Sony's Stellar Blade might've only just released, but it's already found itself in a baptism of fire. Developer Shift Up Second EVE Studio is releasing what could be one of 2024's big PlayStation 5 exclusives, but as it basks in some pretty decent reviews, it's caught in a cloud of controversy.

Images have started appearing online, suggesting that Stellar Blade purposefully added a racial slur to the background. According to Sony, this was a mistake that will be patched out in an upcoming update.

Stellar Blade accused of including racial slur

As reported by IGN, Stellar Blade includes a questionable piece of graffiti, with the word "hard" next to the R Shop. The R Shop refers to information broker Roxanne, while the hard graffiti appears several times in the game. When placed together, they could be taken as a well-known racial slur. 

Sony claims the incident was "unintentional" and will be removed as part of the game's Day 1 Patch. The full statement reads: "The placement of two graphics near each other in Stellar Blade resulted in an unintentional objectionable phrase.

 "Shift Up had no intention of creating offensive artwork and will be replacing the graffiti for the Day 1 patch." When IGN asked whether the graffiti would be removed from the disc as well, a PlayStation representative said it "should be removed for all users in the Day 1 update."

Still, the news hasn't gone well with gamers, who question how this could've made it through so many stages and ended up in the final release. One disappointed gamer wrote, "You can't tell me this was not intentional," while another added, "No way. This is f****d up." Whether an accident or not, we'll hopefully be able to put the issue to bed.