1.) People who have decided to buy it will buy it anyway. They'll be pissed, but in the end they will give their $59.99 to Sony either way, since the new release isn't that far away.
2.) Free controversial publicity. The people who don't know anything about the game now have more of an inkling due to controversy, especially since its a touchy subject that has been played on before (think of the effect of the muhammed cartoons). This will be posted everywhere (and i believe it has already as we speak), on news shows that hardly ever step into gaming, hitting more of the mainstream with it.
3.) Even more hype. The idea of a 'limited copy' of the game that has that song in question is going to hype the game even more. The people who are on the fence about it will become very interested in puchasing it.
4.) Sony looks like the good guy here. By issuing a worldwide recall, they're making themselves look like they're standing up for justice, and the muslim community will appreciate that much, while those who don't appreciate the delay, like mentioned in #1, will buy the game anyway.
5.) Lots of retailers and people are going to ignore the new release and recall (such as gamecrazy in canada). So thousands of people are still going to get their copies early (like me) and actually even more people are going to be forced to find a way to get it somehow.
6.) Limited supply drums up demand. With all the desperate people trying to get the game early and few stores willing to break the release date, people will have increased anticipation over this game, possibly resulting in the wiifit-effect.
7.) The Resistance 1 controversy about the Church of England. The archbishop of Manchester condemned the game and asked it to be removed from circulation because of the heavy shooting inside the famous church. The effect? Resistance 1 got a huge boost in sales after a hefty apology from Sony.
8.) Release confusion. With a lot of people having no idea about when it really is coming out exactly, people are likely to keep talking about it for some time, giving it longer legs though a rather smaller opening week.
9.) Sony itself is being very lenient about this recall. The street dates are being broken by thousands of people and retailers all over already, so I don't think they'll really enforce this recall too strictly. This means that the losses to be incurred from replacing all existing discs will not be as big. I think this worldwide recall thing is just a publicity stunt to please some people.
10.) The issue is blown out of proportion. This is just song lyrics that can be edited out easily via a patch (media molecule had it ready after 12 hours). Sony, however, by issuing a recall, just made the small issue very visible to everyone and made it much bigger than it really is, giving the game a lot of exposure to non-gamers. People could have easily just forgotten about this as its so small of an issue, but Sony chose to let everyone know to take advantage of the free press.
Overall, i think its a good idea for sales.
Another point to consider, its scheduled to be released on Amazon on November 4. That means its releasing on the same day as Resistance 2... Bad idea, I think, though this could also mean a good thing because it could result in a HUGE week for the PS3. This is an unknown point that could go either way.
The only bad things I can think of here is now its going to release after Fable 2 and right in the neighborhood of Gears 2(PS360 owners who are on the fence will then buy Fable 2 or Gears 2 instead of LBP) and a few people are pissed enough to cancel the purchase altogether, though I believe they will relent and buy it anyway somewhere along the line. Overall though, these purchases lost I believe will only amount to a few thousand, while the gains they will get from the people driven in by the controversy will be much larger. So I really think the delay, and how Sony handled it, will benefit them in the long run.
I still think it sucks though, even though I got the game early.. coz i can't play online yet :P
