Slashdot Mirror
GTA IV Delayed Into Next Year
1up has the news that Take Two is moving Grand Theft Auto IV's release out to Spring 2008. Sam Houser (the executive producer for Rockstar Games) says that the demands of creating games for the new consoles, along with the scope of the game, forced their hand to maintain the quality they wanted. "'With Grand Theft Auto IV, Rockstar is setting a new standard for next generation video games,' stated Strauss Zelnick, Chairman of Take-Two. 'Certain elements of development proved to be more time-intensive than expected, especially given the commitment for a simultaneous release on two very different platforms. We all recognize that perfecting the game is vital and I can assure everyone it will be worth the wait.'"
of development proved to be more time-intensive than expected, especially given the commitment for a simultaneous release on two very different platforms. We all
recognize that perfecting the game is vital and I can assure everyone it will be worth the wait.'"
.....So do we all agree the delay is for Hot Coffee v2?
We just got the trifecta of games being delayed articles on Slashdot.
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Exactly what I was thinking. Maybe HDTV prices will go down too.
How is this surprising when all they had to show at E3 was a dude driving down a street?
It sucks if you're a Take Two share holder though. Take Two & Rockstar would give Imagine a run for their money for fiscal mismanagement, broken promises and delays.
The PS3 is in desperate need of a blockbuster at the moment, Microsoft has Halo, Nintendo has Mario, and PS3 (while not a Sony creation) has GTA. Without Grand Theft Auto what killer blockbuster games do they have this X-mas? (I'm not talking "It's a good game with high review scores" I'm talking Buy the system, Pre-order the game, Million Seller right away kind of games)
Web Developers: Celebrate to our roots! Animated Gifs and Tiled Backgrounds, dont let our history die!
Hmm, no marketing emails from Take-Two about this one, eh?
...
Yeah, this is a jab at Take-Two for repeatedly sending marketing emails out about a release date for a trailer for GTA IV. No, not a release date for the game, just a release date for a short trailer that shows very little if anything about the game.
I thought it was a bit excessive for them to email multiple times about a trailer. I can see emailing once, but I got a number of emails about the same thing. Wow, big deal guys. I would have been more interested in the later emails if they were going to be showing something of substance in the trailers, but they just showed some typical cutscene-style stuff. Blah, sure I'm burning karma with this post but I found it a bit frustrating to get constantly teased about a game (no, not even the game, a TRAILER for the game) and shown almost nothing. Now the game is delayed but of course I didn't receive that in my email inbox, did I?
I'm sure there's going to be a LOT of hate-messages about this, but to be honest, I don't have a problem with them delaying it to make sure they get it right. Although, the irony is that I did pre-order this game less than four days ago with the expectation of it being released in October. The bad part of this whole thing is that GTA IV will now miss the holiday season! DOH!
We can only hope that this move will not make Microsoft think they can get away with releasing certain other anticipated titles early without ironing out the details in order to get better sales than GTA.
Empathetic-- 94% You tend to walk in someone else's shoes a hundred miles before pointing a finger.
It takes a lot of cojones to stand up and say they're slipping the release for quality. I had a ton of respect for them. I know it'll be worth the wait!
...that the delay is caused not by the multi-platform crap, but by the sudden need to go back and edit the content to fit the new "M" rating standards? They wouldn't want their blockbuster title to be rated "AO"....
Consoles will get cheaper by then, well, at least X360 should. Also, a slightly larger user base will be available than there is right now, which means more sales, and Microsoft's exclusive episode packs (two of them) were announced for 2008. This should definitely boost sales and also give people time to save money on a console. Really, not a bad move if you're a patient fan.
So far what we've seen of GTAIV looks like crap.
The environments are nowhere near next gen levels.
The art and characters are dreadfully drab compared to previous games.
Early previews of the game say it is a mess huge framerate problems, horrendous pop-in for geometry, and so on.
I have a hard time believing that this will be anything but the least popular GTA in the series. You really have to wonder if something major has gone wrong at Rockstar with key people leaving or other internal staffing or management problems.
If that was the case, then only the 360 version would have been delayed. Unless you think it's Microsof deep pockets that are forcing a simultaneous release, which I doubt. But the hard drive is far more of a necessity on the PS3 due to the slower load times.
