Scandal-hit game developer Activision-Blizzard has had to apologize to Muslim gamers for featuring smeared and scattered pages of the Koran in ‘Call of Duty: Vanguard’. This is highly offensive to Islam.
The gaming giant caused anger among the Muslim community this week over ‘Call of Duty: Vanguard’, the newly released 18th installment of the popular first-person shooter series. The Stalingrad map in the game’s Zombies mode featured pages from the Koran scattered on a floor, with some of them soaked in blood.
Many Muslims considered the imagery to be offensive. The Koran is sacred to Islam, so Muslims are expected to respect it. In some Muslim countries, deliberate desecration can be considered blasphemy and could lead the person being imprisoned.
Many players threatened boycotting the game. The hashtag #NoCallOfDuty became a trending topic on Twitter.
Activision-Blizzard issues an apologyCall the content on Thursday “insensitive”And stating it was added by accident. “It should never have appeared as it did in [the] game; we deeply apologize,”In a published Arabic statement, it stated. Gamers noticed that the Koran pages were replaced on the map by blank sheets.
A similar scandal happened in 2012 with another Activision game, ‘Modern Warfare 2’. It featured a multiplayer map on which paintings hanging in a restroom – one near a toilet – had frames decorated with verses from Hadith, a core part of the Islamic scripture. After removing the offensive content, the publisher took the map out of rotation. He also apologized to Muslims.
Activision Blizzard has been a frequent target of controversy. In July, the company was subject to a scandal that caused a lot of attention. It was sued for allegedly allowing an environment conducive to harassment and discrimination in its workplaces. The scandal triggered employees to walk out, resulting in negative media coverage and forcing the gaming giant to change its executive team.
In-game references to disgraced employees were removed from the products by the company amid scandal. It fired 20 employees in an effort to reduce its workforce. “earn our team’s confidence that, when they speak up, they will be heard.”
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