Random Shenmue III Thoughts

Ziming is not one of the four leaders, as confirmed by Suzuki back in 2014...despite the Kenji Miyawaki manga design bearing a striking resemblance to the silhouette in the Chiyoumen leader picture.
Oh, my bad. I didn't realize that. Was there anything else about Ziming in the interview? Do you happen you have a link?

Ren must have still had the fake one that he showed Ryo earlier.
Hmmm, this gave me a bit of a wild idea. What if, considering he's a bit of a shyster, Ren either swapped Ryo's mirror with the fake one before he handed it over to Niao Sun, or he managed to thieve it after the fact. The second scenario seems a lot less likely to me, but I went back to those cutsenes, because I remembered some fairly obvious differences between the fake and the original. On the docks, the fake has the phoenix painted in basically one color, and the stone seems less verdant. It does seem to be the original when Ryo hands it over to Niao Sun, but then when Ren throws what I think everyone has probably assumed to be the fake out of the castle, it also looks like it has the more detailed coloring on the phoenix. It's a little hard to see, though. That might make some sense, just in the way the mirror is focused on as it's in the air, but it would require some real tomfoolery from Ren.

Just as additional thought to chew on, Ren isn't shown in the cutscene where Ryo walks up to where he fights Ge--.
 
Hmmm, this gave me a bit of a wild idea. What if, considering he's a bit of a shyster, Ren either swapped Ryo's mirror with the fake one before he handed it over to Niao Sun, or he managed to thieve it after the fact. The second scenario seems a lot less likely to me, but I went back to those cutsenes, because I remembered some fairly obvious differences between the fake and the original. On the docks, the fake has the phoenix painted in basically one color, and the stone seems less verdant. It does seem to be the original when Ryo hands it over to Niao Sun, but then when Ren throws what I think everyone has probably assumed to be the fake out of the castle, it also looks like it has the more detailed coloring on the phoenix. It's a little hard to see, though. That might make some sense, just in the way the mirror is focused on as it's in the air, but it would require some real tomfoolery from Ren.

Just as additional thought to chew on, Ren isn't shown in the cutscene where Ryo walks up to where he fights Ge--.
Yeah, this is possible but I highly doubt it. Let's say that Ren did go through the trouble of swapping the mirrors behind Ryo's back. Why would he throw it out the window? The mirror would be lost. If he had given it to Lan Di, at least he would know who has it so that he could possibly try to steal it back in the future.

I also just don't know where the story would go if the Phoenix Mirror was completely lost. Assuming Ren's was still the fake, we know that Lan Di has the Dragon Mirror and Niao Sun has the Phoenix Mirror (Lan Di representing the emperor and Niao Sun representing the empress). Otherwise, Lan Di has the Dragon Mirror and the Phoenix Mirror is just lying somewhere outside of the old castle (possibly in the water). I just can't see this being the case.

Not only would it make the story even more convoluted, but I think it would really be out of character for Ren. I could see him pulling some shenanigans behind Ryo's back, but I can't see him literally throwing something that valuable away. If he really doesn't know where the real Phoenix Mirror is anymore, then why is he even still following Ryo? His internal monologue at the end was talking about treasure, so we know he still cares about that and isn't going with Ryo just because of their friendship.

An interesting video, with a few novel points raised on Shenmue’s lack of success particularly in the west. Thoughts?

It's an interesting video, but I don't know if I agree that 9/11 had anything to do with Shenmue's fate. I don't think that most Americans associate countries like Japan and China with Islamic countries like Afghanistan, even if they are all in Asia. It's not like it was released just before Pearl Harbor or something.

I also find it curious that he seems to be under the impression that Shenmue III concludes the series, saying things like "Yu Suzuki's Shenmue trilogy is complete" and "culminating with Shenmue III."
 
It's an interesting video, but I don't know if I agree that 9/11 had anything to do with Shenmue's fate. I don't think that most Americans associate countries like Japan and China with Islamic countries like Afghanistan, even if they are all in Asia. It's not like it was released just before Pearl Harbor or something.

I also find it curious that he seems to be under the impression that Shenmue III concludes the series, saying things like "Yu Suzuki's Shenmue trilogy is complete" and "culminating with Shenmue III."

Yeah I also don’t agree with his 9/11 thesis on polarization as we’ve seen very ‘Japanese’ games wildly successful in the west but few with contemporary Asian settings.

