Random Shenmue III Thoughts

RyoHazuki84 said:
I say Shenmue III "progresses" the plot no differently from the first two games. At the end of Shenmue 1, you really know nothing other than having to go to Hong Kong...and you go to Hong Kong... Then in Shenmue II, Zhu Yuanda isn't seen until the end of the third disc (for the DC version that is), and though his role is small but still significant.
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Yeah, I've been banging that drum for a while. All 3 games drip feed the main plot in tiny amounts.

S3 was a lot more successful emulating S1 with Bailu than it was emulating S2 with Niaowu, which means its strengths mirror the strengths of S1 (atmosphere, mystery) and its weaknesses are exposed when compared to S2 (simulation of a busy place, action, characterisation).

If Feng, Sun, Shiling, Niao Sun etc. had a bit more to them, the game would feel a lot more like S2. It wouldn't have taken much, either -- just more than the bare minimum we got. S2 fills the "in between bits" by developing a cast of characters, while S3 fills it with interlocking gameplay systems, which are inherently repeatable and cheaper to make.

I think they did the best they could with what they had. Story and character stuff is expensive to produce. It is what it is!
 
how much money you reckon they could have saved if instead of the game being fully voiced they went the yakuza route and only had voiced dialogue for cutscenes and other important interactions? enough to make a significant impact on the production financially?

I personally don't think that money is what was holding the game back, but this is just a thought that popped into my head.
 
i agree with orient that they did the best they could with what they had.

If they went the Yakuza route they could have saved some money, i don't know how much but they decided to went with the full Shenmue experience, the full Shenmue experience is not something easy to make in my opinion in relation to the budget because it has a lot of things.

Shenmue III have so many things to do, they added so much to the Shenmue experience like herb gathering, fishing, Chobu-chan, change clothes and much more.

So from the moment they decided to make the full Shenmue experience they had to spend more money.

From all the things Yu Suzuki said about Shenmue III i really feel that he wanted to do more with the game, i really feel that he had to make a lot of compromises and budget plays an important part in this.

The game was delayed 2 or 3 times, i really feel that Yu Suzuki wanted to work even more in the game but for some reason it was not possible to delay the game even more so Yu Suzuki had to release the game, i really feel that it happened like this.

All i know is that with the budget they had they achieved the Shenmue experience in my opinion, i only dislike a few things in the game, i love Shenmue III.
 
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They pobably could've saved quite a bit with text-only dialogue, but very hard to say how much impact it would've had on the overall production.

Let's say to achieve a "perfect" Shenmue III, you have to fill 8 pint glasses with beer -- each representing a core element of Shenmue -- but you only have enough beer to fill half the glasses. Do you fill some glasses to the top but leave others empty? Or do you try to fill them all, knowing it'd require a miracle, because the fans are thirsty and pounding on the table, screaming that everyone deserves their fill?

I don't envy Ys Net one bit. They did what must've felt like the only option at the time: try to deliver a fully-featured Shenmue game. If they had more time/money, they would've continued to fill each of those glasses higher and higher, but they didn't. That's the way it goes sometimes.
 
orient said:
They pobably could've saved quite a bit with text-only dialogue, but very hard to say how much impact it would've had on the overall production.

Let's say to achieve a "perfect" Shenmue III, you have to fill 8 pint glasses with beer -- each representing a core element of Shenmue -- but you only have enough beer to fill half the glasses. Do you fill some glasses to the top but leave others empty? Or do you try to fill them all, knowing it'd require a miracle, because the fans are thirsty and pounding on the table, screaming that everyone deserves their fill?

I don't envy Ys Net one bit. They did what must've felt like the only option at the time: try to deliver a fully-featured Shenmue game. If they had more time/money, they would've continued to fill each of those glasses higher and higher, but they didn't. That's the way it goes sometimes.
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As an aside to this I'll never forget my amazement when I found out that YSNET didn't have any of the source code for the original games when making Shenmue 3. This comes from my first interview with Ryan Payton last year, they spent around 70% of the time making the games systems. Now I don't know if the correlates to funds but that's a substantial amount of time to put into that.

Also their funding from Kickstarter would not have been the final advertised figure of $6.6m around 25% of that is taken in fees and rewards so instantly you're down $1.65m.

The games flaws have been well discussed. The fact we got a game that replicated the Shenmue feel in 2019 astounds me even now. Also it released relatively bug free even if it lacked polish in certain areas.

However, this where Shenmue 4 cannot have a lack of story. They have a basis now of the systems etc. That 70% spent building the systems for 3 is done so that should drop dramatically to allow more focus on the story/character elements in a 4th game. If they don't then I think people would have a right to be much more critical.
 
It's an impressive AA game with a relative small team, for sure.

