Sony is keen to keep a lid on controversy for LittleBigPlanet, even at the risk of upsetting those most eagerly awaiting the title.
Sony has confirmed that the worldwide launch of LittleBigPlanet has been held back by a few days so that the game can be remastered. This follows the discovery of some potentially controversial lyrics in the game's background music.



The offensive track was highlighted by a community member during the final review process. Apparently the lyrics contained "two expressions that can be found in the Qur'an." It was properly licensed from a record label for use in the game.



Sony is keen to keep a lid on controversy for LittleBigPlanet, even at the risk of upsetting those most eagerly awaiting the title. Even so, recalling the title completely seems like a bit of an overkill when a simple patch would have done the job.



But Sony has also been on the receiving end of religious outrage before. A scene in launch title Resistance: Fall of Man had the player fight through a virtual Manchester Cathedral; this angered the Church of England and Manchester Cathedral authorities. They claimed this infringed copyright as Sony had never asked for permission to use the cathedral in the game. They were mostly upset about the idea of players firing off guns in a virtual place of worship. They demanded that Sony withdraw the game from sale.



Back then, Sony showed some balls; although it offered an apology to the CoE, it refused to do anything to the game or accept any connection between the city's violent crime and its game. And as a result, sales of Resistance actually went up AND Manchester Cathedral benefited from more visitors going to see what the fuss was about / check that there weren't really any invading Chimera lurking in the grounds.



LBP must be different though, given its more mainstream appeal. The game is looking like Sony's best hope of competing against the Xbox 360 this Xmas, especially now that it's refusing to lower the console price. So Sony must be extra keen to make sure it's not going to be marred by negative headlines.



Whatever happened to the good old days when PlayStation was, y'know, edgy?



The delay isn't a huge one, fortunately, although it still puts the game later than arch-rival Fable 2. Sony reckons it'll have the new corrected versions of the game out by October 27th in the US. Although the delay will affect the UK and other territories as well, we haven't received an updated release date yet. We think Sony owes us a simultaneous launch at the very least.