It appears he hadn’t finished the game and may be unaware Shenmue 3 didn’t conclude the series. His Metal Gear Solid deep dive videos are very interesting, be curious if he posts a Shenmue 3 review video.
 
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Yeah, this is possible but I highly doubt it. Let's say that Ren did go through the trouble of swapping the mirrors behind Ryo's back. Why would he throw it out the window? The mirror would be lost. If he had given it to Lan Di, at least he would know who has it so that he could possibly try to steal it back in the future.

I also just don't know where the story would go if the Phoenix Mirror was completely lost. Assuming Ren's was still the fake, we know that Lan Di has the Dragon Mirror and Niao Sun has the Phoenix Mirror (Lan Di representing the emperor and Niao Sun representing the empress). Otherwise, Lan Di has the Dragon Mirror and the Phoenix Mirror is just lying somewhere outside of the old castle (possibly in the water). I just can't see this being the case.

Not only would it make the story even more convoluted, but I think it would really be out of character for Ren. I could see him pulling some shenanigans behind Ryo's back, but I can't see him literally throwing something that valuable away. If he really doesn't know where the real Phoenix Mirror is anymore, then why is he even still following Ryo? His internal monologue at the end was talking about treasure, so we know he still cares about that and isn't going with Ryo just because of their friendship.
For sure, it would foul things up quite a bit. However, I think it would be reasonable for Ren to prefer chucking it into the woods over letting Lan Di have it, since the latter would sort of trigger the end-game. The idea has been that if Lan Di gets both mirrors, it's game over. Maybe Ren had some reason to believe that he could still find it after the fact. I would really prefer that it was the counterfeit, but now I can't seem to rule out the possibility that it wasn't, because the one in that cutscene doesn't look enough like the fake to me.


An interesting video, with a few novel points raised on Shenmue’s lack of success particularly in the west. Thoughts?

I found myself agreeing with a lot of what was being said, but as a persuasive essay, I don't know that all of the arguments together are compelling enough to convince me. I found it entertaining, though, and I'd be interested in seeing the review of Shenmue III that he mentions.
 
I wonder if this is something that can be fixed by playing the PC version on an SSD, but I find it odd how some NPCs on the base PS4 version of the game seem to take a while to pop in if you run. It's probably due to the PS4's slower HDD no doubt.
 
I played on PC (fairly beefy rig, with SSD storage), and aside from one time where the phone number page in the notebook bugged out when I was about to make a call, and soft locked the game, I haven’t encountered any of the technical issues that I’ve heard about. Never had any frame rate dips, or issues with NPCs popping in. I’ve also noticed in YouTube videos that there are sometimes some weird, jerky character animations in cutscenes on the PS4 that I never saw while playing.
 
I played on PC (fairly beefy rig, with SSD storage), and aside from one time where the phone number page in the notebook bugged out when I was about to make a call, and soft locked the game, I haven’t encountered any of the technical issues that I’ve heard about. Never had any frame rate dips, or issues with NPCs popping in. I’ve also noticed in YouTube videos that there are sometimes some weird, jerky character animations in cutscenes on the PS4 that I never saw while playing.
I've experienced some lag on PS4 Pro and many a character pop in. That's annoying.
 
I understand why people opted for the PS4 version, but it seemed like one of the underlying ideas behind it was that ‘Shenmue has always been a console game.’ That’s all well and good when the series was exclusive to a console, developed to target very specific hardware, but in this case it seems like they were targeting development for PC. At least it will probably be on heavy discount on Steam at some point. For anyone with the hardware to support it, I would definitely recommend the PC version. I actually backed it for the PS4, though, so part of me wishes it weren’t quite so rough on the console, for posterity reasons.
 
I understand why people opted for the PS4 version, but it seemed like one of the underlying ideas behind it was that ‘Shenmue has always been a console game.’ That’s all well and good when the series was exclusive to a console, developed to target very specific hardware, but in this case it seems like they were targeting development for PC. At least it will probably be on heavy discount on Steam at some point. For anyone with the hardware to support it, I would definitely recommend the PC version. I actually backed it for the PS4, though, so part of me wishes it weren’t quite so rough on the console, for posterity reasons.
I really want to get a good gaming PC to run Shenmue I, II, and III at their max settings. But that takes money...
 
