Trouble in paradise? Maybe. Trouble in Doll Town? Definitely – it's now 24 hours before the viral horror game Welcome to Doll Town is meant to launch on February 13, and its developer still doesn't know if Valve will let it.
Recently, it feels like solo developer Bad Wish Games has been crowned king of my Instagram feed with clips of Doll Town, a cursed adventure game where the little girl Yumi must explore an abandoned town that used to manufacture lifelike dollies. "Doll Town now rots in silence and shadows," says the game's Steam description – but it's too much silence and too many shadows for Valve and other digital storefront owners, apparently.
Bad Wish writes in a February 11 post on Twitter, "I may have bad news. @Steam is currently completely avoiding me for days now and at almost 24h from releasing Welcome to Doll Town, they have still refused to validate the submission for public release."
The developer continues, "There is nothing I can do at that point. The game is fully ready, fully translated, fully playable. They do not answer my support tickets, they do not review my build… I'm stuck."
"Be prepared for the game to be delayed until further notice," they conclude. "My dearest apologies in advance."
The dev claims that Doll Town was also "refused" by itch for being over its storage limit, and by distributor GOG.
"Jesus dude is there a fucking nuke in your game," wonders one fan.
