Edmund McMillen tweeted last night that his title, The Binding of Isaac, won't be published on the 3DS.
As many assumed the reasons were due to the games "questionable religious content". Thank GOD Steam exists!
This will come as no surprise to many since, in addition to the religious content, the game contains suggestive themes, implied child nudity, and excessive gore, which set it at odds with Nintendo's established rules for publication. For those interested in this previously reviewed title, as the tweet mentions, it is available on Steam for both PC and Mac.
I think this was a very wise decision by Nintendo. The liberties the game takes with the Biblical story of Isaac would be offensive to any Bible-based religion, while the presentation of Isaac’s mother is blatantly Christophobic (if that’s even a word.) The designers could have easily chose almost any story to frame this game, but elected to use one that was tasteless and would be guaranteed to offend. I can’t find fault in any publisher refusing to publish a game that would so easily alienate potential customers.
Supposedly it has yet to be submitted to the ESRB. Nintendo will not accept any game without being rated by the ESRB. At least for North-America.
The issue here is that if there's no guarantee the game would be licensed/published, spending the money on an ESRB rating is a massive risk. Imagine the game picks up an M rating, but NIntendo still denies the game on the 3DS. That's likely at least thousands of dollars down the drain that they won't get back, since each platform has content rated independantly, I believe.
I see your point. Seems like they made the right call then.