More indie developers say they've been forced to delay the impending release of their games as a result of Steam's growing approvals backlog - a relatively recent problem that's believed to stem from an influx of AI slop on the platform.

Earlier this month, developers began complaining about delays to Valve's approval process, which was extending the time it took to get their games published on Steam. Valve responded, explaining approval times could now take up to 12 days, due to the number of submissions it was having to re-review. One week on, the situation doesn't seem to have improved.

New turn-based tower defence game Australia Did It: End-of-the-World Railway Defense Business, co-developed by acclaimed indie designer Rami Ismail and Aesthetician Labs, was previously set for release on 10th November. Unfortunately, the game has now been delayed while the wait continues for Valve to review the latest build.

"We're still waiting for Steam to give us the final greenlight and finish their build review process," publisher Mystic Forge wrote on the Steam forums. "We have been stuck waiting for it for a few weeks now and unfortunately we just don't know when they will get around to reviewing it at this point."

Speaking to Eurogamer, Ismail added that Australia Did It has been in Steam's approval queue for much longer than he's used to: "We've been in the queue since 20th October, failed over a minor controller input issue on 5th November (which we resolved the same day), and we've been waiting again since with no meaningful response from Valve despite follow-ups."

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