10:56:22 PM

I'm intentionally not reading your post, but the "it's old so I can spoil it" is never an acceptable stance in a world where they keep making more people. The world doesn't begin and end with your experience.

by phendrenad2

4/13/2026 at 4:17:30 AM

Have you seen Passion of the Christ yet? Jesus dies.

https://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2005/12/05/as-regards-spo...

by acheron

4/13/2026 at 12:05:24 AM

People are allowed to discuss things they have experienced. If those people make a special allowance for others to catch up and experience something recently released, all the better.

by protocolture

4/13/2026 at 3:18:48 AM

How can people ever discuss something in public fora if spoilers have to be eternally avoided? Keep in mind, people often disagree on what even crosses the line into being a spoiler.

by ziml77

4/13/2026 at 12:48:55 AM

Not spoiling something to others is a courtesy, not an obligation. People live by their own rules.

by catcowcostume

4/13/2026 at 2:57:13 AM

snape kills dumbledore

by __s

4/13/2026 at 5:34:17 AM

sigh. this exact type of post spoiled this plot development for my kid when they were getting into reading and were only a few books in. not everyone has been around as long as you and I.

by mrexroad

4/12/2026 at 11:35:38 PM

Doki Doki Literature Club is a game that I played, and then replayed, purely on the basis of recommendations by trusted reviewers. The genre (visual novel) and theme (anime pin-up schoolgirl) are ones that I have no interest in. I was extremely glad that I did play it, though; it was a profoundly thought-provoking experience. It was extremely disturbing in the best possible way.

Definitely not for kids, though, and it's worth taking the content/trigger warnings seriously.

by ropable

4/13/2026 at 6:40:01 AM

DDLC is not a niche game, nor is it a new game. It should have been released 9 years ago, right? This alone proves that the so-called policy violation is just a pretext.

by linzhangrun

4/12/2026 at 10:14:59 PM

It's available on Itch: https://teamsalvato.itch.io/ddlc

(I've never played it.)

by farfatched

4/13/2026 at 3:03:46 AM

GOG as well. https://www.gog.com/dreamlist/game/doki-doki-literature-club...

(I have played it, and I enjoyed it somewhat)

by kulahan

4/13/2026 at 7:13:31 AM

That page shows it's not on GOG, but someone has added it to the dreamlist.

by farfatched

4/13/2026 at 9:37:41 AM

The Android version doesn't seem to be.

by zurn

4/12/2026 at 8:27:36 PM

Walled gardens are antithetical to personal computing. Google is killing ChromeOS in favor of Android.

by throwaway85825

4/13/2026 at 12:06:32 AM

DDLC is one of those once in a lifetime gaming experiences. Like most people commenting - I had no interest in the style or genre, but I am immensely glad I played it!

I distinctly remember sitting there in silence with my mouth open at a number of points during the game.

I went down the ~~MONIKA~_ route, though I was intrigued by %]~JUST_MONIKA%]€_ - She seemed like an interesting character.

by redrix

4/13/2026 at 9:37:01 AM

weird situation regardless. this came out like a decade ago, and while there is a serious undertone, this has been widely discussed during the original virality period.

funnily enough one of the largest Youtubers made a gameplay video of the desktop game [1]. don't believe anything was modified when the port was made. hope this gets resolved just like the recent wireshark fiasco.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLYH8WvNV1YEnYtfmH-sGR...

by rldjbpin

4/12/2026 at 9:09:54 PM

I guess they don't like Monika.

by j-bos

4/13/2026 at 3:04:06 AM

Just Monika?

by kulahan

4/12/2026 at 8:23:33 PM

Well, at least we can "sideload" this easily with minimum attrition, right?

by oceansky

4/12/2026 at 9:45:04 PM

In a few months Google will automatically deploy new software on our devices. This will be for our benefit and to help protect us.

