A racing game that puts players in the shoes of a professional driver who must transport alcoholic drinks while drunk has been pulled from the market Nintendo switch eShop after it was released with a PEGI 3 age rating.
The game in question, which describes itself as a ‘tongue-in-cheek racer’, is called Need for Spirit: Drink & Drive Simulatorand it was first released on PC via Steam and the Epic Games Store in late 2018. On the Epic Games Store it is rated PEGI 16 for “alcohol/tobacco use”.
Although the game’s description states that it is “a parody that absolutely does not encourage drink driving in real life”, the PEGI 3 rating it initially received on Switch suggested that the content was suitable for all ages, which, given the subject matter, is clearly not the case.
The game was released on the Nintendo Switch eShop on October 15, but has since been removed. In a statement to TechRadar Gaming, PEGI stated that it does not know when or if the game will be added back to the store.
“When the age rating of the game in question was examined, it immediately led to an override as the PEGI 3 was incorrect,” PEGI said. “If a game’s PEGI rating changes by more than one age category as a result of this investigation, Nintendo will require the game to be removed from the store and relisted with the correct rating (to ensure their tools working for parental controls Whether and when the game will be reintroduced to the eShop, we do not know.”
The age rating process for digital games involves developers completing an International Age Rating Coalition (IARC) questionnaire when submitting their game to digital retailers. This asks deep questions about the content of the games.
If you complete this honestly, this should in theory provide accurate age ratings for various age rating systems worldwide (such as the PEGI and ESRB systems), and a retail license will be granted for the sale of the game. IARC administrators then manually review a cross-section of games – often selected based on the number of downloads they have or whether a keyword in their name is popular – to ensure the rating is correct.
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