The negativity surrounding Shenmue3

[spud1897]

Please move this topic back to the original discussion.

If you want to discuss anything around pirating then do so over PM.

The dojo certainly doesn't condone pirating of any games.

 

[shibeouya]

I think at this point most of the negativity surrounding S3 has become negativity for the sake of negativity.

I disagree. I'm extremely positive about the game itself, but also extremely negative about the handling of this situation and especially the pre-order stuff.

PC backers are still getting their PC version, albeit on a different launcher, people who do not want to use the Epic launcher will have the option to switch to ps4, get a refund or wait a year for their steam key. What reason is there left to still complain about?

I agree that on the Epic issue they have given a way out and that seems reasonable to me. I can still get people being upset over waiting an extra year to play on PC/Steam, but honestly what's 1 more year for Shenmue? Although I can see the point made that today it's different than 15 years ago since social media and YT will be riddled with videos, so hanging 1 year without being spoiled seems difficult.

Kickstarter backers are not getting preorder bonuses for free? Well, no shit, a Kickstarter pledge is not a preorder. Effing duh!

Can you find another KS that has done this precedent before of not offering pre-order digital bonuses to backers? I could not find any here, and after pointing it out it seems nobody here was able to find one.

I also find the claim that KS pledges are not pre-orders dubious at best - this is like the ultimate pre-order. And again, I've never seen any campaign have that claim before so it comes wholly unexpected and unpleasant.

It all comes down to this: there is content that is exclusive to non-KS-backers for the same price. KS backers should be getting an equivalent or better deal, not an inferior one.

If people are really that obsessed with a fucking move scroll and an alternate Ryo costume, they'll probably be able to buy it as micro transactions for 2$ each.

I'd be ok with that even if it would be pretty distasteful to be asked to pay more for something they are giving for free to anyone who buys the game once. But I'm not so sure it will be available at all after the game releases, I've known quite a few game where pre-order bonuses never get added.

Would it have been a nice gesture from Deep Silver to give Kickstarter backers extra stuff they hadn't even pledged for in the first place for free? Maybe but that's not how life works. If you want stuff, you have to buy it.

I cannot understand this statement. Have you backed on KS before? Pretty much all the successful campaigns I have been part of are giving away things like DLCs or whatever other bonuses to their backers. Did they have to? Definitely not. But did it make sense to keep their most loyal fans happy to secure their brand? Absolutely it did.
Going on the whole "do they have to" argument makes no sense when there is clear established precent on KS for the opposite.
So I think the perception of doing the bare minimum like they are doing currently is what causes the issue - not the legality of it all.

It really looks to me as if those people were trying to create "controversy" where there is none.

I would love nothing more than going back to praising the game for how great it looks so far, but I do not believe this is a "fake controversy" like you claim. I am genuinely unhappy about this situation, but still excited about the game itself and what they have shown. Doing a gesture of goodwill after all their recent fuckups and lack of communication would go a long way I think in trying to smooth things over.

 

[spud1897]

I also find the claim that KS pledges are not pre-orders dubious at best - this is like the ultimate pre-order. And again, I've never seen any campaign have that claim before so it comes wholly unexpected and unpleasant.

This I find interesting as a generic theme. Say you pre-order from a shop and pay for it in full. That's a contract saying you will get the game by X date subject to change etc. If the game is cancelled the money is refunded. If the shop goes out of business you're convered buyer protection law etc.

Kickstarter is different. Its classed as backing/investment with the risk that the project isn't completed. There are many kickstarter projects that fail and backers dont always get their money back. I know theres some protection via Kickstarter but by and large the money is written off and doesn't have the buyer protection a pre-order would have.

By definition they are different.

That said theres nothing stopping them giving a goodwill gesture to the backers to smooth things over and gain some good PR (unless contractually they cant) but we also dont know what some of the backer exclusive stuff is. Is it the same or is it something different, is it better or worse than what's on public sale. We cant judge that.

 

[Down by Law]

Most Kickstarters i've seen are 2D games and it's probably a lot easier for them to make new content for backers than a fully voiced, multi system layered 3D RPG. The two shouldn't be compare, though for reasons unknown they are.

Gosh I wonder which one requires more resources?

 

[GhostTrick]

Most Kickstarters i've seen are 2D games and it's probably a lot easier for them to make new content for backers than a fully voiced, multi system layered 3D RPG. The two shouldn't be compare, though for reasons unknown they are.

Gosh I wonder which one requires more resources?

Let's make a comparison indeed:
Shovel Knight gave backers 3 new campaigns (instead of what was promised which was playing the main campaign with boss characters. Instead they got their own campaigns with remixed, new levels and new story) and a multiplayer mode. For free.

While not confirmed yet, it seems like Shenmue 3 wants backers to pay for a costume and a technique scroll.

For the record, Hollow Knight is giving their backers the game sequel for free.

And Oculus Rift gave backers an Oculus CV1 (Priced at 700 dollars) on top of the DK1 they paid and were delivered.

