Surprised no one saw this yet ...

Firstly, the developers have been busy testing various plots and have even considered having the entire world unlocked for the player at the start of the game. GTA veterans will know that one of the staples of previous GTA games has been locked areas that can only be accessed by progressing past certain missions or pivotal story elements.

Some fans enjoyed this system, as it gave them incentive to move through the story and continue playing the game, while other fans found the system somewhat limiting and unecessary.

Secondly, and more importantly, Rockstar is aiming for a multiplayer component to compliment the singleplayer, with up to 16 players fighting it out in various multiplayer modes.

Source: http://gamernode.com/News/4628-GTA-IV-will-have-16-multiplayer-for-PS3-and-360/index.html

Delay vindicated? 

Yeah, I saw that.

Wondering what kind of multiplayer mode it would be though.

 just look up the GTAVC/SA multiplayer mod for the PC version. Probably will be something like that

Saw it and didn't particularly care. Hopefully it will add something to the game, otherwise I'll continue to assume it will be similar to GTAIII in that it's only fun when you cheat and that only lasts an hour at most (my personal opinion at least).

Is it just me or has hype for GTA IV deflated like anything..

That happens when a big-time game is delayed, doesn't show any new gameplay vids, doesn't release any information (until now), and has now been pushed behind loads of other great games (Halo, Uncharted, Mass Effect, Super Mario Galaxy, etc.)

There's too much other stuff to be excited about right now to spend too much time worrying about GTA IV.

I would love for them to implement an online co-op campaign to the game. That sounds like a lot of fun imho. Especially if the missions were designed specifically for 2 players.

But I do agree that the hype is way way down on GTA IV, and the reason why is posted above my post by Mr Rocketpig~

Can't wait for this game, best game ever. I've played the series for over 1500 hours atleast.

Wow, at least 1500 hours, that would come out to about 62.5 days. Not sure if that is something to be proud of, or ashamed of. I'm gonna go with the latter of the two.

Multiplayer for GTA is just a far fetched rumor, I'll believe it when I see it. Any online besides co-op would hurt the game. Death match or capture the flag just don't seem right for this series.