If you still want to sideload dangerous unnaproved applications, first just ask Google for permission and then a day later they'll let you sideload applications to your device. I'm so grateful that they are allowing us to do this and protecting us.

by kcb

4/12/2026 at 11:35:45 PM

[dead]

by gumby271

4/12/2026 at 8:46:32 PM

If you wait 18 years before being able to install apps outside Google Play you get a nice bonus of automatically becoming age verified in a private manner. So don't complain, it's for your own good.

by zb3

4/13/2026 at 8:23:21 AM

Good thing casino apps remain up — otherwise the teenager in me would become bored with such a smartphone.

by animuchan

4/13/2026 at 9:39:29 AM

Don't forget the nearly naked Kardashian skins in Fortnite. Gotta allow those so Timmy Tencent can get his cut off preying on 13 year old boys.

by kotaKat

4/12/2026 at 9:12:10 PM

Surprising, even by Google's standards. DDLC is a violent game but not much more. What app store rule exactly is it breaking?

by wavemode

4/12/2026 at 10:06:44 PM

Self-harm (especially when depicting minors) has special standards. The recent court losses on child safety for Meta and YouTube probably led to this.

by j2kun

4/13/2026 at 12:53:19 AM

Completely absurd. If it's not safe for children just slap an age rating on it.

I don't like this trend of every technology assuming I'm a child that needs to be protected from the world while simultaneously assuming I'm an adult with infinite disposable income that must be shown ads to all the time. This is insincere. Children need to be "protected" only when it's convenient and allows the platform to exercise unchecked control. Nobody is protecting children from ads because that would be inconvenient.

by AlienRobot

4/12/2026 at 9:34:26 PM

"Violent"? Do you consider news reporting to be violent too? This isn't remotely in the league of all the shooter games you can find on the store.

by the_pwner224

4/12/2026 at 10:45:27 PM

When journalism shows death or gore, they do often call it violent imagery. So... yes? Violent imagery is imagery of violence. The news report is not itself violence, but it contains violence.

by xboxnolifes

4/12/2026 at 10:31:19 PM

Gore in shooters is culturally treated as much less "violent" than e.g. graphic scenes of suicide. You could make an argument that it shouldn't be, but it is.

by stratos123

4/12/2026 at 11:37:34 PM

Most shooters are an abstraction, i.e. you're not really shooting anyone.

You are, but you're not.

Most of them are in the same league of violence that an aggressive debate would be in.

by hackable_sand

4/13/2026 at 6:44:42 AM

Which is really sad. Video games with dehumanized violence: a-ok. Video games that show you the actual consequences of violence, well that is a bridge too far.

Perhaps soiety would be better if it was reversed.

by bawolff

4/12/2026 at 9:43:54 PM

There are countless games on the store that let you kill endless hordes of humans in detail...

by kcb

4/12/2026 at 11:33:02 PM

This game was released via a physical release on the Nintendo Switch.

It's very clearly intended for teens+.

by knaik94

4/13/2026 at 6:15:03 AM

The switch release is rated PEGI 18, ESRB M 17+

by hmry

4/12/2026 at 11:39:16 PM

The game is free and should run on any potato PC or even Mac (w/ Rosetta on Apple Silicon).

Google can suck on a lemon.

by throwatdem12311

4/13/2026 at 12:51:12 AM

This is a great game especially on PC. I don't know if the hidden files are available on mobile, but it was a great dive into hiding data in plain sight, with the game files, from decoding binary hidden in images, to spectrograph QR codes hidden in audio. Friend recommended the game to me and I'll never forgive them, only Monika.

by Adachi91

4/13/2026 at 6:37:07 AM

vivid/stasis (gratis VN/rhythm game on Steam) has some cool ARG stuff like this as well. I'd highly recommend it.

by opan

4/13/2026 at 6:49:22 AM

I've never played this, but this move has made me curious. Is there a way I can still play this on Android? An apk or fdroid or a mobile web version?

by ohlookcake

4/12/2026 at 10:12:43 PM

As someone pointed out why do we even bother with age ratings if we’re just going to ban games entirely for having wrongthink?

by DoneWithAllThat

4/12/2026 at 10:33:23 PM

Because there are always moral panics, always some "thing" that's corrupting the youth, be it television, rock-and-roll, D&D, video games or now social media, and people keep thinking giving in to the moralists will protect the children.

