And again, purges — Sony has removed a bunch of games from the PS Store

Another Round of Cleanups — Sony Removed a Bunch of Games from the PS Store

Sony has quietly pulled another batch of low-quality releases from the PlayStation Store. This latest sweep erased several titles broadly labeled as "shovelware" — among the disappeared is the oddly named Jesus Simulator.

Several small publishers lost multiple entries: GoGame Console Publisher, VRCForge Studios, and Welding Byte were all affected. Examples pulled from the store include Urban Driver Simulator, Water Blast Shooter — Wet Gun, Racing Car Chaos: Extreme Stunt Showdown, Supermarket CEO Simulator, and a few others that tended to appear and disappear quickly.

"Shovelware" is the catch-all for cheaply made, rushed releases — e.g., trend-chasing clones or trophy-farming buckets of content. The complaints are familiar: brittle gameplay, hollow environments, thin writing; the PlayStation catalog ends up carrying a lot of dead weight, which users and moderators often call out.

This isn't the first major purge: earlier this year Sony removed over a thousand titles from a single large publisher. Is the timing random? Some observers point to the Shared Commitment to Safer Gaming effort backed by Sony Interactive Entertainment, Microsoft, and Nintendo as a possible catalyst for tighter curation.

One title that attracted particular attention was Jesus Simulator by VRCForge Studios. Released last month, it attempts to depict the life of Jesus Christ, drawing on Gospel passages and some historical sources. Steam players were mixed-to-cool: many slammed its visible use of generative AI, the mostly empty world, and weak dialogue, while a smaller group suggested it might serve some educational uses and noted moments of careful detail.