Delays are something we must unfortunately face, but when that delay occurs to probably the most anticipated title sales wise, instantly the holiday season sales are a different matter. While major hitter Halo 3 is still as far as we know coming along for a Fall release, GTA IV, historically a huge seller is the first numbered game in the series for quite a few years, and is releasing for both major consoles. Needless to say, millions upon millions of holiday sales are expected.

Unfortunately now Take Two has announced that GTA IV will be moving to the second quarter of 2008. That puts it somewhere in the midst of January-March 2008, since Take Two’s fiscal year ends on October 31st 2007. Beyond the obvious disappointments that we won’t be playing GTA IV this holiday, this also dramatically effects sales. Those celebrating are small titles which will inevitably sell better without the hit title GTA IV to compete with. Both PS3 and 360 have weakened holiday lineups. While I think Microsoft has enough going for it to roll with the punches, this was undoubtedly a big part of the Sony plan for the holidays. With the dirty deed of pushing back the title from this holiday, it’s only likely that other delays are possible, meaning GTA IV could potentially be a year out from now, hugely disappointing for fans of the series.