I largely agree, but the interests have gotten misaligned. Back then it was the threat of regulation which changed things up, I think the governments should do a little more of that.
but… Looks like they don’t audit so good, if this article is evidence
That’s the whole issue with it being a lobby group. It makes them a ton of money, so they are incentivised against making a rating for it because that would draw more attention/limit sales.
And that’s where the whole government lobbying part comes in.
Not entirely sure about the European PEGI, but the American ESRB is funded by the same companies that it regulates. It was created after the outcry about violent games and was the industry self-regulating to avoid the government getting more involved.
It is a lobby group for the industry, for better and in this case very much for worse.
It does have back buttons, which is why it’s unlikely to launch in the west as Scuf (owned by Corsair) is a major patent troll when it comes to those. That’s also the reason for the original Steam controller no longer being released.
The Hori one is launching at the end of this month, if I recall correctly. I might look into importing it once it does.
Nordic Games bought what remained of THQ back in the day when the latter went bankrupt. (THQ used to be comparable to the likes of EA and Ubisoft before they made some poor decisions)
The holdings company behind THQ Nordic rebranded into Embracer some years ago.