Real music in Shenmue

[Revan]

I've had this fantasy for a while now that if Sega ever did a Shenmue remake they could replace the cassette tapes you buy in the Tomato store (or add new ones, no big deal) with actual 80's hits for even more realism and immersion. I've accepted that this is never going to happen and I'm also not sure how easy a mod of this would be to pull off.

So just to entertain my wishful thinking, imagine you're a Sega employee working on a Shenmue Kiwami/a modder making a new mod of Shenmue HD that will feature real 80's music in addition to the game's standard soundtrack. What songs would you include in this additional song selection which you feel would fit Shenmue's world well?

I would have specified that the songs should not have been released after 1987 to respect the date of when the first two Shenmue games take place, but given Ryo owns a Sega Saturn in 1986, go crazy I guess!

I'll start:

 

[Jetmcfancy]

I think it would be a shame if they didn't include some City Pop somewhere in this concept. So I'll play it very safe and just go with Plastic Love for now.

Spoiler

Who wouldn't wanna see Ryo hitting the streets of Dobuita with a bit of City Pop playing over him?

 

[Niowiad]

Sorry I physically need to post this one

 

[Mittens2317]

I’m not gonna pretend I’m an expert at modding the game, but I’m fairly certain it’s doable regardless of SEGA or YSNet going that route.

 

[DigitalDuck]

Sorry I physically need to post this one

Needs to replace the Space Harrier Uriah theme.

 

[BlueMue]

It would've been cool if the cassette tapes featured real music from that era. I was thinking about this myself a couple of times over the years. It would make things more believable, though music tapes are only one bit of a whole line of products and things that could be licensed to feature real life products.

The rerelease has shown how much trouble even simple things have caused in terms of licenses and renewing for music like this is rather costly. Also, the original music we got is also great work that fits well into the setting. Ulitmately Shenmue is still a bit of a fantasy story, even in the realistic setting it's in and using own brands and such makes it a whole lot easier to craft that setting.