I remember at E3 when Peter Moore described a "perfect storm" of gaming on the 360 - the perfect storm consisted of Madden 2007, Halo3 and GTA4. He said it was going to draw record-breaking sales numbers - D'oH!. I guess now we know a little more about why he's leaving MS...
I'm all for developers taking their time but delays always dissappoint. The gaming industry should better understand how to set expectations lower so that everyone is always pleasantly surprised. For example, at E3, Nintendo announced that Mario Galaxy will be available in December which was sooner than most expected.
certified elipsis abuser
And how many GB of your hard drive did you have to sacrifice to get those loading times? I've heard of 7 minute install proceedures on certain PS3 games. Inexcusable. That said, I will readily admit that I do not at this point own a PS3, and it has nothing to do with any perceived technical differences or limitations, it's the library. But the slower drive speed of the PS3 is commonly mentioned on /. and other sites, so that is where my assumption comes from.
In short: PS3 may load fast because it uses the Hard Drive as a cache, big time. The 360 can't guarantee that, but can stream data off the disc faster than the PS3 can stream data of it's discs.
Hey now!
The Dreamcast was one of the greatest, fun consoles created, in its brief run it boasts more solid fun games than most consoles ever get in their first two years.
Don't start using the Dreamcast as fodder for your console war, May the departed rest in piece
(and regardless, if you really need to say these things why not compare it to a truly bad console like the Saturn or the 3D0)
Web Developers: Celebrate to our roots! Animated Gifs and Tiled Backgrounds, dont let our history die!
A delay is perfectly fine with me. There are tons of older 360 games I need to purchase and play (GRAWs, GoW, R6V, SCDA etc.), not to mention some upcoming ones like Bioshock and Mass Effect.
We can only hope that this move will not make Microsoft think they can get away with releasing certain other anticipated titles early without ironing out the details...
Like the latest version of Windows?
As another poster noted, Microsoft had more to gain from the GTA release as it had exclusive 360 content. This gives SOny more time to convince people to buy a PS3 instead of a 360 for the games that are coming out.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
A recent rumor has Microsoft dropping the Core system (with no HD) and allowing game makers to require the HDD version of the 360.
It seems like this move might be giving Rockstar enough time to re-tool the game to take advantage of the HDD requirement by allowing for more content (which would also benefit the PS3), and at the same time letting the HDD requirement for games sink into the buying populace and see how well it works out.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
PS3 is an overpriced piece of fail. That doesn't mean that MS didn't make some big mistakes (#1 being HDD is not standard) too.
The "M" rating is no longer a sure bet for GTA - and GTA is franchise gold. Rockstar has to get this one right.
2008 is a presidential election year - an election will almost certainly turn on core issues like Iraq and health care.
But it is all to easy to picture Rockstar in a another spectacular PR crack-up, the center of a messy, politically-charged debate over video game violence.
LIES! Price of Coke in 1903: $0.05 Price of Coke in 2003: $1.00
Don't disagree. I'm just tired of this exact post being copy pasted in every article.
I still have more fans than freaks. WTF is wrong with you people?
First off, I just have to say before I say anything else is that I'm not a fanboy. I LOVED my PlayStation2 and I continue to hope that the PS3 eventually gets its act together and brings back the glory days of the last generation.
That said, for those of you who say this hurts the XBOX360 more than the PS3, I couldn't disagree with you more. This coming holiday season is a very important time for the two systems. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if this holiday season is important enough to finally give one of the two systems a significant share of the market over the other. That's how important I consider it to be.
With that being said, an important part of any holiday season is to have an established killer app to push consoles. Xbox already has one. The PlayStation doesn't. While the previous score of- Xbox, 2 killer apps, PlayStation, 1, already seemed to tip the tide in Microsoft's favor, a score of 1-0 would be devastating. Now, don't get me wrong. I'm not saying that there aren't games coming out for the PlayStation that could be good and could eventually become killer apps, but "eventually" isn't going to sell consoles in this all important season.
Now for the exclusive content. GTA4 will eventually come out, and the exclusive content will probably still be there. If Microsoft gains a significant portion of the console market this holiday season, then the affects of the exclusive content in GTA4 could be even greater then they would have been if the game had been released this season. In a way, this delay could actually help MS more that hurt it in the long run.
