Kickstarter Project Update #103: A message from Ys Net, Epic Games & Deep Silver

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I am glad they are taking this into consideration and hope that people get some form of compensation for their grievances. However I know for some it won't be enough no matter what they do. But at least they're attempting to heal the damage and I am sure some of the more reasonable fans will at least be happy. And honestly this couldn't happen soon enough, because I am starting to see comments go the opposite extreme.

Comments like "Because these whiners can't swallow their damn pride and download an app we're going to lose the future of this series!" Sigh I never thought I'd see the community so divided.


I can understand those comments when you see all those dumb angry comments on Kickstarter. But I cant understand those comments here when it's about talking to fellow members of the community and backers. We should unite, not divide. Because us alone wont be enough to support Shenmue III and IV. The worst has yet to come as I said. Those Steam/Epic thing is nothing but still should be fixed for the Kickstarter to not be lumped as a scam. Yet, the previews and soon reviews aren't glowing. Heck, some are and will be a fuckin stab to the game. Some are already talking about a "disaster".
 
I can understand those comments when you see all those dumb angry comments on Kickstarter. But I cant understand those comments here when it's about talking to fellow members of the community and backers. We should unite, not divide. Because us alone wont be enough to support Shenmue III and IV. The worst has yet to come as I said. Those Steam/Epic thing is nothing but still should be fixed for the Kickstarter to not be lumped as a scam. Yet, the previews and soon reviews aren't glowing. Heck, some are and will be a fuckin stab to the game. Some are already talking about a "disaster".
My issue is with the people acting like Yu Suzuki murdered their first born child.
 
I’m fairly certain that I recall Yu Suzuki saying in an interview that he approached numerous publishers before resorting to Kickstarter. That said, I’m unable to find the direct quote without investing some serious time as most results for ‘Yu Suzuki’ + ‘publisher’ return stories about the EGS scandal, so I’ll have to put my comments down as conjecture at this point.

I like to think that common sense would suggest that before turning to Kickstarter, YS would have approached publishers and given Koch’s relationship with Sega, they would likely have been one of them.

Even if I found the quotes regarding him approaching publishers to try and secure a deal before kickstarter (I’m 99% sure that I’m not misremembering), he of course doesn’t go into the specifics of who he spoke with and so it would remain speculation.

All we can say for certain is that before the Kickstarter there was not a publisher attached to the project (well, technically there was Sony) and then after the money was raised, one was announced.

I can’t show you proof that the Kickstarter money was what attracted Deep Silver to the project anymore than you can provide proof that it wasn’t. With that in mind, we will have to agree to disagree.

Edit: did a bit more digging and although I was still unable to find a direct quote, the news that Suzuki was seeking a publisher came out in the wake of the Shenmue postmortem back in 2014. We’ll never who he spoke with in the 17 months (possibly longer as we don’t know when he actually began looking) between the postmortem and the Kickstarter reveal, but I would be surprised if Koch/DS were not one of those developers.

i know what you mean, but still all of it is speculation.
"if, coud be, probably, would make sense, ..."
no one here knows any of these details. we only know what Suzuki said in some interviews,
and thats mostly about the stuff that happened, not about stuff that didnt happen.
Deep Silver approached me, that doesnt mean that i tried to contact Deep Silver before.

thats the only problem i have with a lot of posts here. some people are just posting things like its 100% the only truth,
for example that Shenmue 3 would be a better product without Deep Silver.
that doesnt make any sense, if we look at what Suzuki had to say about Deep Silver
 
Hopefully they give a steam code to backers so we don't have to listen to this anymore, but it's kinda sad to see these immature whiners get appeased because they cried about it.

@Jibby The other day you told me this site isn't a place to vent. How come staff is allowing the opposite extreme to happen: speaking badly of fellow Shenmue fans?
 
i know what you mean, but still all of it is speculation.
"if, coud be, probably, would make sense, ..."
no one here knows any of these details. we only know what Suzuki said in some interviews,
and thats mostly about the stuff that happened, not about stuff that didnt happen.
Deep Silver approached me, that doesnt mean that i tried to contact Deep Silver before.

thats the only problem i have with a lot of posts here. some people are just posting things like its 100% the only truth,
for example that Shenmue 3 would be a better product without Deep Silver.
that doesnt make any sense, if we look at what Suzuki had to say about Deep Silver
I understand where you’re coming from, but I don’t think that there’s anything wrong with speculation provided it’s not presented as fact. I think at times we’re all a little careless with the way we word things and sometimes the lines between fact and opinion can become a little blurry. If that’s something I was guilty of during this exchange, my apologies.

Ftr, I don’t believe that Shenmue would be better off with no publisher, but am not convinced that DS are the best publisher for the job. If there really was no other choice, then so be it.
 
Forgive me if this has been said repeatedly, but just in case it hasn't:

Steam was never mentioned during the Kickstarter or Slacker Backer campaigns. I'm not going off memory; I've checked, and anyone can easily do the same (but countless out there haven't and won't).

The first reference to Steam came in a June 2018 update announcing the backer surveys, listing the Steam client among PC requirements that were explicitly subject to change during development.

The labelling of version options in the survey itself did overtly specify Steam, though by this point most if not all users would have already donated without anything resembling a promise of this sort.

I say most if not all, because I have no way of checking now what the wording was in the upgrades/add-ons process, which may or may not have labelled the PC rewards as being Steam-based before the point of donation.

If it did, then people who added or upgraded to a PC reward during the backer survey period may have a claim to that promise being broken. But they will be a slim minority at most, and unlikely to include everyone currently claiming they were "scammed."

Also lost in the uproar is the fact that Steam pre-orders never opened. Yes, for months now it's been formally advertised that the game was definitely coming to Steam on release, and that is justified cause for disappointment, even frustration. But again, not for refunds or lawsuits.

