The highly-anticipated video game Little Big Planet has been delayed due to fears one song in the game may cause religious offence.
Little Big Planet is a critically-acclaimed, G-rated game that lets players guide a character named Sackboy through a series of levels which can also be created and shared amongst users.
Developed by Media Molecule and published by Sony, the game uses licenced music in the background during gameplay.
One of these tracks, “Tapha Niang” by Grammy-award winning musician Toumani Diabaté, apparently contains lyrics which are quotes from Islamic holy text the Koran.
In an online statement, Sony said it was withdrawing Little Big Planet worldwide after discovering the song’s lyrics.
“It has been brought to our attention that one of the background music tracks licensed from a record label for use in the game contains two expressions that can be found in the Qur’an.”
“We have taken immediate action to rectify this and we sincerely apologize for any offense (sic) that this may have caused.”
Sony was allegedly reacting to a letter, published on gaming website Kotaku, saying Muslim gamers found the combination of music and words from the Koran “deeply disturbing”.
The letter translated the offending lyrics as “Every soul shall have the taste of death” and “All that is on earth will perish”.
However the song, from the album Boulevarde de L’independence, may not have been intended to offend anyone.
It was released two years ago by Diabaté - who is also a devout Muslim, according to the Taipei Times. The African musician has never previously been associated with religious controversies.
Sony may have wished to avoid another religious debacle after a notorious run-in with the Church of England last year.
In June 2007, the Church of England was considering legal action over the use of the sacred Manchester Cathedral as a setting for a shootout in blockbuster video game Resistance: Fall of Man.
The church said Sony’s production was “insensitive” given the rate of gun crime in Manchester, and rebuked Sony’s claims it had sought permission to re-create the cathedral.
The Manchester Cathedral controversy came two months after animal rights groups were shocked to see a real goat’s carcass used at the launch party for Sony’s God Of War II.
Sony’s decision to withdraw Little Big Planet has left Media Molecule “shellshocked and gutted”, according to a statement on the developer’s website.
The game, originally set to be released in Australia on Thursday, is now reportedly delayed until early November.