Ah, Metal Gear Solid 4: Guns Of The Patriots has fueled many forum debates. From topics ranging from if the game will eventually be ported from PS3 to 360 to if the Xbox 360 can even handle running MGS4, it has been quite a heated exchange for fans of the series and their respective console.

More gasoline was added to the fire when MGS4 assistant producer Ryan Payton said in an interview with Reuters that in order for the game to be profitable, MGS4 would have to sell 1 million copies on the first day of its release. Fanboys, analysts, videogame editors, and forum jockey’s were left scratching their heads wondering why MGS4 could only turn a profit if a million were sold on its release date. The fires of discussion continued to burn and speculation raged on.

Payton has now retracted his statements in a recent Bionic Commando Podcast and even denies ever saying that MGS4 would need to sell a million. Payton says: “I don’t even know how many figures we’d need to sell to be profitable,” and adds “More importantly, that’s not something you really talk about in an interview. I’ve been trying to contact Kemp Powers over at Reuters to see, I don’t know if he recorded it on tape, but I’d love to hear it. So we can set the record straight.”

Now I don’t know who said what, or if it was off the record, or if his alleged statement was just a presumption by Reuters. But this comes off as kind of suspicious, in the sense that these statements were put out there by Reuters ages ago and Payton is just now getting around to refuting their merit. I’m sure we’ll be hearing a ton more as this continues to develop.