Topic: The Binding of Isaac 3DS Release Blocked

[ShyGuy]

Thanks for insulting many peoples deeply held personal belief systems, Morari. I hope you don't catch any fish with your trolling.

[KDR_11k]

The game's rated 16 here, that's like a weak M rating. If the ESRB rates it AO they're silly. It's very stylized. There's a poster included with the retail edition that has a realistic painting of Isaac but it's also shaded so that there are no visible naughty bits (it's probably a parody of 80s videogame covers).

However I can understand Nintendo not wanting this game. I played it, it's awesome but it's also not something for weak stomachs. The graphics are cute and super simple but there are many disturbing themes in there.

I haven't seen any vaginas in the game though it's suggested that the ugly, fleshy blobs in the Mom fight might be her vagina poking in and releasing more horrible monsters but there's nothing to see there.

Also http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VB4tk1g-7os&feature=sh_e_se&list=SL.

Since they're rated anyway, I don't know why Steam doesn't display their ratings.

Maybe the rating is platform specific and being indie games they didn't want to spend those 20k$ unnecessarily.


BTW, the game is about McMillen's childhood.

[Ceric]

Not.

http://esrb.org/ratings/search.jsp?title=binding+of+isaac
...

I'm confused by this.
That Link didn't contain an ESRB rating.  It just says it hasn't found anything.
Putting in 'binding of isaac" yields nothing being found.

Apparently, if you trust McMillian's twitter account, the game has received an M rating in Germany. It hasn't been rated anywhere else as far as I can tell.


It's certainly possible that the game could've avoided the dreaded AO rating in other regions, despite containing material that is clearly intended to be offensive to some groups of people. Does anyone here actually know what criteria pushes a game from M to AO?

Being Porn will get you an AO.  Though in general it seems to come from either having a combination of all the offensive tags prevalently or really going to extremes with something.

[StrawHousePig]

Ceric, I would guess it's not Not Rated (as well as not found) because it hasn't been submitted. Also, the URL I posted contains what you then went on to search for.



Troll, I believe you mean to say you have a son named Holy Bible and when the book named The Torture of Holy Bible came out you were damn glad it won't be on the store shelves your kids may have access to.

I assure you, you are mistaken about a great many things.

[ejamer]

...

Being Porn will get you an AO.  Though in general it seems to come from either having a combination of all the offensive tags prevalently or really going to extremes with something.

If that's the case then I doubt that The Binding of Isaac would get an AO rating.  It's obviously offensive but not (as far as I can tell) extreme in a way that would really deserve being blocked from release.  Guess it depends on the rating board though.

I suspect the real sticking point is that everything on the eShop is published by Nintendo, and that they just don't want to be directly associated with any game that is so intentionally disturbed. Games like SMT: Devil Survivor and it's sequel have direct religious themes, but had no trouble appearing as retail DS releases when published by other companies.

[Morari]

I believe you mean to say you have a son named Holy Bible and when the book named The Torture of Holy Bible came out you were damn glad it won't be on the store shelves your kids may have access to.

No, I meant just what you meant. That I'm glad that my son doesn't have access to forms of media where someone with a similar name (Issac) is offered up for sacrifice to appease inner voices of an insane person. The only difference is that you're talking about a fairly harmless video game that most people haven't even heard of, whereas I'm talking about a morally corrosive book that is available just about everywhere (sometimes for free even!).

More to the point at hand. I don't see how this game could really get anything more than a Teen Rating in the US. It's not really that graphic in either its violence or sexuality. In fact, it's so highly stylized that's it's difficult to definitively make anything out of what's going on. It's all just conjecture on the behalf of players. If the basic premises is truly what's bothering people, then I suggest we have much larger problems as a society.

[Luigi Dude]

Once again, the The Binding of Isaac is a game where you play as a naked little boy who fights enemies like giant vagina's that shoot blood, using attacks like peeing on them and gets powerups by killing himself with things like shoving a coathanger through his head or hanging himself.  It doesn't matter if it's stylized, the fact is these things are still happening which is what the ESRB has a problem with.

