Take this as you will- industry analyst Michael Pachter went on record saying he believes the game Grand Theft Auto IV was delayed due to problems with programming the game for the PlayStation 3. because of this, both the PS3 and XBox 360 versions of the game have been delayed until Q2 2008. The XBox 360 version gets delayed due to contractual obligations preventing it being released early on other platforms.

"We think it is likely that the Rockstar team had difficulty in building an exceptionally complicated game for the PS3, and failed to recognise how far away from completion the game truly was until recently," said Pachter.

"We think it is also likely that Take-Two had a contractual commitment to Sony that it would not favour competitor Microsoft by launching the Xbox 360 version of GTA IV prior to launching the PS3 version, and believe that any delay of the PS3 version necessitated a delay of the Xbox 360 version," he added.

It is his feeling this could shake investor confidence in Take-Two Interactive even after steps were put in place to improve their system for green-lighting games for production.

"Take-Two management stumbled badly for the first time during their tenure," says Pachter.

"While the delay of GTA IV was clearly not the fault of new management, we believe that it should have been better understood several months ago, and should have been communicated to investors much earlier than today.

"The company has begun an initiative to improve the green light process for new projects, but given the delays of Manhunt and GTA, its process for monitoring projects under development appears to be a failure," he said.

Whenever I see that Michael Pachter's name connected with a gaming news article, I know better than to trust its contents (Nothing against you Lyndon, for posting it). In the past, he has been dead wrong on various things he has said. Yet for some reason, everything the guy says makes it onto all the gaming sites news feeds.

With that said, why would Rockstar, a company that had previously been exclusive to Playstation for many many years, suddenly have trouble designing a game to work with its "Home" system? I mean, does that not sound ridiculous? The jump from PS2 to PS3 may be a stretch in terms of work, but to think that SCEA just says heck with you guys, figure it out yourselves - that is dumb.

Which is why I do not believe Pachter's argument. I think the more likely scenario here is that Rockstar simply isn't going to have the game ready and in the form it needs to be to ship by October. Could the Manhunt debacle have been a setback to Rockstar? I'm sure it was, and has probably caused them to have to rethink whatever strategy they had for GTA. Maybe GTA IV was already pushing the limits towards a strong M rating, and they didn't want to push their luck with the ESRB.

Overall, I am very disappointed that the game will not come out on its originally planned release date, as I have been a diehard Rockstar fan for years. But I also doubt that it will take as long to come out as has been suggested. I think the new date they threw out there was simply to buy themselves plenty of extra time, so that they can turn around and surprise us with a much closer release date.

And you know what, I should be an industry analyst, if all it takes to be one is to post ones opinion on a forum. Pachter Schmachter

After following the game industry for what feels like forever, the delay of this game just follows the exact same pattern of almost every other AAA title released on all of the consoles over the years.

There will be many more delays announced before Christmas.

Personally I think its a good thing, I have seen way too many games that have HAD to be released on a specific date (usually to tie in with a blockbuster movie release) suffer because of this.

Comments like these are always going to be speculation, the developers don't want to alienate themselves with gamers, or game companies... they want everyone to buy their games.

Maybe we should set off our own rumour... if enough people believe it, then it must be true :-)