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Gran Turismo 4 Delayed Until 2005 in Pal Regions
AndyDavies writes "Sony has announced that the highly anticipated Gran Turismo 4 will be delayed to a 2005 release in PAL regions due to the localization process. The game is still on schedule for a 2004 release in North American and Japan."
This lame decision is sure to increase piracy, as those who really want the game in the PAL region will endeavor to get a free cracked version.
I would think that translating a language would be one of the hardest parts of localization (PAL -vs NTSC is just a mostly a hardware issue, right?). I guess translating from English to "Queen's English" is too bloody hard for them? Maybe its the whole metric to english and back to metric thing that is throwing them off? I mean in the Japanese version the steering wheels are already on the right, correct?
First they drop the online mode, now this? Crazy. Its like they are trying to piss people off.
Localization could be a factor, but I don't think any modern game publisher will start the localization so late in the game as to cause this kind of delays. It's still possible, but doubtful.
In the SNES days, there was also the issue of truly terrible NTSC to PAL conversions. I've seen games slowed down over 20% on the PAL version. Huge black bars at the top and bottom of the screen. Sony might just want to give europe a real release of the game, as opposed to a travesty like this.
IMO, the most likely scenario is that the game's testing is running a little late, maybe 1 or 2 weeks late. The resources that were supposed to be dedicated to the PAL conversion/testing are moved to getting the American and Japanese version of the game, and the PAL version has to wait until January or February.
Because console programmers seem to be so locked into the idea of "one common hardware platform" that they hard code everything to 400 vertical lines, 60 times a second. By the time it comes to do the PAL conversion they look at it and think, "well, we could go back redo the code.. or just slap a big black border top and bottom".
Guess which one often wins out.
Of course, the problem is, you've taken care of the extra screen real estate, but now you're only getting 50 fps. They look at it and think "well, we could go back and redo the logic... or just have it run 16.67% slower."
And that, my friend, is the ingredients of a truly shitty PAL conversion, made all the more annoying by the fact it could have been avoided with a bit of forward planning in the design stages.
Comon, I've already GOT a PAL version of GT4 (Prologue?). They've already figured out whatever supposed PAL problems they claim to have unwhittingly stumbled on when thet released prologue.
What utter rubbish... What's the 'real' reason here?
Besides, my TV (Like a growing number of UK ones) can accept NTSC and PAL... So relase the damn game already!
Grrrrrrr.....
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