Going "Gold" in less than six days...

[Tyranthraxus]

This may seem unrelated at first...

The Expansion pack for Zoo Tycoon 2 just went gold...

So?

It's release date is the 18th.

Civ IV's release date is the 24th (Shipping date anyway). If manufacturing time is equivalent between Take 2 and Microsoft then you could say that Civ IV will probably go GOLD within 6 days.

My guess would be this Friday for Civ IV to go gold. Unless the ship date slips.

[Locutus]

Some games are gold for over a month, some for barely a week. The dates of one game don't say anything about the dates of another, but obviously if Civ4 is going to be released on the 25th it will have to go gold before the 20th, so you can't be very far off (but that's stating the obvious).

[Nikolai]

Echoing Locutus, but here's for hoping it happens soon.

[Addled Platypus]

I have said it once
I have said it twice

and now I will say it again

just ship it

[Adagio]

As Locutus said "going gold" doesn't always mean that the game will be out x days later, but I hope you're right

[Joseph]

They have said that Civilization sold more than 6 million copies. Do they mean Civ 1, 2, and 3 sold more than?
If it is only 6 million for all 3, than I think they will only burn about 2 million for the first sale.
The first stores to carry the game will be EB, Software Etc and some others that I have not hear of.
Take 2 will be watching those sales to see if they need to burn more copies.

Target, Wal Mart, Best Buy, Costco, Sam Club, etc. will not get the game for a week or two or maybe more after it is shipped.

I wonder if T2 will tell us how many copies were sold in the first week, month or a year from now.