Before you start shedding tears of joy, let us tell you that the game has reached India but is, as of now, stuck at the Mumbai customs. Our friends over at Gaming Indians have been in constant touch with the people concerned, both at Take2 and e-Xpress Interactive and the news doing the rounds right now is that the game has finally made it to the Indian shores. Considering the general apathy of the customs as far as the Indian gaming community is concerned, it can take anywhere between 7-10 working days before the games clear customs and are ready to hit the shelves across the country.

While gamers here would love nothing better then get their hands bloody with someone from e-Xpress Interactive, it would be unfair to put all the blame on their shoulders alone, considering Take2 decided to concentrate more on the European markets and redirect the copies to them instead. When questioned by one of the GI users via email about the delay on the Take2 website, this is what they had to say, wrong grammar and all:

the game will be released accordingly (sic) to the government. It is not our choice to create release dates.

Nice! While the Indian government can be blamed for a whole lot of things, pinning the GTA4 delay on them is taking things a bit too far. While Take2 waits for the Indian government to “create” release dates, the local retailers over here are having a field day importing the copy from others parts of the world and selling them at a premium. Such copies have been reported to sell at even at Rs.1000 over the marked price (Rs.2499 for Xbox 360 and Rs.2999 for PS3).

It will be ironic that when Take2 and e-Xpress Interactive finally manage to get the game on the shelves here, there won’t be any original buyers left who were all worked up about the supposed Day 1 release here. While the publishers and distributors are busy putting the blame on every one but them, we, the gamers end up getting the shaft, which truly is the sad state of affairs.

Editors Note: GTA 4 is scheduled to hit the Indian shelves on 19th May 2007.

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• bobby sandhu Says:
  May 12th, 2008 at 7:53 pm

  yes yes yes.. wooh woooh woooh … hhhhhhhhhh

• scythe Says:
  May 12th, 2008 at 9:28 pm

  now i feell bad for getting rid of my 360… anyway - 7-10 weeks? that’s about all the time i have left now! FUCK! FUCK!! FUUUCCKKK!!!!!

• Tubadoor Says:
  May 13th, 2008 at 3:54 pm

  “Considering the general apathy of the customs as far as the Indian gaming community is concerned”

  HAHAHAH.. seriously?
  Who approves this?

• mogambo Says:
  May 13th, 2008 at 6:21 pm

  does anyone know if the version being released here is the censored or uncensored one? if its the censored one, looks like i’ll have to boycott buying games in india as i already have done with boycotting films in the theatre… rally against censorship!

• teh_gunnerer Says:
  May 13th, 2008 at 6:35 pm

  This customs story is something I’m totally not buying. This was the original reason given to me by several “insiders” in the last week of April.

• Cody Says:
  May 14th, 2008 at 1:41 am

  @Mogambo: The version releasing over here is the uncensored version. Only the Australian version will be censored where a cene in which Niko sticks a gun in someones ass and the ability to pan around the car while being with service girls has been removed.

• L’Inde entre de plus en plus dans l’age du jeu vidéo | Game Charts Says:
  May 14th, 2008 at 9:43 pm

  [...] juste quinze de jours de retard, vraisemblablement pour des raisons d’approvisionnement (cf. The Angry Pixel ). -News-, [...]