Religious music offends as PS3's Little Big Planet hits world headlines

by Steven Williamson on 27 October 2008, 09:06

Tags: Little Big Planet, Sony (NYSE:SNE), PS3, Action/Adventure

Quick Link: HEXUS.net/qapwh

Add to My Vault: x

Sony's upcoming community-focused adventure game for PS3, Little Big Planet, which was due for release on 24th October, has caused quite a stir for all the wrong reasons, hitting world-wide headlines following reports that it contains material that may be deemed as offensive to muslims.

The offending material was first bought to light on the Sony forums, where one poster claims that the background music to the game contains lines from the Qur’an, the central religious text of Islam.

"We Muslims consider the mixing of music and words from our Holy Koran deeply offending," wrote the poster. "We hope you would remove that track from the game immediately via an online patch, and make sure that all future shipments of the game disk do not contain it."

Sony has been quick to respond to the complaints, but haven't explained why lines from the Qur’an were featured in the family-friendly game in the first place.

"We have taken immediate action to rectify this and we sincerely apologize for any offense that this may have caused," Sony wrote on its official PlayStation blog. "Sorry for the delay, and rest assured, we are doing everything we can to get Little Big Planet to you as soon as possible."

Some copies of the game did manage to get into the hands of customers early, but Sony say that it will release a patch to remove the offending lyrics.

The game is now expected to launch in Europe in the week commencing November 3rd.


HEXUS Forums :: 5 Comments

Login with Forum Account

Don't have an account? Register today!
I read (no source so this may be rubbish) that is was pulled in reaction to that one post & that the song is a well known one which has been performed in front of thousands of people (I think at live aid?) & never had any complaints.

A bit about it, released in 2004 & no complaints so far :D I'm sure I read it had ben performed at some big event.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/7686590.stm
Over reaction or cunning marketing ploy…?

Either way it's making the game famous world wide.
Rob_B
I read (no source so this may be rubbish) that is was pulled in reaction to that one post & that the song is a well known one which has been performed in front of thousands of people (I think at live aid?) & never had any complaints.

Interesting. You wonder if these things are done for a bit of publicity. It was on BBC news yesterday. Of course they showed gameplay footage as well.
Steven W;1554536
Interesting. You wonder if these things are done for a bit of publicity. It was on BBC news yesterday. Of course they showed gameplay footage as well.

Not that I'm a cynic or anything but LBP will shift PS3s this Christmas, especially with it's appeal to the casual/non-traditional gamers and this little ‘event’ has just given it massive exposure in that sector which Sony would otherwise find hard to get…
Old news Hexus, i got my copy pe-ordered for my Birthday 5th November ( although by Gameplays standards possibly be Tuesday). now i gotta get myself a playstation eye.