I'm honestly a little worried...

[YanTin]

Hi people, This is actually my very first post here!! To sum up an entire introduction, im just a die hard shenmue fan, same as most here. I think of shenmue as not just a "game" to pass time, its actually like a novel, a detailed story that I invest in with years of passion for the whole series.

I just finished Shenmue 3 after the longest wait of my life. I am not disappointed at all. The game delivered everything i expect from Shenmue for me, and I loved every single second of it. Honestly, i was kinda going into this expecting the story to be left open at the end of the game because that's just how the story goes, and i did hear Yu suzuki talking about continuing the story for so many more chapters so on and so forth, so Shenmue 3 ending with another cliffhanger wasn't the thing that is bothering me....It's the fact that it was difficult and took many years just to get a third installment in the series. The fact that it was delayed many times, had trouble being developed with a smaller team, and needed our financial help most of all (though the kickstarter outcome was fantastic), I do worry for the future of Shenmue still. I still feel there is a dire need to save shenmue. We saved shenmue 3, but what about 4 and 5 and 6, what about the rest of the story we are eager for?

It took about 20 years to be blessed to have Shenmue 3, I just hope and pray that we will be able to keep this story going without huge gaps in between..

Long live Shenmue

 

[jsh020]

I dont think there will ever be a huge gap between like 2 and 3 had, if anything its probably a do or die moment where we either get 4 entering development, or the franchise is straight-up finished being video games and the rest of the story will be concluded in some other medium presumably a manga.

All is probably coming down to how this game sells, which seems to be a huge point of contention on the dojo right now but the cold hard truth is, the game needs to prove its got financial success associated with it and it needs to prove that now. Assume its gonna flop or succeed however you will.

 

[YanTin]

According to some sources, it didn't meet expectations in sales, but that doesn't really mean anything considering it's only been out almost a week.

As for a manga, I'd be totally content doing the rest of the story that way. I mean, I would definitely miss playing the games and taking it all in and the music etc....but for alot of us, the story of it all is the factor we are most invested into, and I firmly believe yu Suzuki could capitalize very well on that same as in a video game format.

 

[scooterusa]

W

According to some sources, it didn't meet expectations in sales, but that doesn't really mean anything considering it's only been out almost a week.

As for a manga, I'd be totally content doing the rest of the story that way. I mean, I would definitely miss playing the games and taking it all in and the music etc....but for alot of us, the story of it all is the factor we are most invested into, and I firmly believe yu Suzuki could capitalize very well on that same as in a video game format.

What sources are these? This game should easily do 100,000 in sales worldwide. That would be enough to secure funding.

 

[code l name]

W


What sources are these? This game should easily do 100,000 in sales worldwide. That would be enough to secure funding.

That would be very far from securing any funding for future games. I think most of us speculated it needed to clear ideally around 500,000 units globally to ensure a sequel was all but guaranteed given relatively modest budget. 300-400k would be on shaky grounds and anything less would be hard to put a positive spin on.

 

[jsh020]

W


What sources are these? This game should easily do 100,000 in sales worldwide. That would be enough to secure funding.

100K would be fucking awful

According to some sources, it didn't meet expectations in sales, but that doesn't really mean anything considering it's only been out almost a week.

First-week sales don't signify a failure outright, but this game ain't exactly got positive word of mouth so I dont see why this one would suddenly have legs. But like, who are some sources?

 

[Budgiecat]

W


What sources are these? This game should easily do 100,000 in sales worldwide. That would be enough to secure funding.

Thats less than 3 million once you deduct costs.
Thats not a profit for Epic since they invested 3 million.
They also take 8% of digital sales but still.
And then there's whatever Deep Silver, Sony and Shibuya invested.
Of course we negate the 7 million brought in through KS by fans because thats already profit basically, but these sales numbers should not include them; as they should be representing any new sales on launch and regular retail pre-orders.

My general rule is multiple by 60 and then divide by 2 for distribution and marketing costs and then take another 5 or 10% off.