Yeah the game got a 16 rating in Europe but that's because European rating boards aren't as strict on sexual related content as America.  If the problem with this game was just it's violence, it would have easily gotten an M rating in America, but when you add naked children killing themselves and blood spewing vagina's, that basically guarantee's an instant AO rating in America by the ESRB.

Basically all they have to do is put clothes on all the kids and remove the giant vagina's and the game could probably get an M rating which allow it to released then.  Of course McMillen isn't going to do that so this game isn't going to hit any console service since Nintendo, Microsoft and Sony all refuse non-rated or AO rated games.

[KDR_11k]

Again, where do you see blood spewing vaginas in BoI? Monstro has a cleft lip, he's not a vagina. The Viz enemy (the goatse) is just the lower body of the Gluttony miniboss, he tears his stomach open to fire the blood laser, not his ass or anything else.

[Ceric]

Ceric, I would guess it's not Not Rated (as well as not found) because it hasn't been submitted. Also, the URL I posted contains what you then went on to search for.

The reason I was confused is that your post started with "Not" and then reiterated what I had posted right above you.  Therefore I could only infer you were responding to my post as if you had found the game on the ESRB website.  When I clicked the link it was just a reiteration of what I just proved.

[KDR_11k]

Come to think of it, I can't really find anything that contradicts the Bible in Binding of Isaac (well, outside of the standard videogame aspect of shooting enemies). Well, okay, using the bible on Satan gets you killed but that guy's the super hard bonus boss. Other than that the faith based stuff has all the holy things give benefits while the enemies are only based on evil entities (may change with the Wrath of the Lamb expansion but we don't know that yet) and making a deal with the devil is paid in blood, often turns you into a monster and may trigger additional enemies (e.g. Krampus may show up). Of course there's a lot of non-faith-related stuff, a lot of which is based on the kinds of cautionary tales children are told by their parents (e.g. the roid rage). The game is overall based on the impression that those stories have on small children and the actual gameplay is clearly a nightmare Isaac is having. I'm not sure he's even supposed to be applying the coat hanger to himself, in a nightmare context that may just be a fear of the things based on all the horror stories about abortions he was probably told.

McMillen said in an interview that it's about how he felt about the stories he was told as a child so many of the things in it are probably manifestations of fears brought by those cautionary tales.


Of course the game is also full of videogame in jokes, including various Zelda and Mario items.

[Ailingforale]

Just... wow...

[Chocobo_Rider]

I'm glad! That game suuuuucked.

Shock value without real value shouldn't be perpetuated.

EDIT: Oh, and yea, there's a difference between a game "with angels" and a game taking its premise right out of the Bible.  And Mr. McMillen can't be foolish enough to think that wouldn't close more doors to his game than it would open.

[Mop it up]

Wait, this game is popular? Really?

[the asylum]

Oddly enough, Nintendo had no problem publishing Eternal Darkness...

[oohhboy]

^^That was based on an Eldar God type mythology that is more of a theme than a system of belief.

BoI is thematically disturbing, nothing there that screams AO or anything like that. It's just always disturbing, unsettled. The gameplay itself is solid even if team meat is a little over hyped.

My real guess as to why Nintendo didn't take it was that they weren't willing to bear the ESRB rating costs not only in America, but the rating costs it must incur everywhere else it is expected to be released at given the perceived smaller audience size do to the disturbing nature of the game along with a tenuous, but direct connection to an actual religion. While Super Meatboy made some relatively good bank, they didn't make that kind of money, enough to fund that many ratings hoops.

[Kairon]

Personally I think examining the specifics of the game's content is a bit premature because I suspect the game never got an ESRB rating in the first place, without which I'm assuming it had zero chance of being allowed on either a Nintendo platform or a Sony Platform. It wouldn't be eligible for 360 or XBLA either... I guess XBLIG doesn't require an ESRB rating and is thus possible...

Also, I'm confused, why is it assumed that Nintendo would pay the ratings costs for the game?

