Gran Turismo 5 delayed again

In what will surely prove to be the least surprising piece of gaming news this week, Sony has announced that Gran Turismo 5 has been delayed again. The much-anticipated latest addition to the long-running simulation series was due to be launched on November 2 in the US with Japanese and UK debuts following the day after. However, the project has already been held back several times, with a previous Japanese launch date pencilled in for March 2010.

In a curt blogpost on the Official PlayStation site, SCEA producer Taku Imasaki states:

We sincerely apologize to GT fans for the delay, however, creator Kazunori Yamauchi and the team at Polyphony Digital want to make certain they are creating the perfect racing experience, and we are confident that this ambitious game will exceed expectations when it launches.

Imasaki promises that the release will be, "this holiday season", although fans will no doubt now be bracing themselves for further disappointment.

GT5 was originally announced at the E3 games event back in 2006 and had already been in development for two years before that. Last year, in an interview with AutoWeek, the game's creator Kazunori Yamauchi claimed that the game had cost $60m to develop; that figure will have certainly risen in the following 12 months.

So any takers on March 2011?