EDGE Magazine Cover Story: Shenmue 3

Peter said:
Jesus wept @mue 26 how the hell are you?

Also @Rikitatsu I thought this would have made you not be " that guy". I am not getting at you either. We all have our opinions and I could be wrong also... I was going to type up a more specific response and quote a few of your points to talk about but it's proper late, and I've a christening tomorrow, so I will keep it short.

I honestly just read the things you mentioned as extensions and evolution to the Shenmue we know and love, and with Suzuki and a lot of the core team still at the helm, it's common sense to think that.

For example, the food v stamina thing. I just thought of the 70 man battle, and how it would work better if you were forced to fight good, and not be up against 1 hit baddies, or able to cheese behind a corner forms while to regain health. Or, like when you run away from Pedro Warren, only for Ryo to hunker over out of breath, and get dropkicked in the back. The food adds another dimension to something like that, and I think it sounds good. Food and stuff can help you out. Change your strategy. Make you think. Shenmue evolving.

With the affinity system... I think a few people have touched upon it but Shenmue was one of the first to offer full NPC interaction, with different responses based in circumstance. Naturally, technology limited that to story points but now... We have a Shenmue where it actually knows how friendly you are with the person?? This is NPCs here right? Not scripted cutscenes. I can't think of a single game in 2019 where it does that! Witcher 3, Skyrim, Horizon Zero Dawn... You can't even initiate a conversation with them, yet they are supposed to be proper open world's? Yu Suzuki revolutionised the genre with his vision of an open world, and with the Kickstarter, we all had our doubts about if he still had it. If he could create an open world to rival today's GTA and God of Wars. Everyone's too busy looking at the size of the map and ways in it, but from the sounds of this affinity system, it's not the size of the world that's making it real, it's the people! Talking to NPCs and getting different responses... Maybe different notebook entries and paths.... That's actually insane! Again, Shenmue evolved.

The devil is in the detail and the saying does stand; quality, not quantity. We have waited for Yu Suzuki to present us with his modern day technology, open world game, and whilst all of us are looking to unlock the next section of the huge map with pretty buildings and objects, he is focusing on the people inside those. THATS what's grabbed me by the balls and smashed me off the ground! This game sounds nothing that I could have imagined. Whilst I could be wrong, I hope I am not, and even I can say I didn't see this coming.
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I'm not even being negative on the affinity system, I'm just not yet sure how it will end up being, it could very well be amazing, it all depends on their execution. But the "doing tasks" part set off some alarms in my head. I'm gonna hope the way they do it would be natural, Yu earned my trust in that regard.

Stamina system might have some tactical merit in fighting but I just can't picture a situation where it's not pointless busywork outside of it. Good thing we have a demo coming so fans can give feedback if it ends up being as bad as I imagined.

danielmann861 said:
Yeah, I kind of have to disagree. Having lived in a small town for a portion of my life, I learned that it was all about lending a hand to the community that won you the most favour. Whether it be baking something to sell at a community fair for the benefit of the township or just lending neighbors a hand if they needed it.

Being an active part of a community and lending a hand goes a long way with small town folk and them accepting you and helping you in return. You scratch my back, I scratch yours is the basis of most country townships because it shows that you’re willing to be a part of that town as opposed to being aloof.

Everyone I know who has ever lived in a small town has said the same thing.

If anything, they become more suspicious if you don’t try to make an effort and will continue to cater to their own and treat one as an outsider. They’ll be friendly to you but they won’t help you.

If Shenmue III manages to find a balance between this then that could be very interesting. Like say if you play as someone who learns to take a part in the community then it might make your goals a little easier...or if you remain aloof, you can still get to your end goal but it will make things harder.

That could be very interesting if they find a way to make that work. That sounds like what the affinity system is to me.

My one fear is I hope it’s not all fetch quests. I do hope it’s a blend of both social interaction and maybe a few fetch quests or odd jobs (like maybe a new take on the taking out the books section from Shenmue II)

But yeah, from my experience, I’ve found that being active in the community and helping people out wins you far more favour among people in a small town then being aloof.
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Well, my point was "just" doing tasks alone is not enough to build affinity in a realistic scenario, I'm not gonna disregard your experiences, but generally speaking, it sounds extremely mechanical to have someone open up to you just by doing them a favor... I agree that social interactions should be the main driving force behind this system.

