Released late last month, Balatro is a deck building game with a Poker theme available on many platforms such as Xbox, PlayStation, Switch or PC. But recently, the game was removed Nintendo eShop in many countries, especially in Europe. This surprised both the developer and publisher of the game. The main reason for this is said to stem from suspicions about encouraging gambling.
According to research, when winning a game, players will receive chips but can only use them to buy upgrades and cards in the game. So according to the game publisher, this is not a gambling act.
However, taking the poker theme and having a feature similar to the betting process when playing cards seems to have caused Balatro’s rating to change rapidly overnight and immediately caused it to be removed. Nintendo eShop in some regions, for example Germany or the UK. Balatro’s PEGI rating on PSN and Xbox has also been changed from 3+ to 18+ but luckily the game is still sold normally on these consoles’ stores.
The game publisher said they were “disappointed” with the move of the PEGI rating board because in October last year, the two sides discussed this issue and PEGI approved the game. no changes required. Then suddenly attack them without any prior notice.
A similar situation also happened in May 2023 with another indie game on Nintendo. As a result, this game was forced to delay its release on the eShop.