I *highly* recommend Rainbow Six Vegas. One of the best shooters I have played in a long time. GRAW2 pales in comparison, but the 'co-op campaign' mode (using 'campaign' very loosely) is a lot of fun with friends over Live. R6V might even be my favorite shooter EVAR!
No reason to lie.
When Nintendo used a crap format (N64 carts) they lost developers. We're talking about Nintendo here, an established presence at the time -- the NES and SNES had dominated their competition. Microsoft has sold a total of around 30 million consoles -- 20M X-Box, 10M 360s. Rounded, because I'm lazy and that's close enough. the N64 sold around that number. In addition, Nintendo actually did well in Japan, something Microsoft does not.
If MS's decision was actually hampering developers, they'd leave.
So take your whining somewhere the fuck else because it doesn't fit in with REALITY. Last gen, Sony had launch exclusivity for GTA:VC and GTA:SA. They lost that this generation. If anything, signs point to Sony pissing off Rockstar, not Microsoft. You never even back up things like:
And Rockstar has been publicly complaining about being forced to try to fit a free roaming city sized world into a smaller amount of space than last gen.
Where? I have no seen such a complaint -- and you'd think someone who hates MS enough to troll EVERY SINGLE GAMES POST might have a goddamn link handy for this. And don't tell me "MS is paying developers" unless you have a link for it. I love how everything MS does is shady or being paid for, but Sony is just this great consumer friendly corporation. I don't know what fairy tale land you live in, but in the world I live in, both companies fucking suck when it comes to the way they treat customers.
(/rant off)
I don't give half a rat's ass about any console title. How many people would buy this game for PC if they would release it first, and how much easier/faster would dev be for the PC? Why not just release the PC version, then limp along till the console versions are ready? John Q. Ignorant is still going to buy the console titles like hot cakes.
I hold very few opinions. I hold information based on observation and fact. If you wish to disagree, please use facts.
I said LAUNCH EXCLUSIVE you mental midget.
Take a reading comprehension class with your Sony shill money, asshole.
(For the record, last gen, I owned a PS2, and do not own either version of the X-Box.)
...is that they're renegotiating Jenna Jameson's contract for her return as the voice of Candy Suxxx.
(It costs extra for hot coffee time, after all.)
Nintendo charged enormous royalties for using their cartridge formats.
DVD-9, though limiting compared to newer formats, is still cheaper to create games on than using a higher capacity format like Blu-ray or HD-DVD. This was not the case with the N64 vs. PS1. Not only did you have a larger capacity medium with CD vs. carts, but it also cost a lot less for developers to go with CD.
If it had been cheaper to stay with carts vs CD back when N64 came out, you would not have seen developers jumping ship anywhere near as quickly.
I haven't noticed any game of mine on the PS3 that has loading problems. This is not surprising as the BD drive has a consistent data throughput which is frequently in excess of the variable throughput of the 360's DVD drive. I expect load times are similar as makes no difference. And no most games do not cache either but even if they did, good for them - the PS3 always has an HDD so why not take advantage of it.
Most filler games will probably still fit but there is going to be serious headaches for the "epic" titles to fit in that space. Only last week the PGR4 devs said they canned day / night options on their tracks since they didn't have the space to fit to pre-render the track data at the different lighting levels. While the GTA devs haven't said what their problem is, I would not be surprised if space was a major, major issue for them on the 360.
Football Manager 2006 came out on the 13th of April that year, and required the hard drive. So it's clearly possible to demand one, if you argue your case with Microsoft.
"I Know You Are But What Am I?"
Considering that they just announced GTA 4, and Rockstar hadn't exactly been dormant the past two years or so, I knew a delay was coming.
I remember reading a comment on slashdot saying this was UNPOSSIBLE!!1!
The AACS key is NOT 0xF606EEFD628B1CA427BEA93A9CA9773F
Wow.... I thought that was pretty damn funny.
You take it, I don't want it...
