Poker-themed deckbuilder Balatro gets delisted from some stores after its PEGI rating absurdly jumps from 3 to 18+ over 'gambling imagery'

Roguelike deckbuilder Balatro has run into a problem related to its poker-inspired gameplay and imagery. Its age rating in some parts of the world has changed since the game's launch in February, and as a result the console version of the game has been removed from some online stores, according to Balatro publisher Playstack, who posted a message on Twitter today:

«We are aware that Balatro has been temporarily removed from sale on a number of digital stores in some countries on console platforms, meaning that some new customers will be unable to buy it,» Playstack said. «Presently we cannot estimate with complete confidence which stores it will be removed from, but our hope is that only a minority of stores will be affected.»

The stores mentioned appear to be several Nintendo Switch stores in European countries and Australia. It sounds like PC users don't need to sweat it, however: «We are highly confident that the game will remain available on PC stores, including Steam,» said Playstack.

According to Playstack, this is all due to «an overnight change to Balatro's age rating from 3+ to 18+ by a ratings board without any advance warning, due to a mistaken belief that the game contains prominent gambling imagery and material that instructs about gambling.

»Balatro does not allow or encourage gambling—and we fundamentally believe the ratings decision is unfounded," Playstack said. «Balatro was developed by someone who is staunchly anti-gambling, and painstaking care has been taken to ensure that the game does not feature gambling mechanics of any kind.»

pic.twitter.com/MroeavYY9UMarch 1, 2024

Balatro's developer LocalThunk said as much to me when we spoke in January. «I'm kind of against gambling,» LocalThunk said. «There's really no actual gambling themes in this game. It's based on poker, which is associated with gambling, but the game itself is really more based on Big Two, which uses poker hands.» Another source of inspiration for Balatro were roguelikes such as