Over the weekend, those playing Modern Warfare 2 began to notice that one of the series' most popular multiplayer maps, Favela, had disappeared.


Why? Publishers Activision and developers Infinity Ward took the map off rotation after receiving complaints from Muslim gamers, who had discovered offensive imagery contained within a room of the stage. It'll return after edits to the content in question have been made.

In a single room on the map, two paintings had been hung whose frames contained a decorative representation of a quote (pictured above) attributed to the Prophet Muhammad, which reads "Allah is beautiful and He loves beauty". Those paintings were hung in a bathroom, one right above a toilet, and didn't appear to be found anywhere else on the map.


You can see the paintings in this video, dated October 2.

It can be offensive to those of Islamic faith—like those in the aforementioned video—to see holy teachings written on or in a bathroom, and with the paintings having been brought to Activision and Infinity Ward's attention, the map has been removed until it can be edited.

An Activision representative tells Kotaku: