For the age rating to be trustworthy, someone actually has to play your game, in full, paying extra attention to all dialogue and content. Paying that someone 1337 USD (200k JPY) for this seems fair to me. While some ports may be created by a single checkbox in Unity, many of them have differences, sometimes exclusive content, sometimes completely separate codebases. Someone needs to check if the Xbox version doesn't have a hidden porn scene.
Besides, Japan isn't unique in this. The German USK also charges similar fees (1200 EUR for new games, 300 EUR for ports) [0]. ESRB and PEGI don't publish their prices, but I wouldn't expect them to be significantly lower.
I can respect why CERO might want extra for ports. Ports can be different, and it will take manhours to check through that possibility which means more money on the payroll.
I also find the per-port fee to be a nothingburger: 20,000 JPY or 60,000 JPY per platform for members and non-members respectively. That's ~$133 USD or ~$400 USD assuming 150 JPY to $1 USD exchange rate, or ~$200 USD or ~$600 USD assuming 100 JPY to $1 USD. That is honestly nothing assuming it's a one-time fee to review.
For the age rating to be trustworthy, someone actually has to play your game, in full, paying extra attention to all dialogue and content. Paying that someone 1337 USD (200k JPY) for this seems fair to me. While some ports may be created by a single checkbox in Unity, many of them have differences, sometimes exclusive content, sometimes completely separate codebases. Someone needs to check if the Xbox version doesn't have a hidden porn scene.
Besides, Japan isn't unique in this. The German USK also charges similar fees (1200 EUR for new games, 300 EUR for ports) [0]. ESRB and PEGI don't publish their prices, but I wouldn't expect them to be significantly lower.
[0] https://usk.de/en/home/cost-overview/
I thought it worked by you sending a video of a walkthrough, not have them play through the whole game.
I can respect why CERO might want extra for ports. Ports can be different, and it will take manhours to check through that possibility which means more money on the payroll.
I also find the per-port fee to be a nothingburger: 20,000 JPY or 60,000 JPY per platform for members and non-members respectively. That's ~$133 USD or ~$400 USD assuming 150 JPY to $1 USD exchange rate, or ~$200 USD or ~$600 USD assuming 100 JPY to $1 USD. That is honestly nothing assuming it's a one-time fee to review.