MTV.com has recently published an interview with the president of Nintendo America, Reggie Fils-Aime, in this interview Reggie specifically talks about M rated games on Nintendo’s forthcoming console. Of particular interest is this passage:

We're reaching out to every publisher, frankly every day. I'll be spending some time later today with the folks over at Take Two to see what type of support they can give our console. ... The fact is there will be M-rated content on the Wii console. EA has already announced that they're bringing 'The Godfather' to our console. And we want every single best-selling game to be available on Wii. Whatever that content is.

It was announced a few months back that 2K Sports (another Take-Two developer) were supporting the Wii, so it doesn’t come as too much of a surprise that Nintendo and Take-Two are looking further into other developers jumping on board.

From what we are told, Manhunt 2 was being developed on current-gen technology, taking the game over to the Nintendo Wii would probably be a good move if this was the case, seeing as how the consoles more revolutionary features are in its functionally rather than graphical horsepower. A game like Manhunt is practically perfect for a console such as the Wii. Fingers crossed on this one, maybe the game will see the light of day after all.

Take-Two Interactive have issued their third quarter fiscal 2006 financial results, I imagine you are most likely interested in the upcoming schedule more than anything else, so we will go right to that. So what can we expect from Rockstar in the months leading up to the year end:

Fiscal 2006 fourth quarter releases from Rockstar Games include Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories for PSP and Bully for PlayStation 2, both scheduled for release in late October.

No mention of an un-announced title. Looks like a Manhunt free year for sure, at this point I wouldn’t bet on even as much as an announcement of the title in 2006. Moving on to 2007/08 looks a little more promising:

For 2007 and 2008, the Company anticipates a strong next generation lineup from Rockstar Games including the simultaneous launch of Grand Theft Auto IV on PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 in October 2007, along with sequels to several of Rockstar's other successful franchises.

We have gone through this one before. You can check out our previous thoughts on the situation here.

...and will introduce a new PSP title based on a premier Rockstar brand.

Looking at everything we have been told about Manhunt 2, it is fair to assume it is based on current-gen technology which would lend it much more to the PSP than the PS3. If we look at the release schedule for PS2 Rockstar North titles it looks a little something like this:

• 2001 – Grand Theft Auto 3
• 2002 – Grand Theft Auto: Vice City
• 2003 – Manhunt
• 2004 – Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas

Then the PSP was introduced, and we where given Grand Theft Auto: (city) Stories. The release schedule thus far looks like this:

• 2005 – Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories
• 2006 – Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories
• 2007 – Unannounced, possibly Manhunt?
• 2008 – Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas Stories? Highly unlikely not to happen.

With GTA: IV targeted at 2007, I believe we can safely assume that a PSP version isn’t a requirement as they would be competing with themselves, so boosting San Andreas Stories into 2008 seems like a far more feasible proposition. If you look at the GTA: (city) Stories so far you will notice they where developed at Rockstar Leeds with supervision provided by Rockstar North. The Manhunt sequel was rumoured to have been in development at Rockstar Vienna (now closed) with supervision by Rockstar North.

All of this doesn’t necessarily say that the next Manhunt title will be a PSP title; many games have made the upgrade over the past 12 months from current-gen to next-gen development and there is still the possibility of a PS2 release, although it is no spring chicken the console is likely to hold a large portion of the market share for a few years to come and there is still plenty of life left in the console yet, a quick look at the upcoming schedule proves that. Then there is the option that none of us want to hear, that the game is cancelled. From what we have been told this is not the case and development is still on going.

What all this confirms is that there is still unannounced titles in the work for both next-gen console and hand held gaming platforms and that Manhunt 2 won’t be released this year, although we pretty much knew that already just by looking at Rockstars release schedule.

Source: Take-Two Interactive