Shovelware, bland titles, and AI spam games are the bane of every gamer's existence, and after Sony decided to rip off titles from one of the biggest distributors of such nonsense, the developer has no plans to stop its releases from infiltrating the Xbox and Nintendo stores.
As first spotted by Push Square, Nostra Games, the Cypriot studio responsible for nearly 700 titles, mostly sim-style games, recently had its titles removed from the digital store outright. However, just because they're no longer on PlayStation doesn't mean these titles won't exist elsewhere.
In a statement shared on Discord, a spokesperson for the studio shared details on how it plans to proceed.
“Unfortunately, the PS Store removed our games and we are unable to provide an exact reason as it was not shared with us either,” reads part of the statement. “For now, we plan to continue releasing on Nintendo Switch, Xbox and Steam. This was as unexpected for us as it was for you, as we planned to continue releasing games for the next few years and you've already seen some of them, but unfortunately it turned out this way. Thanks for your questions, but unfortunately we're also in the dark.”
Although Nostra Games called it “unexpected,” as noted by Push Square, the studio has come under fire for its Ghostly Whiskers title, which has been accused of being a ripoff of another AI-generated game, Haunted Paws.
That, plus several other sensational titles seemingly designed to take advantage of unsuspecting players, as well as the easy Platinum Trophy unlocks, probably made it an easy target to crack down on. It's also not like Sony hasn't taken action against such titles in the past.
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It's unfortunate that Nintendo and Xbox gamers won't be spared a glut of low-end titles.
Shovelware was the bane of gamers
The decision to pull games by Nostra and other similar studios follows increased activity by companies such as Sony, Nintendo and Xbox in determining what should and should not grace their digital storefronts.
This battle has also spread to the popular PlayStation trophy collecting community, as the largest forum dedicated to trophy collecting recently announced its intention to stop counting shovelware and other similar titles in user rankings.
“Shovelware will go into the background, won't count towards the leaderboard, you won't see it (except on the game list page if filtered IN),” the site owner wrote. “Profiles will still show every game someone has played unless they hide it on PSN. Shovelware will also have limited features, no leaderboards/clubs/forums, it's a waste of resources.”
“Shovelware is the plague. Leaderboards will make sense.”
However, as most gamers realize at this point, it's a big game, and even if those studios won't have games on the PlayStation Store or elsewhere, there are several others ready to take their place.
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