[MegaByte]

Nintendo wasn't going to be the publisher, it was Nicalis, so presumably they'd be fronting the ratings costs, but they went to NOA first to make sure that it was even worth it. Anyway, not even talking about Super Meat Boy, The Binding of Isaac has done around 0.5 million sales at $5 a pop (less in bundles, etc.), though it's hard to say exactly how much he's made from the game already.

[StrawHousePig]

The reason I was confused is that your post started with "Not" and then reiterated what I had posted right above you.  Therefore I could only infer you were responding to my post as if you had found the game on the ESRB website.  When I clicked the link it was just a reiteration of what I just proved.

I was on my phone at work, trying to surf, post, work, and not get caught. I saw the warning about a new post after but didn't really look further. The "not" was an answer to the post above yours.


Troll, Nintendo isn't selling a game titled "Holy Bible" (so why are we discussing it as if they are?) and even if they were the name would not have much impact on my kids because none of them are named "Holy Bible". There is no possibility of, "Hey Holy Bible, here's your game! Lets watch it!" One of your mistakes is assuming I object to the content. Today is the first day I learned anything about this turd game. Seeing the name on Steam was enough to make me say WTF I don't want to see that ****.

Think of it like a sex song that is about a girl that has your Mom's name (or sisters, grandmas, you get the idea?). I suppose you'd sing along, with her in the car. I sure as hell wouldn't. That's gross dude.

[MegaByte]

Except the game takes its name from the Hebrew story, the same original source as the name of your son.

[NWR_insanolord]

The reason I was confused is that your post started with "Not" and then reiterated what I had posted right above you.  Therefore I could only infer you were responding to my post as if you had found the game on the ESRB website.  When I clicked the link it was just a reiteration of what I just proved.

I was on my phone at work, trying to surf, post, work, and not get caught. I saw the warning about a new post after but didn't really look further. The "not" was an answer to the post above yours.


Troll, Nintendo isn't selling a game titled "Holy Bible" (so why are we discussing it as if they are?) and even if they were the name would not have much impact on my kids because none of them are named "Holy Bible". There is no possibility of, "Hey Holy Bible, here's your game! Lets watch it!" One of your mistakes is assuming I object to the content. Today is the first day I learned anything about this turd game. Seeing the name on Steam was enough to make me say WTF I don't want to see that ****.

Think of it like a sex song that is about a girl that has your Mom's name (or sisters, grandmas, you get the idea?). I suppose you'd sing along, with her in the car. I sure as hell wouldn't. That's gross dude.

There's a difference between being uncomfortable in that situation and being happy that no one is able to enjoy the thing that you don't like for trivial personal reasons.

[Chozo Ghost]

Personal note, I have a son named Issac so I am damn glad I or my kids don't have to see the Holy Bible sitting on book shelves.

If you don't like the Bible why did you name your son Isaac? That's a biblical name.

[TJ Spyke]

Personal note, I have a son named Issac so I am damn glad I or my kids don't have to see the Holy Bible sitting on book shelves.

If you don't like the Bible why did you name your son Isaac? That's a biblical name.

So is my name (Timothy) and many popular names like John and Mark. You can just like a name

[NWR_insanolord]

Also, I'm fairly certain he doesn't have a son by that name, and was merely mocking the person above him who said the same thing.

[Chozo Ghost]

Probably, but biblical names are extremely common so you never know. I don't know why anyone would want to name their children "John", or any of the other common names. There's like 500 million Johns or Juans or Johans in the world. Give your kid a name that is unique and awesome, not one that's been beaten to death.

[TJ Spyke]

Popularity of names change over time. For example, these were the top 10 most popular baby names of 2011 (US of course):
Aiden (don't know how this was #1 TBH)
Jackson
Mason
Liam
Jacob
Jayden
Ethan
Noah
Lucas
Logan

And for girls:
Sophia
Emma
Isabella
Olivia
Ava
Lily
Chloe
Madison
Emily
Abigail