But the moralists are never satisfied, and their war on free expression, art and culture never ends.

by krapp

4/12/2026 at 10:36:59 PM

You’ve got the 80s and 90s covered. But you’re missing the more recent post-2016 moral panics, like being able to listen to an episode of Alex jones, which spurred the current issue in tech especially YouTube.

by groundzeros2015

4/12/2026 at 10:08:14 PM

Aside from the comments on the rest of this thread, I’ll point out this unique point:

If this game’s content is objectionable, where was Google 5 months ago when it was released? Are they admitting that they don’t review apps that are submitted? Do their reviewers have zero familiarity with major multi-platform game releases?

How are they justifying the availability of the Grand Theft Auto or Resident Evil series on the Android platform if this game can’t be published?

Hopefully this turns out to be some kind of error or misunderstanding that gets corrected.

by dangus

4/13/2026 at 12:50:04 AM

It's obvious that the game was yanked as a reaction to the current moral panic regarding technology and mental health in minors, not for the violence or gore.

This is just how moral panics are. We can say we just wanted social media to be 16+, but after the lawsuits roll in, no one is going to take a nuanced stance. Steam and EGS didn't stand up for Horses either, even after those devs changed the objectionable content, because earlier headlines made the work toxic in the current world.

by cyberrock

4/12/2026 at 10:46:44 PM

I suspect someone got upset after indulging in the game mistaking it to be a rare undeleted porn gem remaining on major platforms. There was a(likely co-incidentally) weird, sternly worded warning letter issued by Jordanian government specifically about this game few weeks back. My reading of that event is that likelihood of wrong people falling into the trap the wrong way is not zero.

by numpad0

4/12/2026 at 11:24:02 PM

Why doesn't DDLC release a webapp bypassing app stores?

by lobito25

4/13/2026 at 2:18:12 AM

Play the game to completion and you’ll understand why that’s not ideal. It is doable but I recommend the PC experience first.

by jquery

4/13/2026 at 7:12:40 AM

Never heard of this game so had to look it up. Well, that was quite. rabbit hole!

by nickdothutton

4/12/2026 at 10:57:59 PM

Let's not mince words. Whoever made this call is a lily-livered, paternalistic chickenshit startled by their own shadow. A nasty case of moral cowardice, coupled to poor judgement, to no-one's benefit.

by inopinatus

4/12/2026 at 11:08:14 PM

(spoiler) The conspiracy seeking part of my brain is fascinated by the fact a company whose decisions are increasingly ai made or moderated doesn't want people to play a game that requires deleting a psychotic stalker off your hard drive...

by eucyclos

4/13/2026 at 3:55:43 AM

I'm so tired of the paternalism from Google and Apple. And of course we have little choice, since we've surrendered to monopolists and walled gardens.

It's disgusting, really, that most of the world is totally fine with this. Most people probably don't even realize how bad this is.

by kelnos

4/12/2026 at 10:27:29 PM

Seems Google needs Mastercard/Visa treatment.

Provide the content, content provider

by PunchyHamster

4/13/2026 at 1:11:33 AM

Seems like we should not be centralizing control like this.

Take control of your computing, user.

by MarsIronPI

4/12/2026 at 10:05:13 PM

This is why a monopoly is bad. Google can dictate who has access or retains access.

by shevy-java

4/12/2026 at 10:37:00 PM

Google can dictate who has or retains access to their market, but that doesn't make them a monopoly, since other markets exist. This game is still available on Steam and probably elsewhere.

by krapp

4/12/2026 at 11:26:32 PM

For android?

by J-Kuhn

4/13/2026 at 9:48:49 AM

I don't know. Is it illegal or impossible to install android software any other way? If so, then the problem seems to be android and not Google.

