Little Big Delay

One of the biggest reasons that we got our PS3 was so we could play Little Big Planet as soon as it was released. As soon as we heard about it we knew we would buy it. It looks like it's a great game. It is a four player co-op game (or can be, at least - it can also be competitive) and it's hard to find games that we can all cooperate on. Plus, it's such a cute game, which apparently is off-putting to some but I love things that are cute. (I don't love obnoxiously over-the-top cute and sickeningly sweet, but I do love cute.)

It has already won awards, and the reviews so far have been great: "A must own game", "a five out of five", "the reason to buy a PS3". Other than a few small critiques of the controls I haven't really heard any complaints yet. Everyone who was chosen for the beta fell in love with the game.

For months we have been counting down to today. And finally the day is here! But Little Big Planet is not.

I was doing the rounds of all the sites I read on Friday when I saw the headlines announcing that Little Big Planet would be delayed in Europe. A few minutes later the other reports began to trickle in. Little Planet was delayed globally, and it was all because of two lines of lyrics in the backgound music of one of the stages. The Singing Safari stage, to be specific. The lyrics aren't even in English, and I think most people wouldn't even realize that they were actually words. Someone did, though, and more importantly he realized that they were actually two lines from the Qur'an. Apparently this is a very bad thing. The lyrics themselves aren't particularly offensive, though they don't really fit the game all that well.

At the 18th second of the level, the line says "Every soul shall have the taste of death". At second 27, the line is "All that is on earth will perish". Not exactly cheery, but certainly unoffensive. And not exactly a unique concept, either - the same basic idea can be found in many other songs, as well as other books and movies. Though I don't know for sure, I would be shocked if the same concept didn't also appear in most other religious texts.

Muslims are supposedly offended by this because the Qur'an is their holy text and shouldn't be set to music or included as part of a game. I say supposedly because some people are saying that Muslims themselves often set lines of the text to music. So some Muslims are offended, and Sony was afraid that more would be so they recalled all copies of the game - which were already waiting at the stores for the release this week - and they are releasing new copies starting next week.

I have two problems with this.

The first is that a recall was completely unnecessary. Media Molecule, who made the game, had a Day 0 patch ready before the recall was announced. They could have released the patch when the game servers went live and required everyone to download it. Sony found that solution to be unacceptable because not everyone has internet access, though they could easily have sent replacement disks to the 2 people who have PS3s and don't have access to Playstation Network.

The other problem I have with this is more complicated. I am bothered by the fact that Sony was so quick to delay the game to avoid offending Muslims. It's not the fact that they are changing the game that bothers me. Certainly if people are offended by such an inconsequential part of the game then changing it makes sense. I believe that the only reason they want to destroy all of the affected disks is because those that are offended are Muslims. I think that a few extremists have made people afraid to offend Muslims. There are extremists in almost every group, and right now Muslim extremists are getting lots of press. Because of this, it seems to me that a double standard has developed. Companies who don't care if they offend most groups will fall all over themselves to avoid offending Muslims.

Ideally, no one would be ever be offended, but that's really not possible. People can be offended by almost anything, and in fact it seems some people look for reasons to take offense to everything. The problem is that most companies, especially those that make video games, don't seem to care if they offend most groups - as long as Muslims are not offended. I've seen games that are offensive to almost everyone - Christians and Jews, Gay and Straight, Black and White - but not Muslims. I think it should be all or nothing. Once you put one group off limits, then offending everyone else seems wrong to me.

It's sort of like South Park. Everything they do on that show is offensive to someone, but the whole thing is so over the top, and they are such "equal opportunity offenders", that it is funny to me. If they were to put one group off limits then the rest of the show would seem far more offensive.

And again, the background music of this one stage of the game is not a crucial part of the game. I don't mind a bit that they are changing it. I just think they should have used the Day 0 patch rather than issuing a recall.

I still intend to buy Little Big Planet, of course. I'm impressed that there will supposedly only be a one week delay before we can get our copy. I'm frustrated and irritated that there is a delay at all, though. The patch that Media Molecule made would have solved the problem much more quickly and efficiently. And I can't help but feel that they would not have delayed the game if I had been offended because they had included something from my religion. But maybe I'm just being cynical. I hope they would have gone to all this trouble and expense if it had been a Christian or a Jew that was offended because quotes from the Bible or Torah had inadvertently been included.

And I hope that the delay will really only be a week, because I'm anxious to start building my own Adventurers Club themed levels!