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Sega's lawyers tried to have Yakuza: Like a Dragon removed from SteamDB

Apparently, Sega's lawyers may have been convinced SteamDB was an illegitimate distribution service for the game.

TJ Denzer

March 30, 2021 7:25 AM

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SteamDB is an interesting and rather useful tool for a lot of games. It lists, tracks, and analyzes most of the products that show up on the Steam store with pretty pinpoint accuracy. It’s often the source of a lot of rumors and stories as we see signs of new and unannounced games or DLC make appearances. However, it also gets its share of trouble. Such is the case with Sega, whose lawyers recently tried to have Yakuza: Like a Dragon removed from listing on SteamDB.

The legal activity against SteamDB regarding Yakuza: Like a Dragon was recently revealed by SteamDB creator Pavel Djundik via his personal Twitter. According to Djundik, Sega’s lawyers reached out with a DMCA to have Yakuza: Like a Dragon outright removed from listing on the SteamDB service. Allegedly, their reasoning was that it was a service that distributed the game. SteamDB does not sell really sell games as much as reveal details about them in regards to the Steam service, but Djundik complied and temporarily (hopefully) removed Yakuza: Like a Dragon from SteamDB anyways for the time being as he seeks to resolve the matter.

SteamDB does not support piracy, it does not provide downloads, it does not sell keys, it does not link to any websites that do any of these activities. https://t.co/Cv33ml7Anm

— Pavel Djundik (@thexpaw) March 29, 2021

According to Djundik, SteamDB gets about one DMCA take down notice a year or so demanding that games are removed from listing on the service, but generally it is resolved without incident. What makes this case special, he claims, is that Sega did not immediately respond to replies on the matter. Djundik has apparently gotten ahold of Sega of America at this point to discuss the issue, but as of the time of this writing, the game remains pulled from SteamDB.

There are plenty of reasons we can imagine a publisher might want something removed from SteamDB. As aforementioned, listings on the service are almost always a source of leaks and rumors. Very recently, it was through SteamDB that we learned the alleged name of DLC that may be coming to Streets of Rage 4. It’s possible there’s something going on with Yakuza: Like a Dragon in regards to Steam that Sega doesn’t want to going around as public knowledge.

Nonetheless, SteamDB doesn’t sell games. The request for Yakuza: Like a Dragon’s delisting seems like a matter of a legal team flexing unnecessary pressure. It would be surprising to see if the game remained delisted for long. Even so, we will follow this story for further news and updates.

TJ Denzer

Senior News Editor

TJ Denzer is a player and writer with a passion for games that has dominated a lifetime. He found his way to the Shacknews roster in late 2019 and has worked his way to Senior News Editor since. Between news coverage, he also aides notably in livestream projects like the indie game-focused Indie-licious, the Shacknews Stimulus Games, and the Shacknews Dump. You can reach him at tj.denzer@shacknews.com and also find him on Twitter @JohnnyChugs.