It has come to my attention that the rather popular map, Favela, has been removed from the online multiplayer rotation of both Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 and Modern Warfare 3 because the map upset the Islamic gaming community. It seems there was a holy scripture placed inside a rather inappropriate location within the map and Infinity Ward is working on a title update that will remove the image. Until then, the map will not be playable in the multiplayer mode of either games.

Religion is a rather touchy topic, especially in international entertainment but it’s so bizarre to me that anyone actually noticed what was written on a very small frame of a very small picture in a very small part of a rather hectic map. Still, Call of Duty has a lot of “campers” and I do remember joking about camping in said location so I guess some people get bored.

Religion aside, this goes under the topic of gaming censorship, though, this wasn’t the first time something was directly removed from Call of Duty. In Modern Warfare 2, there was an instance where the player slaughters people in a Russian airport. The mission, “No Russian”, was blocked out of various international copies of the game and even the North American edition asked if you could handle such content before playing. That mission was brutal and had every right to be banned out or censored in some shape or form.

Even though the in-game issue with the Islamic community to me, is rather small considering it took almost three games to discover, the question still remains how censorship is to go down in gaming, especially in popular shooters. The current issue some people have is “if you censor one, you have to censor all” and last I checked, there is something offensive no matter how small, about most real-world shooting titles. Trust me, if something offends you, you’ll find it. Heck, there’s a map where you fight in a church in MW3.

At this time, Infinity Ward is looking to fix the current issue through a title update. After all, the Islamic community was planning to boycott the next installment, even though the next one is a Treyarch title. Still, I’d like to hear what all of you have to say about religion or censorship in gaming. I’m not a Muslim person but I can see this being offensive. Personally, I probably would have looked to the future rather than making a big deal out of a three year old game.

Here’s a translated version of the original video if you haven’t seen it already.

[Video by AVIATION / Original video by KhaledQ84EveR]