The Grand Theft Auto series is extremely secretive when it comes to new entries in the long running franchise, but DNS IP snoopers have spied some domains. They're 'linked' with Rockstar's grandtheftauto5.com DNS IP, which means these spoof sites are likely big hints of fake products and services to come.
A casting call page has alleged leaked for Grand Theft Auto V according to reports, which means we know some of the characters we expect to cross. There's an 18-25 "liberal young male" railing against Republicans, a 30-40 "white creepy man" hateful of technology and James Pedeaston returns.
More evidence is mounting for the current development of Grand Theft Auto V, and one particular casting item makes it incontrovertible.
Huge blockbuster budgets involve spending a lot of publisher cash before "a single penny is earned back," and that concerns a lot of people warns David Braben. With the rise of social and online gaming the triple-A blockbuster isn't the only means to earn big anymore he notes. Games are also "better suited" for ad revenue.
Rockstar Games are yet to officially announce that Grand Theft Auto V exists, although Dan Houser has said they're busy with the game's goliath script. Apparently Gamestop Germany reckons it could be ready by January 15th, 2012. This June at E3 2011 Rockstar are expected to reveal GTA V to the world.
Metroid Prime developer Retro Studios is working on a Nintendo Wii 2 videogame according to sources, and they were one of the first to get a dev kit for it. Elsewhere in 'wish it were so' news is that Nintendo are buttering up Rockstar Games to get Grand Theft Auto V launching on the Wii 2, alongside rivals.
Fiscal year 2011 for publisher Take-Two is flush with cash thanks to a year-on-year net revenue growth of 49 percent to $1.14 billion; a profit too. There was no $108.1m loss this fiscal now passed; instead they made $53.8m. Red Dead Redemption has sold 8.5m copies since launch. What's next?
GameSpot is reporting that sources close to Rockstar and Take-Two Interactive have confirmed that Grand Theft Auto V is "well under way" and that development "is already having final touches such as minigames being applied to it." The sources say that the game will see a 2012 release and that the game's scale is massive, claiming, "It's the big one."
Gamers who play Grand Theft Auto IV on their PC can now download a mod that will give the game a serious bump in graphic fidelity.
Official Xbox Magazine's rumor section seems to think that the long-awaited announcement of Grand Theft Auto V will be made this Summer.
Last week's iCEnhancer 1.2 mod for Grand Theft Auto IV spurred on Steam purchases of the game, launching the years-old game into the Steam Top 10 Weekly Sales.
The UK's Gamestation, owned by retailer GAME, listed Grand Theft Auto V on its release schedule before an updated listing had it promptly deleted. It also had a hit-n-run appearance as a pre-order. Rumour pegs this summer for a full announcement of GTA V followed by a likely release in 2012.
Publisher Take-Two is a "very attractive investment for anybody," thanks to their stellar line-up of owned intellectual properties, boasts COO Karl Slatoff. They're "continuing to invest" in the "best IP out there" like GTA and BioShock. Take-Two is "fantastic" on its own, and great for "any kind of investor".
Worldwide technology director Julien Merceron of Square Enix says we'll be witnessing "a big leap in graphics." Games striving for realism will lead the way. Studios will be leveraging "physically-based" rendering and lighting, he adds. We'll see "way more" difference in realistic games than "cartoony" ones.
Noticeably absent from Take-Two's Q1 fiscal 2012 results were any mention of Grand Theft Auto, however more unannounced titles will be revealed soon. Speculation is even higher now that Rockstar will unveil Grand Theft Auto V, releasing it from April 2012 onwards. Strauss Zelnick avoided the 'GTA question'.
Publisher Take-Two is up to something. Back in April they registered the domain citizenskywatch.com, and now a placeholder has gone live at the site. They've also started up a twitter feed and there appears to be a YouTube channel as well. Is this an all new IP ready to be launched, or a GTA viral organisation?
Take-Two head Strauss Zelnick revealed that overall the Grand Theft Auto franchise has shipped a huge 114 million copies to retailers during its lifetime. Grand Theft Auto IV has cleared 22 million of that grand total. CEO Zelnick also gave away some other key title numbers, although L.A. Noire is missing.
Once again Rockstar's Grand Theft Auto franchise has been typecast as the villain of the piece as a 23-year-old was said to have talked about it before killing. The Metro newspaper ran the headline: 'Sailor's 'GTA gun spree' on nuke sub'. The Royal Navy sailor shot dead one Lt Cmdr and seriously wounded another.
The 'British Design 1948-2012: Innovation in the Modern Age' exhibition at the Victoria & Albert Museum will be including quite a bit of video and computer gaming history. Among the exhibits will be Tomb Raider's Lara Croft, LittleBigPlanet's Sackboy, Grand Theft Auto IV's Nico Bellic, Psygnosis' Lemmings, the original space simulation Elite, as well as the ZX Spectrum and an Apple MacIntosh designed by Jonathan Ive.
Rockstar co-founder Dan Houser states that the company has barely scratched the surface of what's achievable in open world games, and that there's plenty to do with the Grand Theft Auto template.