I'll put it in standup comedy terms; if you walk the crowd, it doesn't matter what you said, doesn't matter if it was cool in another city, you fucked up. You didn't read the audience. Sony risked walking the Muslim crowd, and a global company with lines of business far more diverse than video games just can't do that. Commenter HamThePharoah pointed out Sony has huge sales in Middle Eastern nations. "Sony is one of a few VERY highly respected brands here, and most Arabs are Sony fanboys." Sorry, but in addition to freedom of expression, another Western value is "the customer is always right."

That said, it's a shame LBP is taking it in the shorts like this, and it'll have a chilling effect on games' efforts to engage or include Middle East culture going forward. Anything said in Arabic won't be bothered to be translated for vetting or approval. It'll just be removed, with LBP and Media Molecule cited as the reason.

Now, with that outta the way, we did have some original reporting this week. Major carryover from TGS, so you should hit that roundup, as well as Blizzcon's, for news out of those shows. We also had some sales result, a look at campaign giving in the game industry, and a tour of NetDevil's studio. The list is on the jump.

Super Let's TGS Round-Up
Blizzcon 2008 Round-Up

NSider's Letter To Sony And Media Molecule Re: Qur'an References
Is Microsoft Making It Harder For Small Developers?
Europe Gets An Eighth Xbox 360 Bundle (This Time, With Pro Evo)
The Force Is Strong With U.S. Game Sales In September
Nintendo Kicks Sales Ass In September, Xbox Rebounds
A Visit To NetDevil: Hands On With Jumpgate Evolution
Guitar Hero To Bloat Further With "Modern Hits"?
Frankenreview: Dead Space
This Is What Atlus USA Looks Like
I Wish I Hadn't Played Castlevania Judgement
Rumor: Ric Flair, Bear Suit Spotted At EA LA
Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo Talk Edutainment
The Politics of Gaming: The Politics of Mmm, Giving Good

I asked many of my friends online and offline and they heard the exact same thing that I heard easily when I played that part of the track. Certain Arabic hardcore gaming forums are already discussing this, so we decided to take action by emailing you before this spreads to mainstream attention.

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

Hit the jump for the full text of the email, which very well may have been the catalyst for the delay of one of the biggest games of the holiday season.

To: Sony Computer Entertainment & Media Molecule

While playing your latest game, "LittleBigPlanet" in the first level of the third world in the game (titled "Swinging Safari"), I have noticed something strange in the lyrics of the music track of the level. When I listened carefully, I was surprised to hear some very familiar Arabic words from the Quran. You can listen to part of the track here:

http://mt14.quickshareit.com/share/preview/soundclip22503c0.wav

The words are:

1- In the 18th second: "كل نفس ذائقة الموت" ("kollo nafsin tha'iqatol mawt", literally: 'Every soul shall have the taste of death').

2- Almost immediately after, in the 27th second: "كل من عليها فان" ("kollo man alaiha fan", literally: 'All that is on earth will perish').

I asked many of my friends online and offline and they heard the exact same thing that I heard easily when I played that part of the track. Certain Arabic hardcore gaming forums are already discussing this, so we decided to take action by emailing you before this spreads to mainstream attention.

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

We would also like to mention that this isn't the first time something like this happened in videogames. Nintendo's 1998 hit "Zelda: Ocarina of Time" contained a musical track with islamic phrases, but it was removed in later shipments of the game after Nintendo was contacted by Muslim organizations. Last year, Capcom's "Zack & Wiki" and Activision's "Call of Duty 4" also contained objectionable material offensive to Muslims that was spotted before the release of the final games, and both companies thankfully removed the content.

We hope you act immediately to avoid any confusion and unnecessary controversy, and we thank you for making such an amazing game.

Regards,
NSider

(On behalf of the gamers at True-Gaming.net)