I have a sneaky feeling we’ve not heard the last of the Gran Turismo 5 delay, something that’s dominated the gaming news for the last 24 hours.
If you’ve missed our coverage of this incredible event, it goes a bit like this:
- It’s delayed in the US, no, wait, it’s delayed in Japan, no, wait, it’s delayed everywhere!!1!11
- I blog about the whole thing whilst eating pizza and drinking tequila
- We find out the decision to delay the game was only made the day before
Unmatched, I’m sure you’ll agree. Still, at least our servers managed this time, which is probably something good out of something bad. However, the tirade isn’t over: Studio boss Kazunori, silent on Twitter since the 21st of September, Tweeted last night on the subject to say “sorry”, twice.
He went on to say that the reason for the delay was to “finalize some of the game’s more complicated systems” – hardly the most in-depth reason for the last minute shift of the game’s date.
He also said that he didn’t think the game would be out later than the end of the year. “I believe we won’t keep you waiting until then,” he said in repy to a Tweet from a follower.
The Tweets have either since been removed, or Andriasang, who picked up on them overnight, has gone crazy. Here, I think, is the content of the tweet, from here:
延期しちゃってごめん。複雑なシステムを落ち着かせるのに手間がかかったせいです。ほ んとごめんね。みんな、すまない・・・。ちょっとまってて。
Kaz’s ‘explanation’ flies in the face of that of Sony spokesperson Satoshi Fukuoka, though, who cites ‘production issues‘ as the reason for the delay.
The more I think about this, the more I think it’s just to bundle in firmware 3.50. If anyone from Sony wants to get in touch to confirm or deny this, you know where we are. Bring tea.
JamboGT
Read these tweets and their translations this morning when I woke up.
GT5 was the only game I intend to get between now and Christmas and this doesn’t really change anything, fortunately I have F1 2010 ( and the TSA championship ;) ) to keep me busy.
I think the big problem with the delay and sometimes the problem with Sony in general is the lack of details they give in these occasions. They always seem to be hiding something, even if the reason is relatively acceptable.
JamboGT
Upon re-reading I thought that instead of lack of details I think vagueness is a better term.
Michi
The game is ready, its a sales thing, making the most money they can get from launch i guess
But whatever happens, it’ll still sell, but ah well F1 it is!
Yahavage
I think you’ll be right on the bundling 3.50 in being the reason for the delay. If they’ve spent so long making the game as close to perfect as they can, they probably don’t want some one just coming along and haxing teh trophies or pirating the game, or whatever. Well, I guess thats kinda good, still sucks though :(
3shirts
I still think it’s a poor reason to delay. Just start shipping the ones without it and add it into the next batch your produce. Surely the percentage of those that receive copies without the 3.50 bundled in who are also jailbroken PS3 users is gonna be small and not enough to make a dent on the huge sales this thing is gonna make.
teflon
Is the 3.50 the one that was out for the last 3 weeks? Well, then that’s not going to be it at all. It could be to sync it up with a 3.51 or 3.60 firmware update, but not 3.50.
After all, MoH was tied to 3.50, and that wasn’t delayed. It’s just a little it of code at the start to check the firmware version…
Raider197
He’s been silent since the “21nd”?
gernboes
of all the delays gt5 has suffered, this is easily the worst. because we had for the first time a hard release date and it was only 3 weeks away. not only is everybody pissed (not that it will stop them from buying) but i think the just threw away their last bit of credibility considering release dates.
they can just stopn announcing dates from now on, because if they do, everybody will go “yeah, right…”
i will not even believe the game is released when i have it in my hands. i will have to put it in my ps3 and play it, for fear that it says something along the lines “we where not quite ready, please wait for a game-enabling patch around Q1 2011”
Owendarko
If this is delayed till 2011…you can kiss goodbye either Motorstorm Apocalypse, LBP2 or Killzone 3 making their original dates. I’m guessing Killzone 3 will be delayed.
The actual delay though not life-threatening is extremely embarrassing from a business perspective. They have literally set at least 3 dates in stone which have then been changed..and this last one is taking it a step too far now.
The game will NEVER be perfect…nothing is perfect in life..you’ll always find something wrong.
gazo69
So until FW 3.50 is out we won’t see GT5?
BIGAL-1992
Just release the bloody game.
Grey_Ghost13
I’m starting to really doubt that this will be out this year now! “We plan to get it out” “We don’t think we will make you wait that long” just doen’t inspire me with confidence that we will see it! I’m all for releasing it with 3.5 to combat the pirates, and I think this may be the reason. Satoshi states production issues while Kaz states finalizing more complicated systems, well az has allready stated that the game could have been released half a year ago if he wanted. I think that the techs working on 3.5 just got it ready sooner than expected by polyphony and the went ahead and pressed aload of disks, know sony want it released with it.