Steam Spy is a resource for judging how well games on Valve’s digital distribution platform are doing, but lately more and more developers have been asking for their data to be removed.
Everything in our list of best PC games probably sold really well.
While not under any obligations to do so, Steam Spy’s owner,Sergey Galyonkin, honoured these requests. He’s since had a change of heart and the data has all gone back up.
So, why did developers want this data removed? Because of how Steam Spy collects the data, it shows the number of owners a game has, rather than purchases. Obviously these two figures vary, thanks to giveaways, review codes, promotions and the like.
Paradox recently asked for their data to be removed from Steam Spy, and there’s a bunch more information on the whole thing at that link there. Techland asked for the same, and that seems to have been the catalyst for the change.
The decision to overturn the removals was announced on Twitter today, where Galyonkin explained that he’s trying to build a useful tool for developers.
So, let's see what happens if I restore all the removed games at Steam Spy.
— Steam Spy (@Steam_Spy) 25 August 2016