I don't want this thread to take a negative turn because I keep defending my not-so-positive points, so I'll drop it here. Just gonna say it's all about the execution, the EDGE preview was still kind of vague with certain aspects... We will know for sure soon enough when the demo hits (Which I'm predicting would be after MAGIC).


Anyway, isn't it crazy that we still know NOTHING about Baisha?
And not sure if translation mistake, but Chobou might've been renamed to
Niaowu
...
 
I wonder how the game will be balanced in terms of difficulty. What if Ryo becomes overpowered after having spent ages in training? Will there be levels of difficulty in options? The training and all the ecosystem around looks extremely engaging. We may underestimate the power of attraction of this section if YSnet are doing well.

@danielmann861

Completely agree. Ideally, I think Yu shouldn't have publicly mentioned this as a "system" which suggests a very "mechanical" feature but instead simply as a realistic NPC behavior towards you.
Affinity System is not really new in gaming but has never been made at Shenmue's level of quality. I can feel all the satisfaction after you succeed to earn the villagers trust, their personal secrets, their help for clues etc. It will be the spiritual sequel to Shenmue 1.
And this time, Yu Suzuki will no longer be blocked by the GD-rom storage restriction for dialogues.
 
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The affinity system makes sense. The strong point of Shenmue was it that Ryo is part of the World. Unlike the other more modern open world games out there. In this games you are just a random dude or gal in a random word where the NPC do not react to each other. In S3 the affinity system could change that.

You are a part of the world and the everything you do has some consequences. If is done in the right way it could be great.
 
For me having read this again it sounds like they have integrated everything into the game in order for it to impact everything you do. This is a step up and much more realistic.

Peter mentioned this in another thread but the eating makes sense. It would massively impact Ryo if he didn't eat before he trained and it asks the player to interact in the world and engage to ensure he is able to do so.

The affinity system is an extension of real life. If I walked into somewhere demanding information then I'd be told to do one. The fact that over time characters will begin to trust Ryo is normal. Also it encourages players to become lost in the world. Information hunting has a new feel and challenges. Money says there will be different ways to get the same bit of information thus increasing the replay value when we start combing through the game again and again.

I'd imagine from what I understand the fighting difficulty would change with Ryos abilities. If you're smashing people early I'd hope the difficulty would come up to present a challenge early on. The moves set being there suggests a depth that was seen in the previous 2 and while it's a new system it will be familiar to us. Easy to grasp difficult to master. Again it impacts the game. Beat someone respected up the village won't like you, save a cat you're a hero!

Controls sounds modernised but with a tip to the old ones. Simple, easy and effective. I'd say tank controls are gone.

The story bits they mentioned aren't too bad given the scope of the game. My memory can be shocking so I'll likely forget haha.

There's lots to come too.
Qtes: What will they look like
Array of arcade and mini games
Toys
The parts with us playing as Ren and Shenhua.

Great preview with more to come. The fact that EDGE have chosen to preview this (yes with old screens admittedly) is awesome. The game is front and centre and comes across as if it's been brought up to date but retains the Shenmue charm we all love.

Roll on Monaco and roll on August 27th!
 
... if someone could PM the scans I'd very very VERY grateful.

Also, being in the UK, I might be able to get extras copies on the 28th, I'll be in the city that day.
 
Vivi-gamer said:
... if someone could PM the scans I'd very very VERY grateful.

Also, being in the UK, I might be able to get extras copies on the 28th, I'll be in the city that day.
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You have a PM
 
Rikitatsu said:
Well, my point was "just" doing tasks alone is not enough to build affinity in a realistic scenario, I'm not gonna disregard your experiences, but generally speaking, it sounds extremely mechanical to have someone open up to you just by doing them a favor... I agree that social interactions should be the main driving force behind this system.
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Don't get me wrong, I wasn't having a go at you...and I think we agree on at least one aspect...but I just don't think it's that un realistic in a small town to be helping the community in order to gain their trust to make life easier. I'm with you on one thing though, I'm hoping it's not just an excuse to have countless fetch quests and I do hope it's a nice mix between the two (which I have faith in them pulling off.)

What I want it to be is something more akin to the original game but evolved...where you may have to help out the elderly lady looking for a house or help the lunch lady's daughter out...stuff like that but make the rewards more involving in the sense that it earns you their trust and has them start to open up to you more. I want these quests to actually have weight and mean something as opposed to being just a check list of stuff to do (which is what most open world games fall prey to)

To me, this sounds like the opposite of Yokosuka. Where in Yokosuka everyone in town knew your name and knew your family's upstanding reputation; here it feels like you're going to have to earn that trust and that really excites me...that's what I've been wanting from Shenmue III ever since I saw some of those systems play out in Shenmue II with Fang Mei and Shenhua in the final stretch.

