Beating 70 Man Battle with just 2 buttons, Parry & Throw (No D-pad input)

[Billkwando]

As I briefly explain in the video, it initially kinda happened by accident when I was smoking with my left hand, and started the game up with my right hand, just for silliness. After I downed the first 3 guys, I realized Ryo's counters are srs business, LOL. It just takes good timing, and it's great practice. I'm basically training up for when I decide to try to top my old world rank of #64, 4'29"13. Pretty sure I can top that, but I'm taking my time learning the ins and outs of this new version, as there definitely are differences (or at least one, you can't kick enemies while holding one anymore, hopefully they'll fix).




I actually did it a few times, and just tried to pick the most interesting one, where nothing too humiliating happened. Those guys will throw you a curveball every now and then!

 

[That Guy.]

Mastering the art of countering in this game makes fights much more easier. I notice myself becoming more technical (instead of just button mashing like I used to) in fights because of I getting better at countering. Makes fighting someone like Chai so much easier though you can't depend way too much on counter against him, but for some reason in Shenmue II you can spam the Y button all day without having to hardly time it much, but then again, combat in II feels much looser overall.

 

[Billkwando]

Mastering the art of countering in this game makes fights much more easier. I notice myself becoming more technical (instead of just button mashing like I used) to in fights because of I getting better at countering. Makes fighting someone like Chai so much easier, but for some reason in Shenmue II you can spam the Y button all day without having to hardly time it much, but then again, combat in II feels much looser overall.

Yeah, lots of stuff about combat was a letdown in Shenmue II, not the least of which being the heinous insertion of QTEs in many/most of the significant fights, or making some of the best moves share the same input as another great move (forcing you to choose), and I'm anticipating Shenmue III's battle system will probably make me cry. If there is one.

 

[Murderous Int]

That one spoiler picture with the health bars and Ryo doing what looks like a attack from SIII gave me hope it might have a fun combat system.
Yeah SII was annoying in the Baihu and Izumi fights where it would drop a sudden QTE on you.
I can deal with having to switch moves in the menu, they already started to get one too many inputs. The one part that I didn't like was the weird semi-first person view it does when you are looking for Ren in Beverly Wharf and get into fights. It just makes them akward to control.
Though I do love the yellow head building where if you fail to sneak around you can false extra combat. Being what it may I find Shenmue II has a little more polish in the actual combat compared to the first game.
Also while in the first game you could win or lose against Chai, in the 2nd game a few fights do that fade to black where you kinda of hope you could fight it all the way for something a little different or just till the player really lost.

 

[z.su1]

Potentially unpopular opinion, but I just want QTEs gone from S3 altogether. They are disruptive and break the flow of battles and cutscenes alike, they are not challenging in the fun sense and they punish players trying to enjoy the story, the very antithesis of what Yu was trying to go for with the games, and that is allowing the player to enjoy the game at their own pace.

QTEs popping during Izumi's fight was irritating, and so was Baihu's, and the inputs were deliberately awkward! I mean, how did Yu think Circle+Square, Triangle+X (or the Dreamcast's equivalent) during an already heated battle was good design???

Anyways, I liked both games for their combat. In S1, I was forced to play more methodically because of the pace and lack of dodge roll. But in S2, I was forced to think on my feet a lot more because the combat was speedier and enemies really ganged up on you, and the game augmented the combat by making Ryo's movements looser, which helped make combat way more dynamic off the bat. The closest the S1 came to feeling dynamic, imho, were the Disc 3 battles, especially the 70 man battle.

 

[oregano9]

I managed to beat Chai at the Arcade on my third try ever using this strategy. Its so OP that you don't even need to master any throw move in order for it to work, its just a matter of timing and patience.

Potentially unpopular opinion, but I just want QTEs gone from S3 altogether. They are disruptive and break the flow of battles and cutscenes alike, they are not challenging in the fun sense and they punish players trying to enjoy the story, the very antithesis of what Yu was trying to go for with the games, and that is allowing the player to enjoy the game at their own pace.

So much this. QTEs were a novel concept back when the first Shenmue was released but nowadays they have already overstayed its welcome. Its frustrating not being able to fully enjoy the action scenes since you will always be more concerned about noticing when the next buttom prompt will appear.

 

[Lunatic LK47]

I managed to beat Chai at the Arcade on my third try ever using this strategy. Its so OP that you don't even need to master any throw move in order for it to work, its just a matter of timing and patience.



So much this. QTEs were a novel concept back when the first Shenmue was released but nowadays they have already overstayed its welcome. Its frustrating not being able to fully enjoy the action scenes since you will always be more concerned about noticing when the next buttom prompt will appear.

I'll have to agree about the QTE's. Shenmue 2 just got ridiculously obnoxious and nothing short of watching cutscene videos would ever let us succeed on the first shot. PS4 Spider-Man 2018 has the right idea of letting us disable them from the options menu.

 

[Murderous Int]

So much this. QTEs were a novel concept back when the first Shenmue was released but nowadays they have already overstayed its welcome. Its frustrating not being able to fully enjoy the action scenes since you will always be more concerned about noticing when the next buttom prompt will appear.

QTE's in Shenmue were good in the sense you could have a scene play out like in a martial art film with the camera position catching the perfect shot and still have player engament. I agree In free fighting this is annoying since you force the player from something open (many moves user can input) to one choice that QTE forces.

Longer film type segments they work much better like when you and Ren are cuffed together. Keep the player active so remove that and it's just a scene of two guys runing around, similar with when you first go into heartbeats bar. if it is better or worst for it in these type of scenes? I can see it both ways sometimes you are way too much into what button to press to really enjoy the full impact of what's happening, but it is also engaging you a bit more into the scene since it feels like you are the one doing it. If people are watching you play they also get to enjoy a more cinematic action piece.

I think if Shenmue III keeps QTE's in the game it should be optional to player prefrence/skill, that way all types of players can enjoy it. I recall Yu saying he wanted to make the game more friendly for different types of playes or something to that effect, the only ways I can see that's to remove them or make them optional or adjust to players based on how they play.

 

[Bule]

Just wanted to say that seeing this video helped me a lot on my most recent playthrough. I've never really gone in much for throws, but it really opens up a whole other side to the combat.

 

[Billkwando]

Just wanted to say that seeing this video helped me a lot on my most recent playthrough. I've never really gone in much for throws, but it really opens up a whole other side to the combat.

Hey, I'm really glad it helped! I had a lot of fun doing that video. It seems like I stumbled on to something not a lot of folks knew about. One more reason why it's sad that they ruined fighting in Shenmue 3 (Shenmue 2, too, really. Whoever thought it was a good idea to put a QTE in the middle of a fistfight deserves a Mud Spider to the face, lol).