Update: Valve returns Hatred to Greenlight after removal

Update: Hatred has been restored to Steam Greenlight. Developer Destructive Creations has posted a message to its Facebook page which claims to be an email from Gabe Newell.

"Yesterday I heard that we were taking Hatred down from Greenlight," the statement reads. "Since I wasn't up to speed, I asked around internally to find out why we had done that. lt turns out that it wasn't a good decision, and we'll be putting Hatred back up. My apologies to you and your team. Steam is about creating tools for content creators and customers.

"Good luck with your game, Gabe."

Original Story: Valve has made the decision to remove Hatred from Steam on the same day that its developers began a Greenlight campaign, indicating that it found the content so distasteful that it wouldn't want to distribute it.

Hatred is being developed by Polish studio Destructive Creations, which describes the game as possessing a "disturbing atmosphere of mass killing, where player takes the role of a cold blood antagonist, who is full of hatred for humanity." On initial release, the game's trailer attracted both attention and criticism for its graphic portrayal of the murder and execution of civilians as the player character engages in a shooting spree.

In its short time on the Greenlight system, Hatred garnered a great deal of support, receiving 13,148 up votes and ending up at number 7 in the Greenlight charts before being pulled. Destructive Creations took the step of publishing the statement received by Valve by way of an explanation to its supporters.

"Dear Hatred Fans, as you know today we've launched our Steam Greenlight campaign for Hatred. Unfortunately after couple of hours Steam shut it down giving the below as reasons behind their decision:

"We wanted you guys to know that based on what we see on Greenlight we would not publish Hatred on Steam. As such we'll be taking it down."

"Even though games like Manhunt or Postal are still available on Steam we of course fully respect Valve's decision, as they have the right to do so. In the same time we want to assure you that this won't in any way impact the game's development, game's vision or gameplay features we're aiming for. The game is still to be released in Q2 2015 as planned.

"Moreover we don't treat this as a failure because yet again this showed us a huge community support we're totally overwhelmed with. After only a couple of hours Greenlight campaign being live, Hatred gathered 13,148 up votes and ended up on a #7 on Top 100 list.

"This is the best proof for us that there are diehard Hatred fans out there, waiting for this game to be released. And that we need to keep going to deliver them a game that offers exciting and challenging gameplay.

"The whole situation only pushes us forward to go against any adversity and not to give up. It also makes us want to provide our fans Hatred pre-orders sooner, as many of you have asked for them.

"At the end of the day you, gamers will judge if we were able to do a game that's simply fun to play."