Valve says it knows low-effort and AI-made games are crowding Steam Next Fest, and that “a significant number of people are thinking about how to solve this problem.” It also says it won’t fix that by choosing which tools developers can use or by limiting who can publish. Marc Wilkinson and Tom Giardino of the Steam Business Team said this at Steam Indie Connect, a developer event in South Korea, on October 27, 2026.
Korean outlet Inven reported the Q&A, and its English edition, Inven Global, published the translated quotes used below. VGC, IGN and GameSpot followed on October 28.
- Who: Marc Wilkinson and Tom Giardino, Steam Business Team, Valve
- Where: Steam Indie Connect, co-hosted by Valve, the Busan Indie Connect Festival organizing committee and the Korea Creative Content Agency
Steam's front-page charts. Wilkinson said visibility is driven by how many people buy and play a game. Image: Valve
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What Valve said about AI slop in Steam Next Fest
A developer from the latest Next Fest reported poor engagement and player complaints about low-quality games, and asked if Valve had a fix planned. Wilkinson said games are shown almost at random for the first two days, and personalized recommendations take over after that. In his view, many articles about a flood of low-quality games were based only on those first two days.
The random start gives every game a fair share of exposure, he said, and stops developers from abusing the system by getting in early to grab visibility. “We recognize that the trade-off is some low-quality games get exposed,” he said. “We are fully aware of the situation, and a significant number of people are thinking about how to solve this problem.”
Giardino said the scale has changed fast. Three years ago he was persuading developers to join because there were “only 50 or 100 games”. Now thousands take part, which he called “the pendulum swinging to the opposite side.” The October edition, which ran from October 19 to 26, opened with what Valve called “thousands of FREE demos”.
Why Valve won’t gatekeep AI games
AI also came up through clones. A developer said indie studios are getting extortion emails that threaten to clone their game with AI and release it first unless they pay. Giardino replied: “We don’t want to be gatekeepers telling developers which tools they should or shouldn’t use,” adding that using AI is each developer’s decision.
He called extortion more a matter for law enforcement than for a store, but said: “If you report such cases to us, we want to look into them further and help in whatever way we can.” Clones existed long before AI, he noted, and his advice was to build a community and keep updating: “Rather than relying on a single mechanic that someone can easily copy, you need to keep growing your game by adding features, personality, and creativity that stem from your own perspective.” The fear is real: the Moonlighter team delayed its ReVamp playtest over AI clones on October 19.
Developers also asked to filter out Greenlight games about 14 years ago, and Steam Direct games later, Giardino said; each time Valve improved the store instead of turning developers away. “We don’t think we’re perfect and there’s plenty of room for improvement,” he said. “Rather than limiting developer access, making Steam a smarter and more dynamic platform is the starting point of our philosophy.”
What Steam’s own rules already say
The Next Fest documentation says the first few days are “completely randomized in all locations” apart from named lists and personalized sections. After that, logged-in users see recommendations based on what they did during the fest.
On AI, Valve’s rule is disclosure, not a ban on the tools. The Steamworks Content Survey asks developers to list “Pre-Generated” AI content that ships with the game and “Live-Generated” content created while it runs. Live-Generated content also needs guardrails against illegal output. Valve says it evaluates AI output “the same way we evaluate all non-AI content,” and that AI tools used for efficiency gains are “not the focus”. This is the disclosure Epic’s Tim Sweeney called “a political act” in posts between October 23 and 26.
The Personal Calendar recommends new and upcoming releases and left Steam Labs on October 23. Image: Valve
Wilkinson added that wishlists don’t affect visibility: “What drives visibility is the number of people buying and playing the game.” Steam’s Personal Calendar, which recommends new and upcoming games, left Steam Labs on October 23.
What’s next
Valve announced no store change and gave no timeline or details for a fix. For now, the AI disclosure on each store page remains the way to check how a game was made. The next Next Fest runs from February 22 to March 1, 2027, according to Steamworks.
Sources: Inven, Inven Global, Steamworks, VGC, IGN.
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Featured image: Valve