Let me redeem myself. I was so wrong. Big business never does anything with their best interest at hand and that was stupid of me. I'm ashamed of myself. This is how I act after all the PS3 has done for me, putting food on the table, helping take care of Grandma last year. I'm sorry Sony, I'm sorry PS3 fans :( Please mod this one down too, I deserver it.
Man, sorry again for this, I don't know what I was thinking. Sony execs etc. are always right. The PS3 will have the bestest Christmas ever!! If someone can release Rock, Paper, Scissors I'd take the cell plunge right now.
Thanks, I hadn't heard anything was allowed to do that already.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Man, what's with the mods today? Suddenly everyone's afraid to hit the "funny" button.
It's like someone hooked up some mousey nerd with a bunch of mod po- oh sweet lord...
+5, Truth
Honestly, I'm surprised any developer is doing Pre-rendered FMV's with the current gen systems. Why not do everything with the in game engine? The graphics look great to begin with, it saves space on the disk, less/ no load times between the switch, and it doesn't break the immersion.
With very few exceptions (something like Rogue Squadron II ) I'd be happier to see FMV's go away.
here is such a complaint, straight from the mouth of Sam Houser. I used to think this disc space issue was a silly argument, but then I think of how pathetic the gamecube was when it came to cross-platform games with video (Kelly Slater looked like it had video encoded in Realmedia). I still think procedurally generated textures will save a ton of space in future games, and the choice to include blu-ray inflated the cost of the PS3 to a level that hurts its adoption a great deal. That said, look at each successive generation of video games and you'll see a pattern of exponentially greater storage requirements. Atari games were only a few kilobytes, Nintendo cartridges were a few hundred kilobytes, SNES/Genesis were a few megs, N64 cartridges were 4-64 megs and saturn/ps1 were hundreds of megs (CD-sized), PS2/XBox were CD/DVD and up to ~7 gigs (the gamecube was a less successful and somewhat niche system which used a low-storage proprietary media format that may have indeed hurt them in that generation). In fact, with the exception of the few PS2 games that were CD-based, I think Microsoft is the first company to stay with the same media format (and all its limitations) on a consecutive generation of hardware and it's really one of the reasons I don't think of the 360 as next-gen, maybe half-next (and no i'm not a PS3 fanboy, I'm too poor). I'm not sure if this will hurt Microsoft in the long run or the overall quality of cross-platform games that have to aim for a more common denominator storage requirement. However, It's certainly not something to be dismissed.
So if I'm a software developer and I want to exploit a little spin, I tell you that the game is 3 years off and I deliver it in 2 and a half, you're happier than if I had promised the software in 2 years and I deliver in a 2 and a half?
C'mon now. Think it through.
I mean the thing that made GTA III, IIIa, and IIIb so great were the framerate, art, and general next-gen-ness.
Since sarcasm doesn't travel well through the IP ether, let me just point it out here.
I'd rather they fix those issues rather than release a piece of crap on the market.
And few fans of the series would think otherwise. But the problem isn't that the game as a whole is too far from completition, the problem is that the PS3 has been lagging behind more and more (hence why we've never seen a single screenshot of the PS3 build of the game) to the point that while they could get the Xbox 360 version in time, they wouldn't be able to do so with the PS3 version, and due to their agreements they can't put one version out before the other (imagine the major blow to the PS3 if the Xbox 360 had GTA IV monthes before it would!).
You just got troll'd!
Actually they didn't say that, Sony did, and PGR4 Devs came out immediately to argue this. They chose to do it to give a broader depth of weather changes and reality, not because they ran out of space. The link eludes me right, now since I am at work, but I think it was on qj.net.
Game developers are clearly feeling the pinch with DVD-9 and this is no surprise considering the size is increasingly inadequate.
Really? Here are some leaked specs of the 360. But feel free to disagree. Here is one way to prove otherwise - find a torrent site hosting 360 games and locate a torrent containing an uncompressed iso that exceeds 7gb. I suggest Blue Dragon since that spans 3 discs making it fairly likely that disks 1 & 2 are close to full and therefore indicative of the maximum capacity.
Oh, Oblivion? That game where the developers had to put the data on the disc twice, 'cause Blu-Ray's seek times are so damn shitty?
Nice try there, skippy. Try getting in touch with reality next time.
My sig can beat up your sig.