The upcoming FMV game, Dating a Ghost (鬼才和你谈恋爱！) has been removed from Steam this morning. The light-horror FMV featured several veterans of the genre but is now no longer on the store front. No information about why it was removed has been provided. A demo was planned to be released before Steam’s Next Fest.
It seems likely that a demo was submitted to Steam review, which typically takes about a week to approve. And that review failed, for some reason, resulting in the swift and immediate removal. This is the highest profile FMV to be removed from Steam so far. There is a small chance that this removal was an error, like when Enjoy Amoy & Sisters was tagged as Adult Only.
The director previously worked on Knowledge or Know Lady and Beauties for Help on the Island, so it would be fair to say his team are familiar with the platform. As for why the game wasn’t simply tagged as Mature Content, instead of being removed, is unknown. It could be related to the fact that the country of origin, China, does not allow mature content and so the developers wouldn’t be able to access their own game.
The next course of action for the developers would be to resubmit the game to Steam, pay the small fee, and address any of the content that breached the guidelines. This process could take weeks or months, so it is unlikely that there will be a demo for Steam’s Next Fest.
They could also try to release in on Epic Game Store, but it will likely not sell as well just on that platform and require extra steps to integrate with the platform.
The game was first listed on Steam almost six weeks ago with a rapid turnaround from filming to release. They recently released a trailer and a few screenshots. We will watch this with great interest and update this news post if any of the developers comment on the situation.
Edit 2026-05-31: Nothing official has been announced yet but it seems as though Chinese regulations prohibit the depiction of ghosts in modern-day settings when it is seen to promote superstition and/or cults. Ghosts in a fantasy setting, like fox spirits in God bless or Goddess are not usually a problem as it is far removed from the current society. However, there is also some inconsistency with the censorship.
Since Ghost Camp had a similar theme, this reason might be valid. And if this was the reason it was taken down, then it faces an uphill battle to be released in China without extreme modification. it could potentially still release outside of China, like Cellveillance, but sales would be a mere fraction of what they could be. It also may be possible for an team outside China to put it on the platform, circumventing this censorship.
Really bummed about this. I was looking forward to it.