I insist that for preorder bonuses, nothing is confirmed yet. But yeah, if you want to defend that, think twice. Instead of saying "of course others are generous because look at thos 2D games !!!" think again that Shenmue III might want you to pay a fuckin costume and a scroll, which is greedy af. Is it that bad ? No. But when others are giving new content for free or even new games, you might want to say nothing in the case lf Shenmue III because there's nothing to brag about not giving pre order bonuses to backers. Nothing.

 

[mjqjazzbar]

How much did Shovel Knight cost to develop? Wasn't it digital only for a while?

By the way, played through and beat it twice on my 3DS. Great game.

 

[GhostTrick]

How much did Shovel Knight cost to develop? Wasn't it digital only for a while?

By the way, played through and beat it twice on my 3DS. Great game.

We dont know how much it costed in total. But between you and me, I dont think that Kenpogi and scroll technique costed more than a Shovel Knight campaign.

Heck, I could understand that point if it was about the season pass (even though, even that isn't clear yet because we dont know the content in question). But in any case dismissing what other good gestures others KS did is kinda a bad way to excuse Shenmue III, if it's indeed confirmed.

 

[Down by Law]

You'll find the Shovel and Hollow knight development houses are a tiny fraction of the size of YsNet (Team Cherry has three permanent employees) so those kickstarter funds go an awful lot further in wages. Now Oculus is owned by Facebook of all companies and i'm sure they aren't hurting for cash. It's easier to be generous when money spreads far and wide or is no concern at all.

We all knew that 6 million wasn't going to make a Shenmue III that could stand with the other two. Deep Silver and Epic have injected cash and want a return on that investment. If they have to do that by offering retailer bonuses for non-backers or season passes for all players, so be it. If you backed at $29 you are still getting the game for half price which is a hell of a good deal.

If you had the choice between a scroll and jacket or the significantly expanded game, you'd choose the former I assume?

 

[mjqjazzbar]

That's kind of the paradox here:

1. Ys Net needs more money to make a better Shenmue III
2. Kickstarter backers don't want Ys Net to raise more money at their expense

If the finished product looked much better, I think Kickstarter backers would be less upset. Right now, Ys Net needs to release some super polished footage and a demo to save face.

 

[Reprise]

Yeah, let's cherry pick a very small number of crowd funding campaigns that treated backers like royalty and ignore the huge numbers that have treated their backers even worse than Shenmue 3's has (which I wouldn't even really describe as bad, it's certainly more professional than some of the more amateur/low budget ones I have backed).

To answer the question on pre-order bonuses, I actually don't know as I don't pay any attention to them (or DLC), but I'll look into it. What I can tell you is more often than not, I not only paid a higher price than the normal retail cost, but I also received the product several weeks or even months after the official release date.

 

[GhostTrick]

You'll find the Shovel and Hollow knight development houses are a tiny fraction of the size of YsNet (Team Cherry has three permanent employees) so those kickstarter funds go an awful lot further in wages. Now Oculus is owned by Facebook of all companies and i'm sure they aren't hurting for cash. It's easier to be generous when money spreads far and wide or is no concern at all.

We all knew that 6 million wasn't going to make a Shenmue III that could stand with the other two. Deep Silver and Epic have injected cash and want a return on that investment. If they have to do that by offering retailer bonuses for non-backers or season passes for all players, so be it. If you backed at $29 you are still getting the game for half price which is a hell of a good deal.

If you had the choice between a scroll and jacket or the significantly expanded game, you'd choose the former I assume?

Sorry but let me put it this way:
Shenmue III giving a season pass is "generous".
Shenmue III giving backers a pre-order bonus isn't generous.

So yeah, I agree, it's easier to be generous when you have the cash. I'm not asking Shenmue III to be like Oculus and give a 700 dollars device (which they had 0 obligation too, yet they did). I'm not asking Shenmue III to be like Hollow Knight and give the sequel for free (which they had 0 obligation too) nor even like Shovel Knight and give all the new content for free (which they had no obligation).

But let's be honest, we're acting here as if it was either an expanded game or a free costume. Sorry but the funds didn't came from the pre-order bonus. You just cant defend that. The season pass ? Sure because it might involve additionnal work. But yeah as I said, we're not asking Shenmue III to do as much as the others. Just not to be greedy. Even Mighty n9 didnt.

 

[Tosh]

i still find it kind of hilarious that we need 20 articles, youtube videos and pages on different boards
to talk about three ingame items. and there is not even any progress in this discussion. none.

the release is in November. not in July, not in August, not in September, not in October ...
and we have one information from a KS support mail. all of this because one guy posted a mail answer.
and we dont even know exactly what their answer meant
because they didnt say anything in detail. we are just assuming one thing and thats the topic for weeks now.
we have no idea how exclusive any of this stuff is, if you can just buy it with real money
or if this stuff is available for everyone ingame for ingame money, just not right from the start.

also Deep Silver didnt say anything about this,
we dont even know what retail versions there will be because there are still shops with just the Day One Edition
and shops with just the normal version. if even Deep Silver didnt announce the final retail versions yet,
how about we wait for a real official update? the release is in 4 months and not tomorrow.

