After many months of patience, Electronic Arts has officially ended its bid for Grand Theft Auto publisher, Take Two. Shares fell approximately 25 percent as a result, but Take Two’s CEO is not worried. In fact, he says: “We remain focused on creating value for our stockholders and our consumers.”
Well, best of luck, Take Two. I’m glad you weren’t gobbled up, but I’m hoping you can stay afloat without them.
I believe we saw it on the cover of some PC magazine a few weeks back, but now Rockstar themselves have made it official: GTAIV is coming to PC North American and European shores on November 18th and 24th respectively.
Here’s the official PR for those who’re interested:
For the hardcore gamer demographic, Nintendo’s press conference was a bore. For those with an open mind and curious as to how Nintendo will continue to broaden the gaming market, it was something worthwhile. Sorta.
The press conference was a mixed bag and just like Microsoft’s press conference, it’s a lot more exciting to read the list. Enjoy.
Good news. Rockstar released a patch for both the Xbox 360 and PS3 versions of GTAIV. Bad news? It looks like it’s geared for multiplayer only. Who plays the multiplayer of GTAIV regularly anyways?
For those who care, here are the patch notes:
According to Take-Two’s financial report, which reported some mighty profits, GTAIV’s Xbox 360 exclusive downloadable content will be delayed until quarter one of 2009. On the real world calendar, that means it could arrive any time between November 2008 and January 2009.
Why? “The reason we moved it is more about portfolio balance than anything else… the delay is not about development issues.”
Let’s hope it’s worth the wait and that interest hasn’t waned.
What’s worse? The drunk driving simulation in GTAIV or actually driving drunk in GTAIV? Owen Wood from Kotaku puts it to the test with some entertaining results.
The drunk driving simulation in GTAIV is dizzying, but it’s not impossible to overcome. I did try driving drunk for a few minutes, but the novelty wore off and it became annoying.
Check it. Some ironic luck this week. Most of it making itself known today.
Want to play MGS2
Fortunate: Found Metal Gear Solid: Essential Collection for $26.99 CAD.
Unfortunate: Received two copies of MGS3 and MGS — no MGS2
Resolution: Will exchange tomorrow.
$100 000 for 15 months of work. That’s what Michael Hollick, voice of Niko Bellic, made. That’s it. No more. Voice actors don’t receive residuals for games like they do for other entertainment mediums.
“For instance, our contracts say nothing about the use of voices for promotional purposes over the Internet,” Mr. Hollick said. “The first G.T.A. IV trailer generated something like 40 million hits online, and that’s my voice all over it, and I get nothing. If that were a radio spot, I would have. Same thing for the TV ads. I recorded those lines for the game, but now they’re all over television. It’s another gray area.”
Sucks for him, but on the bright side, he is known now. If all else fails, he could always rent himself like Roman did.
After spending 40+ hours with Grand Theft Auto IV, I thought I experienced enough of it to really share my views on this monolith sized game. Like many folks out there, I adore the game. More so than the previous installments where I found much of the praise to be misplaced — they were good games, but for good the sum of their parts and not the finer details. Did GTAIV change all that? Mostly.
(more…)
Another record was set by GTAIV. This one, however, is quite significant. After a week of sales, Rockstar’s baby raked in $500 million. That’s a lot of millions. Pirates of The Carribean: At World’s End did $404 million and Halo 3 did $310 million. As for copies sold? 6 million units were sold worldwide.
Shit. I was shocked.