Kickstarter is knocking back any reports it receives because no campaign promises have been broken. People can be upset that it's not coming to their preferred launcher, and if they added/upgraded during the backer survey they might have cause to demand a refund, but the vast majority have no grounds on which to claim compensation. They're not getting what they want, and that's not good, but for most or even all, the terms of their financial contribution did not promise or even hint that it would be on Steam.

Are you saying that some people are playing the victim in all this? If it was never promised on Steam then I feel there is a massive over reaction to Epic games. Maybe it was promised but we can't see the update even though you looked? I can understand why some would be annoyed but I am so shocked at some of the comments. They waited all this time for Shenmue 3 just to get a refund and never play the game because they are upset about something?

But I really do get why they feel scammed as it was advertised on Steam. Feels like it's playing games more then breaking promises but I don't really know.
 
@Jibby The other day you told me this site isn't a place to vent. How come staff is allowing the opposite extreme to happen: speaking badly of fellow Shenmue fans?
Whilst the wording in his post was a little unsavoury, I don't particularly see that as venting, at least not on the same level of pure emotional rawness that was being displayed the other day. I hope they give a Steam code to the backers too. Because despite the wording, he's right that there's been a lot of uproar and that this topic has pretty much been the center of discussion for a while now. I'd like to see that blow over.

Also, please use the report button next time if your feel a certain post is out of line. We can deal with stuff like this much more effectively that way.
 
The dojo is a Forum where everything that matters about Shenmue should be discussed, and although i do not agree with the wording of Lan di Sama, he is right to certain degree, that there have been many other Things Happening in the Shenmue realm but the main discussions are just around the Epic incident. I would not call the interest in that Topic whining but it is overshadowing the other Things are going on. Like the gameplay material for example. That is a pity. So it would be a good when the Problem is solved soon, so we can talk about more nicer Things again.
 
Whilst the wording in his post was a little unsavoury, I don't particularly see that as venting, at least not on the same level of pure emotional rawness that was being displayed the other day. I hope they give a Steam code to the backers too. Because despite the wording, he's right that there's been a lot of uproar and that this topic has pretty much been the center of discussion for a while now. I'd like to see that blow over.

Also, please use the report button next time if your feel a certain post is out of line. We can deal with stuff like this much more effectively that way.

Well seems to me you and the rest of the staff are not in any way being impartial. You call for calm when people who simply don’t care are allowed to mouth off whatever they want however aggressive while we are not allowed to “vent”.
 
Well seems to me you and the rest of the staff are not in any way being impartial. You call for calm when people who simply don’t care are allowed to mouth off whatever they want however aggressive while we are not allowed to “vent”.
I'm all for Space Lion being able to speak his mind on this topic.
 
Reprise stop laughing at every one of my posts please. It is only furthering the animosity between the two of us.

I just don't understand why you really care what Lan Di-sama said. It comes across that you're looking for a fight, from my perspective. Maybe I'm mistaken. But it just seemed like Jibby was given a friendly warning to ensure arguments and discussions don't get nasty, that's all. Lan Di-sama's comment was sarcastic, but not personal or abusive.
 
I just don't understand why you really care what Lan Di-sama said. It comes across that you're looking for a fight, from my perspective. Maybe I'm mistaken. But it just seemed like Jibby was given a friendly warning to ensure arguments and discussions don't get nasty, that's all. Lan Di-sama's comment was sarcastic, but not personal or abusive.

What are you talking about? You are laughing at literally every one of my posts regardless of content.

Now you point fingers claiming I want to fight.

?

I just called him and the staff out.

You can’t say,”Shenmue dojo is a positive place to discuss Shenmue” while allowing one group of fans show complete disregard for others concerns, mindlessly troll, and call the issue simply whining especially when actual, real world money is involved.

People’s grievances are genuine. And for the most part, we at the dojo have been down to earth - if a little emotional - about it.

Yet that’s not good enough for many of you. This entire discussion is mired in bad faith from both sides.
 
What are you talking about? You are laughing at literally every one of my posts regardless of content.

I've laughed at two posts of yours, unless there are others I have forgotten about. And I literally explained why I "laughed".
 
First off can we not have people laughing at posts when it is clearly not needed, it is clearly fuelling more emotion and that's not what we need. Move away from it.

Discussion on this topic should be rational. When this news broke people on both sides of the fence were venting far beyond something civil and we have been more than fair across the board in asking people to calm it when needed. In fact no bans have been issued thus far and this also testiment to everyone taking a moment before posting.

Posts that are deemed rude or abusive are looked at but we can't reach everything, certinaly not in a topic that moves so quickly. Use the report button to flag anything to us and we can deal with them on a post by post basis. Alternatively if someone is bothering you then the ignore function is there, please use it.

Now move away from this line of discussion.
 
The staff have only ever advocated for the people on both sides of the argument to co-exist. We've reaffirmed this to people on both sides of the argument too. On the day of the announcement emotions were running high and people were venting pure frustration for the sake of frustration and weren't offering any real conversation or talking points. The post in question above was not an example of that.

As not to derail the thread further, I want this to be the last post on this matter. The report button exists so that people don't have to derail threads by arguing semantics. Use it in the future.
 
The staff have only ever advocated for the people on both sides of the argument to co-exist. We've reaffirmed this to people on both sides of the argument too. On the day of the announcement emotions were running high and people were venting pure frustration for the sake of frustration and weren't offering any real conversation or talking points. The post in question above was not an example of that.

As not to derail the thread further, I want this to be the last post on this matter. The report button exists so that people don't have to derail threads by arguing semantics. Use it in the future.
THANK YOU this shit was getting out of hand.
 
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