It looks like Valve has finally woken up to Domina developer Nic Gorissen's bizarre rants on Steam. The game has been removed from Valve's platform after Gorissen posted yet another transphobic screed in the notes of a recent patch.
Why has Domina been removed from Steam?
Domina developer Nic Gorissen has arguably been skating on thin ice when it comes to Steam for a while now. Things first started getting weird around May 2021, when Gorissen included a rather odd rant about "weak men" in his game's patch notes. More of his political opinions were inserted into following patch notes, but things began to ramp up in March this year, when he posted an extensive anti-mask rant alongside a Domina update.
Gorissen then continued to express his politics through further transphobic and conspiratorial messages slipped into Steam patch notes. Last month, Gorissen's meltdown continued as he threatened to stop updating Domina on Steam; it was being review bombed, both due to the dev's political opinions and due to a dispute over whether or not game features were being gutted to sell as paid DLC. Users left negative reviews for Domina, and Gorissen attempted to remove them for "fraud", only for Valve to reinstate the reviews. It's likely this was the beginning of the end for Domina on Steam.
Following this, Gorissen was subsequently banned from his own game's Steam forums by Valve's moderators. He responded to this decision by calling Valve "cowards" and "clowns", suggesting it was a "stupid company to work at" and leveling other, less mild barbs at them as well. This may well have been another contributing factor to the removal of the game from Steam, akin to (but not identical to) Paranautical Activity being removed over a death threat sent to Gabe Newell by the developer.
Earlier this week, Gorissen posted yet another transphobic rant disguised as a Domina update. In the patch notes, he once again rails against trans folk, suggesting that educating people about trans identity is "lying to [children] about basic biology" and "destroying [their] innocence". He ends the update by suggesting people "ask God for courage" and linking to an external video supposedly supporting his point.
Business as usual, right? Apparently not this time. Valve subsequently removed the game from sale on Steam; the message on the game's Steam page reads that "the publisher" requested it be removed, but Gorissen confirmed (via homophobia-filled Gab status) that he wasn't the one who had taken his game down. Gorissen says Valve's Gabe Newell "doesn't seem to care that I brought millions of revenue to the table" and that "God fights and wins every battle".
Will Domina be back on Steam anytime soon?
When Gorissen threatened to stop updating Domina on Steam, he mused that he might decide to publish the game directly. It now looks as though that's probably the only way you'll be able to play Domina in future, as Valve is unlikely to reinstate the game given Gorissen's insistence on clinging to his views (and, more to the point, expressing those views via Steam patch notes). Valve hasn't given an official reason as to why Domina was removed from the platform, but it's not hard to see why given the game's patch notes in the last year or two.
Right now, there isn't really a way to play Domina, as the link to the game on Gorissen's website simply leads straight to the Steam page, which, as we've established, doesn't work right now. As such, your only hope if you really want to buy this game (and thereby support Gorissen and his viewpoints) is to wait until he announces some kind of solution.