I understand why people opted for the PS4 version, but it seemed like one of the underlying ideas behind it was that ‘Shenmue has always been a console game.’ That’s all well and good when the series was exclusive to a console, developed to target very specific hardware, but in this case it seems like they were targeting development for PC. At least it will probably be on heavy discount on Steam at some point. For anyone with the hardware to support it, I would definitely recommend the PC version. I actually backed it for the PS4, though, so part of me wishes it weren’t quite so rough on the console, for posterity reasons.

I played the demo thanks to Shadow service and playing in 60 FPS made a huge difference compared to the uncapped framerate we got as PS4 Pro users.

I’ve held off a second playthrough hoping to play on PC with mods, but the increased fluidity makes a big, big difference. For those unable to get a good PC rig, Shadow is a great alternative. Also the fact PS5 is working to get PS4 back library working is encouraging as this might allow us to play Shenmue 3 at increased resolutions and higher framerates.
 
I played the demo thanks to Shadow service and playing in 60 FPS made a huge difference compared to the uncapped framerate we got as PS4 Pro users.

I’ve held off a second playthrough hoping to play on PC with mods, but the increased fluidity makes a big, big difference. For those unable to get a good PC rig, Shadow is a great alternative. Also the fact PS5 is working to get PS4 back library working is encouraging as this might allow us to play Shenmue 3 at increased resolutions and higher framerates.
I've played with Shadow, it works well, but I want something that also isn't lagging based on my sometimes subpar internet.
 
I really want to get a good gaming PC to run Shenmue I, II, and III at their max settings. But that takes money...
Yeah, it definitely does, but if you're able to build one, getting an inexpensive system with highly decent specs at least was a pretty inexpensive proposition recently. (Not sure if the pandemic has changed this a bit.) It's a non-trivial investment regardless, that's for sure.

Also the fact PS5 is working to get PS4 back library working is encouraging as this might allow us to play Shenmue 3 at increased resolutions and higher framerates.
This would also be great. Hopefully that does come to pass.
 
I hung out with my brother this weekend and played S3. He liked the realism of the first two games, as well as the gambling in S2.
He made two playful comments I now can't unsee:

-"Why are there no cops in Japan and China?"

-(Regarding the kung fu shop where you buy the fancy move) "Only in Shenmue could you walk into a martial arts shop, without doors, that has a bunch of axes and swords readily available on a table"

So too, both of us agreed Chobu-Chan killed Zhao Sunming. (Really, he thought the game was a nice throwback and is buying a copy.)
 
I've played with Shadow, it works well, but I want something that also isn't lagging based on my sometimes subpar internet.

Yeah I played the rereleases using Shadow and it worked really well. I mean the increased latency did mean QTE’s were more challenging (not nearly as unforgiving as Shenmue 3) but outside of that even though I don’t have fastest connection, I was able to play them in 4K resolution no issue.

I understand now service has various tiers, so I’m certainly contemplating getting 1 month subscription so I can replay Shenmue 3, especially with some of the mods the community has released.
 

Totally different game, but perhaps this explains why Shenmue 3’s dub is the way it is. I think it most definitely does, in fact.
 
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Most of the NPCS in Shenmue 3 have the same two or three animations: head scratch, wave arms around, bob head, etc.. I suppose that made things easier.
 
Question for anyone who might know.

I‘m thinking about restarting the game and doing a full play through. I still haven’t played the story DLC and to be honest, I want to platinum the game but I’m on my initial new game plus. I left my first new game plus save just after you meet Ren. I failed the fishing rally in Bailu which means I have to do it all over again from the beginning anyways to get the side story trophy.

If I start a new save my current progress from the in progress new game plus won’t carry over will it? In terms of collectibles I mean. I still have to do all herbs in both Bailu and Niaowu (that’s proven to be a pain in the ass) and all other collectibles yet.

My other thought was maybe start a new game and leave my current initial second run save to come back to for collectibles.

but I’m curious if anything will carry over to a new save. Don’t want to overwrite the save and lose all my current progress if nothing carries over until the 2nd run is complete.

Also, does the money exploit in Niaowu still work? The pawn shop method I mean? Or did they patch it out? The other thought was get all the collectible trophies now and then come back and do a third run of the main story and side quests.

Did nobody answer this for you, Dan?

Everything carries over and counts, including herbs and all items/collectables.

The ONLY thing that MUST be done in the same playthrough, are the sidestories; that's it.
 
Imagine if Ren bought two fake mirrors and swapped one of them with the real phoenix mirror in Ryo's pocket before he handed it over to Niao Sun. Now that would be a twist!
 
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