I'd put the current Ys Net in a similar situation of Frogwares and Piranha Bytes, the developers of Sherlock Holmes games and Gothic/Risen/ELEX series, in the sense of scale and ambition of the development team.

(can't recommend most of these series enough for Shenmue fans btw, games have a slow-burn but detailed story/world with plenty of heart)

I also believe that the fact that Shenmue III exists retroactively affected directly into sales of the HD port (besides the word of mouth and Yakuza, of course). Sega probably took some notes on that when it decided to invest in the anime (someone else confirm if it's Sega that's spending on it, please)

Shenmue IV must happen. It must. Please Gaming Gods.
 
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spud1897 said:
As an aside to this I'll never forget my amazement when I found out that YSNET didn't have any of the source code for the original games when making Shenmue 3. This comes from my first interview with Ryan Payton last year, they spent around 70% of the time making the games systems. Now I don't know if the correlates to funds but that's a substantial amount of time to put into that.

Also their funding from Kickstarter would not have been the final advertised figure of $6.6m around 25% of that is taken in fees and rewards so instantly you're down $1.65m.

The games flaws have been well discussed. The fact we got a game that replicated the Shenmue feel in 2019 astounds me even now. Also it released relatively bug free even if it lacked polish in certain areas.

However, this where Shenmue 4 cannot have a lack of story. They have a basis now of the systems etc. That 70% spent building the systems for 3 is done so that should drop dramatically to allow more focus on the story/character elements in a 4th game. If they don't then I think people would have a right to be much more critical.
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100%. I don't blame anyone for being disappointed in aspects of S3, but achieving a "perfect" sequel that satisfied everyone was an impossibility from the start. As soon as the KS was announced I knew compromises would have to be made. In fact, for most of the campaign I was bracing myself for a small game with extremely basic QTE-style combat, hardly any NPCs to talk to, limited interaction with the world etc. etc. The fact 70% of their time was devoted to just recreating the base systems of a Shenmue game in a modern engine...it's impressive the game came out like it did.
 
spud1897 said:
As an aside to this I'll never forget my amazement when I found out that YSNET didn't have any of the source code for the original games when making Shenmue 3. This comes from my first interview with Ryan Payton last year, they spent around 70% of the time making the games systems. Now I don't know if the correlates to funds but that's a substantial amount of time to put into that.
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Could the source code have been used with the unreal engine?
 
Presumably. They might've opted for rebuilding systems in unreal, due to not wanting to go the Dragon/Phoenix route of reversing/recreating the DC (ninja?) engine for retrofitting UE4...
 
RyoHazuki84 said:
Could the source code have been used with the unreal engine?
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I'm no UE4 expert so please take this with a pinch of salt.

My guess is it would have at least sped things up if they had systems to reference into Unreal, rather than rebuild. Some, like the day/night stuff, are inbuilt to Unreal but others weren't.

However someone more qualified than me will have a better idea.
 
RyoHazuki84 said:
Could the source code have been used with the unreal engine?
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Outright reusing it, I don't think so, but source code is an invaluable resource when recreating any sort of system. It's like starting with a cheatsheet. Here's exactly how we solved every single problem the last time, so you can make a conscious decision to copy it, change it, improve upon it, etc.

If they had it, who knows how different the combat would've been, for example. Maybe they could've reused or reinterpreted animation data? Given the complete lack of SEGA stuff in S3, I doubt that was ever on the table, though.
 
My biggest gripe with Shenmue 3 was the fighting system and the lack of story building. I want the old fighting system of Shenmue back. if at all possible. I am now hoping with Shenmue 4 we get that and a more robust fighting system. I can do without the changing clothes thing (which should have never been a thing IMHO). I feel like some of the built systems took away from other things like the change clothes thing. We do need Shenmue 4 and I need Yu to give us the Shenmue experience. I disagree with him trying to make it more mainstream with the next one, but that's me. Hopefully, this anime gets people wanting to check out 1 and 2. And then three and Yu can then see that yes, we don't have to do it, because NOW Shenmue is mainstream.

Thats a lot to task the anime with. But, its what is needed.
 
If you put the PS4 disc in a PC, does it have any goodies like the GD discs of the first two games? I remember in the second game, you can get all these trailers, wallpapers, and special videos. I don't have a Bluray disc for my Mac which is why I can't check myself.
 
RyoHazuki84 said:
If you put the PS4 disc in a PC, does it have any goodies like the GD discs of the first two games? I remember in the second game, you can get all these trailers, wallpapers, and special videos. I don't have a Bluray disc for my Mac which is why I can't check myself.
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The PC cannot physically read the PS4 discs. PlayStation uses different disc reading technology, meaning that when the disk reader on your PC tries to read the disk it'll be incomprehensible.
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dwn_tch_shenmue3screet3kek.png


Images you can hear.

SCHWOP-SCHWOP-SCHWOP-BA-DUM-DUMMMMMM
 
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