Valve rolled out 18+ age verification for Australian Steam users yesterday, which was inevitable: both PlayStation and Xbox have already done so and it is, after all, illegal not to, with fines up to AU$50 million at stake. But unlike PlayStation and Xbox, which offer a small handful of ways to verify one's adulthood, Valve has only one: you must own a credit card.
And no, your debit card won't work, or at least, mine doesn't. You'll need an actual credit card: a card that uses money you don't have, versus a card that uses money you do. It makes a bit of sense, because Australians need to be 18 to qualify for a credit card, whereas teenagers can own a debit card.
But there are other complications: You may be an adult and not qualify for a credit card because you don't earn enough money. You may not meet a particular bank's credit assessment criteria, as per CommBank. You may have a poor credit history. Or, you may simply not want to have a credit card because the prospect of spending money not in your possession is odd to you. If you fall under any of these categories—and I do the latter—then sorry: Valve won't sell you R18+ videogames.
It's not even possible to view the store page for an R18+ game. When I click on Doom 2016, I receive this message:
"Valve is required by the Age-Restricted Material App Distribution Services Code to verify that you are 18 or older before accessing mature content. If you wish to do so, please add a valid Australian credit card to your account and afterwards update the Mature Content Preferences."
As people online have pointed out, it's still possible to buy Steam keys for R18+ games from third-party sellers like Fanatical and Green Man Gaming, and then redeem them on Steam. So it's not a bullet proof answer, but then, few age verification methods are completely desirable. Third-party verification providers like Persona, for example, have raised serious privacy and information security concerns.
I've reached out to Valve to ask whether it intends to implement other age verification methods for Australian users and if so, when.