But yeah, I don't think it's that unrealistic with the "I'll scratch your back if you scratch my back" communal type setup. If anything it feels rather real to me having known that way of life for a chunk of my life.

From what I read in the article, that's what it seems they're going for and if they do pull it off then I'll be mighty impressed.

I also hope they don't rely on progress bars for the affinity system. One of my favourite things from Shenmue II was developing a friendship with Fang-Mei and gaining her trust enough that she actually starts to address you by your first name instead of the family name...I loved that about Shenmue II...that's your progress bar without actually being a visual representation...so I hope they continue that for for the affinity system. Don't give me progress bars to fill....make me actually feel like I'm talking to a living character and earning their trust through dialog changes and audio cues.
 
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Rikitatsu said:
I'm not even being negative on the affinity system, I'm just not yet sure how it will end up being, it could very well be amazing, it all depends on their execution. But the "doing tasks" part set off some alarms in my head. I'm gonna hope the way they do it would be natural, Yu earned my trust in that regard.
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I would hope and expect that it will all feel very organic and natural, as opposed to an RPG 'forced' stat type scenario. I expect it to be like when that old lady asks Ryo for help in locating a house at the beginning of the first game and if you help, she tells you useful information. I would hope it isn't always the case that you have to do tasks too and that is just one example.

I can understand your concerns, because it does sound a lot like what many Western RPGs have done before, which usually did not feel natural or realistic and often felt like padding. I just assume with Yu at the helm, he is building upon the foundations he started building years ago and not forcing RPG mechanics into the game for the sake of it.
 
Reprise said:
I would hope and expect that it will all feel very organic and natural, as opposed to an RPG 'forced' stat type scenario. I expect it to be like when that old lady asks Ryo for help in locating a house at the beginning of the first game and if you help, she tells you useful information. I would hope it isn't always the case that you have to do tasks too and that is just one example.
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This is exactly the scenario that came to mind when I read it. There's quite a lot of scenarios in the original games that show this was always a planned direction, too:

Feeding the cat Dried Fish makes Megumi tell you Yamagishi hurt his back.
Helping Kame find the Yamamoto residence means she helps you when you're looking for someone who can read Chinese.
Impressing the base workers at MJQ makes them tell you about Heartbeats Bar.
Buying Wang a drink means he helps you when you're looking for someone who can read Chinese.
Buying Shozo a coffee makes him help you out when sneaking into the Old Warehouse District a few days sooner than he otherwise would.
Helping Hisaka retrieve Mai means you get information about the guard shifts (turns out this makes no difference whatsoever, but it still counts).
Giving the musician money at the start of Shenmue II makes him give you directions to Wan Chai.
Partaking in arm wrestling at the first stall also gets you directions to Wan Chai.
A lot of stall owners won't help you unless you buy a product/play their game first.

There are probably other examples I'm forgetting about, but none of these felt unnatural. I don't see any reason an expansion of this system would.
 
I think there's too much focus on the "tasks" part of raising the Affinity level IMO. The fact it tracks other stuff like time spent in Bailu and if you've got Shenhua with you indicates a level of further depth we don't know the extent of yet.

So like, your costume could potentially change how the system works, for example. Maybe some NPCs will respect you more in martial arts gear, and for others it might provoke a challenge to fight (which we already know can be an outcome of the Affinity system if it goes wrong for Ryo). There are all sorts of additional factors we don't know about yet.

And "tasks" is a pretty catch-all term and could mean most of anything. It could be taking on part time jobs, trading over a rare capsule toy, completing events and sidequests elsewhere, whatever. Shenmue's not a "find me three bear pelts" game. The list above is a pretty good example of that, and III will likely continue in the same vein.

Honestly it sounds like it'll switch the investigation pillar of gameplay straight into a higher gear. Being more involved with that you do as a player is possibly so much more interesting than how this worked before.
 
So, the thing about the Affinity System is that it could be retroactive as well. I think that would calm @Rikitatsu,
What I mean by this is, say you meet an old lady and she informs you someone stole her purse, and she asks you to get it back for her, and you can either choose to do it or not. Anyway, you choose to do it and later you meet some NPC you need information from, and he just gives you the information because that old lady you helped out was a either a family member or a friend, and he heard that you helped her.