So really, like the best selling Yakuza game (in Japan at least), this needs around 300k to 500k sales because the 7 million from KS is already spent obviously, Epic, Deep Silver, Sony (who take 30% off PSN sales alone), and Shibuya.
500k on the high end would probably leave Ys Net with 10 million to work with.
This is why I'm hoping SEGA turns around and helps them with Shenmue IV

 

[scooterusa]

Thats less than 3 million once you deduct costs.
Thats not a profit for Epic since they invested 3 million.
They also take 8% of digital sales but still.
And then there's whatever Deep Silver, Sony and Shibuya invested.
Of course we negate the 7 million brought in through KS by fans because thats already profit basically, but these sales numbers should not include them; as they should be representing any new sales on launch and regular retail pre-orders.

My general rule is multiple by 60 and then divide by 2 for distribution and marketing costs and then take another 5 or 10% off.

So really, like the best selling Yakuza game (in Japan at least), this needs around 300k to 500k sales because the 7 million from KS is already spent obviously, Epic, Deep Silver, Sony (who take 30% off PSN sales alone), and Shibuya.
500k on the high end would probably leave Ys Net with 10 million to work with.
This is why I'm hoping SEGA turns around and helps them with Shenmue IV

Good info. I still think it can clear 300,000 worldwide. I remember Darksiders 2 (I think 2) only had 100,000 in sales and that was enough to make 3.

 

[Budgiecat]

Good info. I still think it can clear 300,000 worldwide. I remember Darksiders 2 (I think 2) only had 100,000 in sales and that was enough to make 3.

Well the thing is, people would expect Shenmue IV to push beyond what Shenmue III did and Shenmue III while impressive for what it did with its limited budget, was still criticized for its dated look and many things some people felt it left out because of budget restrictions. So a 300k net might not be enough for a proper Shenmue IV unless like I said someone else steps in to help like Sega, and they would want to see an impressive return in Shenmue III to be motivated to do just that. Epic as well when you think about it. Sure they got money for days due to Fortnite (ugh hate that game) but there's no point in putting money in if there's no profit in it from their perspective.

 

[YanTin]

Thats less than 3 million once you deduct costs.
Thats not a profit for Epic since they invested 3 million.
They also take 8% of digital sales but still.
And then there's whatever Deep Silver, Sony and Shibuya invested.
Of course we negate the 7 million brought in through KS by fans because thats already profit basically, but these sales numbers should not include them; as they should be representing any new sales on launch and regular retail pre-orders.

My general rule is multiple by 60 and then divide by 2 for distribution and marketing costs and then take another 5 or 10% off.

So really, like the best selling Yakuza game (in Japan at least), this needs around 300k to 500k sales because the 7 million from KS is already spent obviously, Epic, Deep Silver, Sony (who take 30% off PSN sales alone), and Shibuya.
500k on the high end would probably leave Ys Net with 10 million to work with.
This is why I'm hoping SEGA turns around and helps them with Shenmue IV

If SEGA would take this up and consider doing the fourth game, that would be the biggest security net for the future of shenmue. Money would never be an issue for them, especially since they can thank Shenmue for revolutionizing the whole platform of 3D third person games/open world games forever, even before grand theft auto tried doing 3D third person games.

Btw That's some pretty spot on math.

 

[Xanatus]

Good info. I still think it can clear 300,000 worldwide. I remember Darksiders 2 (I think 2) only had 100,000 in sales and that was enough to make 3.

You remember incorrectly. Within just 2 months of Darksiders 2 release, the publisher (THQ) went bankrupt, and so did the studio who made DS2 (Vigil Games).
Not necessarly just of Darksiders performance, but still.
While THQ managed to sell many of their assets and studios, nobody was foud to take over Darksiders and its developers.

In the end, Nordic Games bought all of it's remaining licences, including Darksiders among 150 other games, for just 5 million dollars.
And yes, they used the licence to make DS3, but with a new studio (Gunfire Games).

 

[ComfyBeats]

THQ Nordic seems to be more of an exception to Deep Silver. They know what the fans want, and somehow they do it within relatively small budgets, enough to break even no matter what. Plus they seem to piss off their fans less than Deep Silver.