One of the bigger difficulties that we face all the time that people don’t really think about are the gray areas of decision-making. It can be very difficult to balance between staying true to the original and making it somewhat palatable to modern gamers. We are constantly trying to find ways to maintain challenge while simultaneously lowering frustration and confusion. We don’t want to be hand-holding, but at the same time we are very cognizant of the much lower threshold of patience people have with games now a days.

Our team has a great mix of purists and modernists, and we constantly argue about these types of issues. Ultimately, we all agree on the balance we want to hit, and its great to have people on the team representing various points of view and helping us maintain that balance.

"When we announced the release date of BioShock Infinite in March, we felt pretty good about the timing.

"He said: Since then, we've come to realise that some specific tweaks and improvements will make Infinite into something even more extraordinary. Therefore, to give our talented team the time they need, we've decided to move the game's release to February 26, 2013. We wanted to let our loyal (and very patient!) fans know this as soon as possible."

Levine continued: "I won't kid you: BioShock Infinite is a very big game, and we're doing things that no-one has ever done in a first-person shooter. We had a similar experience with the original BioShock, which was delayed several months as our original ship date drew near.

"Why? Because the Big Daddies weren't the Big Daddies you've since come to know and love. Because Andrew Ryan's golf club didn't have exactly the right swing. Because Rapture needed one more coat of grimy Art Deco.

"The same principle now applies to BioShock Infinite."

"We are beginning a new saga with Halo 4 and embarking on a journey that will encompass the next decade of Halo games and experiences," commented Microsoft Studios VP Phil Spencer.

"Millions of fans worldwide have been eagerly awaiting the opportunity to step back into the boots of Master Chief, and, with Halo 4 leading the charge, we're confident 2012 will be the most successful year in Xbox history."

For us it is all about the community. Are you active in the community? Are you playing CS now? To reward the most active players, this week we are giving Beta access to the top 7000 active players around the world in CS:S and CS 1.6. We are also giving out additional keys to the top 500 players of CS:GO.

We also want to include the community at large so we are reaching out to prominent community sites and giving them keys to distribute to their communities over the coming weeks.