But if earlier you didn't choose to help her, he'll be a bit more standoffish, and even asks why you didn't help her. Also the Affinity System could alert all NPCs of good deeds and you won't need to do very specific things, except in rare situations. It could also be similar to how the interations with Fangmei in Shenmue II work, or be a combination of both styles.My point btw, is that we don't really know how it will work, exactly. I think the fundamental idea of it is good though.
 
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Yep. I also get the impression it'll be based on not only what you do, but what you've done already. Maybe not in the specific instance mentioned in the article, because that and the combat scenarios seem kind of an undercover tutorial for how that stuff works.

Even just talking about this stuff is making me excited to try it for myself. How the fuck are we gonna last another 6 months?
 
Spaghetti said:
Yep. I also get the impression it'll be based on not only what you do, but what you've done already. Maybe not in the specific instance mentioned in the article, because that and the combat scenarios seem kind of an undercover tutorial for how that stuff works.

Even just talking about this stuff is making me excited to try it for myself. How the fuck are we gonna last another 6 months?
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Also it would be cool if in the Affinity System you could be permanently blocked from doing certain things, certain ways. Like in my earlier example with not helping the old lady get her purse back, her family member/friend just refuses to help you at all no matter what. You're blocked from getting any information from him and will be forced to find a new way to get it. This would dramatically increase replayabilty of the game.
 
Van Joel Sandwich said:
I might be wrong but, we also don't really know when this preview took place.
When was it? January? December last year? October?
Andy might have seen a relatively old buil of the game.
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Probably not as late as October. A month or two out, maybe. Not totally sure what difference that would make in any case, it wasn't an exhaustive detailing of all the mechanics and how they work, and by now the design work would be largely complete with room for tweaks and adjustments.

ShenmueTree said:
Also it would be cool if in the Affinity System you could be permanently blocked from doing certain things, certain ways. Like in my earlier example with not helping the old lady get her purse back, her family member/friend just refuses to help you at all no matter what. You're blocked from getting any information from him and will be forced to find a new way to get it. This would dramatically increase replayabilty of the game.
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Yu did mention there are incentives for replayability, so you might be onto something.
 
Spaghetti said:
Probably not as late as October. A month or two out, maybe. Not totally sure what difference that would make in any case, it wasn't an exhaustive detailing of all the mechanics and how they work, and by now the design work would be largely complete with room for tweaks and adjustments.
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I believe they are improving things everyday so what we're going to see in MAGIC (assuming that what we're gonna see is recent) might be way more polished than what he saw!
 
danielmann861 said:
Yeah, I kind of have to disagree. Having lived in a small town for a portion of my life, I learned that it was all about lending a hand to the community that won you the most favour. Whether it be baking something to sell at a community fair for the benefit of the township or just lending neighbors a hand if they needed it.

Being an active part of a community and lending a hand goes a long way with small town folk and them accepting you and helping you in return. You scratch my back, I scratch yours is the basis of most country townships because it shows that you’re willing to be a part of that town as opposed to being aloof.

Everyone I know who has ever lived in a small town has said the same thing.

If anything, they become more suspicious if you don’t try to make an effort and will continue to cater to their own and treat one as an outsider. They’ll be friendly to you but they won’t help you.

If Shenmue III manages to find a balance between this then that could be very interesting. Like say if you play as someone who learns to take a part in the community then it might make your goals a little easier...or if you remain aloof, you can still get to your end goal but it will make things harder.

That could be very interesting if they find a way to make that work. That sounds like what the affinity system is to me.

My one fear is I hope it’s not all fetch quests. I do hope it’s a blend of both social interaction and maybe a few fetch quests or odd jobs (like maybe a new take on the taking out the books section from Shenmue II)

But yeah, from my experience, I’ve found that being active in the community and helping people out wins you far more favour among people in a small town then being aloof.
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Exactly this.
 
Aside from the ... well, 'systemic' aspects of the Affinity System, I think of its meaning in regards to the overall story. Ryo is weighing out his options regarding what he intends to do with his life, whether that be following the path of vengeance or choosing what I guess you could call a more healing path. Relationships are what will give his life a meaning beyond a quest for revenge, and although he already has a wealth of friendships we've seen him kind of set those aside in his pursuit of Lan Di. So I think the Affinity System will be the systemic foundation of gameplay that enables the growth and change of the character of Ryo.
 
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