And besides, other platforms exist, so it still isn't a monopoly. You don't have to play it on your phone.

by krapp

4/12/2026 at 10:07:33 PM

Self-harm (especially when depicting minors) has special standards. The recent court ruling on child safety against Meta probably led directly to this decision.

by j2kun

4/13/2026 at 12:34:13 AM

I don't think it particularly does in other media. Plenty of books have that as a theme. On netflix, 13 reasons why was one of their big hits.

by bawolff

4/12/2026 at 8:44:48 PM

Google and Apple know better than you what you want to play and what you want to do on your phone. Visa and Mastercard know better than you what you want to buy. Don't disagree with them, because they're only doing this for your own good.

by zb3

4/12/2026 at 10:53:58 PM

I think the issue is that Google deliberately decided to market its closed down app store as a necessity to regulators, in order to 'keep users safe'.

Which invites censorship from morality police types.

by torginus

4/12/2026 at 11:20:06 PM

For those of us who didn't know the game but want to try it due to the Streisand effect, is there an official APK download? Since it's free on Steam, I thought the official website might list an APK, but I haven't found anything other than the Play link.

by stavros

4/12/2026 at 11:41:19 PM

Why not just play it from Steam? System requirements list both Windows and MacOS and the requirment as are puny it should run on any potato.

by throwatdem12311

4/12/2026 at 11:42:14 PM

My phone is more convenient than my PC for games.

by stavros

4/12/2026 at 11:46:26 PM

It only takes a few hours to get through the whole thing and I don’t want to spoil anything but playing on a PC was pretty vital to the experience for me. I don’t know how they’d recreate it on a mobile device.

Now that I’m mentioning it I might just play the iPhone version to see…

by throwatdem12311

4/13/2026 at 12:10:00 AM

Hm, I see. I believe you, it's just that when I'm at the PC I always have something better to do, so I might have to choose between playing it on a phone or not at all.

Was it, like, impossible to recreate the experience, or just more inconvenient for me? Did it need some special keyboard controls or similar?

by stavros

4/13/2026 at 12:20:07 AM

IIRC, not controls but the second act onward features "4th wall" breaks and glitches.

by jldugger

4/13/2026 at 12:25:19 AM

Ahh ok, thanks, I'll try on the computer. It doesn't seem like a very long game anyway.

by stavros

4/12/2026 at 10:34:59 PM

Soviet Union collapsed, bit its cause lives on, now unexpectedly in the West.

by cynicalsecurity

4/12/2026 at 9:50:02 PM

fun game, I don’t want to spoil it but it’s got some elements that you will def appreciate more as a software dev once you get that far in

by luxuryballs

4/12/2026 at 11:38:50 PM

If you want to play bishoujoge, just play the PC version so you don't have to deal with things being censored. The Play Store and App Store do not allow R18 images so the games have to be censored.

by charcircuit

4/13/2026 at 6:48:31 AM

To be clear, the most sexual thing that happens in this game is that two characters almost kiss, but are interupted by a third character before it happens. The romance in this game is about as explicit as a disney movie.

The controversy is entirely because it deals with themes of mental health and suicide.

by bawolff

4/13/2026 at 12:16:59 AM

> If you want to play bishoujoge

This is almost certainly not banned for pornographic reasons.

by jldugger

4/13/2026 at 2:28:35 AM

Wouldn’t be the first time people assumed it was porn just from the cover. Chaos;Head/Noah was mistakenly banned from Steam for this reason until there was an outcry.

by jquery

4/13/2026 at 12:19:39 AM

It's just one more reason to avoid the platform in favor of PC or a cloud PC to avoid the censorship of game consoles and phone platforms.

by charcircuit

4/13/2026 at 1:55:39 AM

I really despise these christo fascist led tech companies that think they can dictate what we are able to see/play, etc.

Meanwhile the people that lead them go to certain islands.

by dev1ycan

4/13/2026 at 4:28:25 AM

[flagged]

by trendbuilder

4/12/2026 at 8:42:01 PM

This is why we need developer verification - so Google can protect us from threats like this /s

by CivBase

4/13/2026 at 1:52:49 AM

[flagged]

by fnord77

4/13/2026 at 2:23:36 AM

I’m glad I had to scroll down this far to find such a breathtakingly ignorant take. DDLC has zero fan service. It’s a story that happens to deal with subjects often encountered by adolescents.

There’s no good reason for this except general Western bias against Japanese moe

by jquery