I was talking about bg3 and how a certain part could be changed to be much darker, and it occurred to me that it possibly could affect the rating of the game if they did (being vague purposely to avoid spoilers). But then I wondered “do things like that even have to be reviewed by the rating boards?” Because Larian has made a lot of changes like that to the game and I imagine it would be pretty ludicrous to have each and every one be reviewed to see if it fits within the current ESRB and PEGI ratings of the game.
generally the raters aren’t actually rating the full game anyhow. (they play for upwards of four hours.)
also, during development, the devs are supposed to send the worst bits on for review and rating (including package of other bits and pieces.) and the rely on hefty fines if something is found that exceeds the rating they were given.
the ERSB supposedly flags games with updated content for review.
A few things:
- Many (most?) ratings these days are self-assessed by the developer/publisher.
- The review process has been heavily streamlined through IARC, so you can effectively get ESRB/PEGI/etc simultaneously. Governmental ratings (like GRAC in South Korea) still require you go through the government agency – but some stores like Epic or Oculus can effectively do this for you – and even then it’s still self-assessed.
- Some of the storefronts offer help with ratings, in a way doing what a publisher would do, if you self-publish. You take a quiz to determine ratings and ask questions before the rating boards even know you exist.
- Ratings boards don’t typically play the game. Sample screenshots and descriptions can be included in some submissions, especially if there’s a grey area or the submitter is inexperienced, but it’s often just apply and get your cert.
I think BG3 already has the highest rating available, so I don’t think it’d be affected.
For substantial changes, the rating would have to be redone, but I don’t think many games add content that would effect the ESRB/PEGI system. Also, in many countries, the ratings are optional in the first place; ESRB and PEGI were the result of the games industry coming together to regulate themselves before the government would (because governments would probably ban most games if they didn’t).
As far as I’m aware, the legal standard only applies to the age rating, so it would be important that this doesn’t change.
The rating boards themselves have contracts with publishers. For PEGI this seems to come down to “re-submit if your changes alter the age rating or damage our ability to do our (legally obligated) job”. ESRB has a policy for DLC (“In most cases, the rating assigned to a game also applies to its DLC. However, if the DLC content exceeds the rating assigned to the “core” product, it must be submitted, and a different rating may be assigned to the DLC.”).
I think once a game has a certain rating (horror, 16+) and sticks within those boundaries, it should be fine. GTA had an issue with this during the Hot Coffee debacle (in which mods could add some kind of half-finished sex minigame) which caused the age rating to be changed, but that’s the only time I remember the age rating ever going up after the fact.
Oblivion also had its initial T rating changed to M after I believe some cave was discovered that was considered too violent. Or it could have been a nude mod. Either way I remember it being kinda controversial of a change.
EDIT:
The pertinent content causing the change in the ESRB rating involves more detailed depictions of blood and gore than were considered in the original rating of the game (the game already carried a Blood and Gore content descriptor), as well as the presence in the PC version of the game of a locked-out art file that, if accessed by using an apparently unauthorized third party tool, allows the user to play the game with topless versions of female characters. The locked-out topless skin was found by ESRB to exist in a fully rendered form on the game disc, but is not accessible in the Xbox 360™ version of the game.
