As posted in the news section, pretty soon we'll know whether EA can takeover Take-2 before GTA4's release date.

According to Pachter (bear with me), EA would have an economic incentive to delay the game if they manage to purchase Take Two, although he didn't give more details.

What do you think this economic incentive could be? Launching the game in the holiday season instead? Do you think EA would do such a thing?

Having pre-ordered the game, I'm certainly a bit worried.

I don't know that they could delay it. Retailers would already have shelled out money by now. The game must have gone gold a while ago. Remember how early Halo 3 went gold to make all the copies?

The costs they'd have to eat to delay the game would be pretty big. Plus the longer they delay the more they risk leaks if the game is already printed.

The game launches in 2 weeks, no takeover bid will be finished within that time, and since T2 management is against the deal, they sure as hell won't delay it.


So not gonna happen.

Would they really wanna piss off millions of people?

......nevermind, they already have...

Notice that EA seems very anxious to close the deal before GTA4 launches, they have said that many times. The tender offer is over on the 18th, although I don't know if there will be formalities standing in the way after that.

@starcraft: That is a valid remark, I hope that stops it from happening.

At the end of the day, the same number of people will buy GTAIV as would have bought it if it launched in the holidays, as it's that kind of game.  The issue is, a larger number of people would have bought it up-front for full price if it had launched later. 

EA would have to decide if the costs they'd have to eat are bigger or smaller than the losses from second hand sales and market pressure-induced GTAIV price drops that come about from now till the holidays. 

I'd rather be afraid, that they release it even if it's faulty and beta-like and wouldn't give the devs enough time to polish it.

No, it takes months and months to complete the whole takeover process not two weeks.

Heck no. Takeovers just don't happen in a few days.

I'm not worried that they'd delay 4. I'm worried that all subsequent GTA games will suck dick.