 

[GhostTrick]

i still find it kind of hilarious that we need 20 articles, youtube videos and pages on different boards
to talk about three ingame items. and there is not even any progress in this discussion. none.

the release is in November. not in July, not in August, not in September, not in October ...
and we have one information from a KS support mail. all of this because one guy posted a mail answer.
and we dont even know exactly what their answer meant
because they didnt say anything in detail. we are just assuming one thing and thats the topic for weeks now.
we have no idea how exclusive any of this stuff is, if you can just buy it with real money
or if this stuff is available for everyone ingame for ingame money, just not right from the start.

also Deep Silver didnt say anything about this,
we dont even know what retail versions there will be because there are still shops with just the Day One Edition
and shops with just the normal version. if even Deep Silver didnt announce the final retail versions yet,
how about we wait for a real official update? the release is in 4 months and not tomorrow.

Maybe Deep Silver and YsNet are to blame here ? Informations are available for preorders. Why dont we get informations about what those preorder means. They're selling the product now.

 

[shibeouya]

I think the argument that nothing is confirmed yet is a very good point, and it's easy to lose track of that and just get tunnel vision. I also think it's fair game to take whatever info we have right now with a healthy dose of skepticism given the project's recent PR blunders.

But honestly if it's not true regarding pre-orders, I don't understand why YS Net is just dodging the question and replying with ambiguous answers. Like, they replied yesterday to my question about pre-order bonuses with the same answer about having to purchase DLC. Why are they unable to provide a clear unambiguous answer to this question if there is nothing to it? It's hard to fault people for imagining the worse case scenario in these circumstances.

 

[Tosh]

Maybe Deep Silver and YsNet are to blame here ? Informations are available for preorders. Why dont we get informations about what those preorder means. They're selling the product now.

we are not in court here, its not like prosecutor against defender. we are talking about a video game,
our life is not in danger. we dont know how the communication between YS Net and DS works,
if they already have all of the information, or if maybe none of it is clarified right now.
all we have is this one tiny information from the support mail and that there will be updates for this topic.
we dont know anything about the backers exclusives, who will get the retail Day One Edition,
how exclusive these pre order items are ... none of it.
why do we have to be so angry about everything and demand this and demand that.
lets wait and then see what the official updates will tell us.
what do we gain from all these discussions here?

 

[GhostTrick]

we are not in court here, its not like prosecutor against defender. we are talking about a video game,
our life is not in danger. we dont know how the communication between YS Net and DS works,
if they already have all of the information, or if maybe none of it is clarified right now.
all we have is this one tiny information from the support mail and that there will be updates for this topic.
we dont know anything about the backers exclusives, who will get the retail Day One Edition,
how exclusive these pre order items are ... none of it.
why do we have to be so angry about everything and demand this and demand that.
lets wait and then see what the official updates will tell us.
what do we gain from all these discussions here?

Who said it's a court ?
I'm just saying that maybe the lack of informations comes from the people supposed to disclose said informations.

It's bad PR indeed that when you put your game on pre-order, you dont explain who's getting what exactly.

 

[Tosh]

Who said it's a court ?
I'm just saying that maybe the lack of informations comes from the people supposed to disclose said informations.

It's bad PR indeed that when you put your game on pre-order, you dont explain who's getting what exactly.

its still 4 months and all the digital retail buyers know what they will get,
we just have to wait what the Day One Edition is about and what exclusives there are for backers.
we know like one bit of a information but to understand the whole thing we need more details.
maybe they just havent clarified it yet and thats why they cant tell us anything.
who knows who is answering these mails? and they later answered that there will be KS updates about that.
they can change, update and edit everything in 4 months, why do we have to be so impatient.
we are still talking about 3 ingame items and not six season passes for 39,99.

 

[Guppy]

It's ironic seeing fans call the Shenmue 3 team greedy when they went on to fulfill most of the stretch goals way beyond what they had to. Meanwhile backers worry about the project not having enough budget given their giant scorn over animations, but still demand non-essential extra fluff like arcade games and forklift which the team still abides... And fans go on now worrying about sales and Shenmue 4, but they will definitely raise their pitchforks if the game dares to make any money over some exclusive in-game items to incentivize strong initial retail sales. Gotta eat that cake and have it too I see.

No offense but like what another member already said, I sincerely hope all your refunds get denied just by what I've been reading all week. Way to go Shenmue fans! Have a nice one.

 

[shibeouya]

if the game makes any money on some exclusive in-game items to incentive strong initial retail sales.

I don't understand this argument. Sure, having pre-order bonuses is a good thing to incentivize people to pay early, I don't think anyone denies that. But the issue is also not giving those bonuses to backers. And it's not like they would make more money since these are, you know, pre-order bonuses that aren't for sale otherwise. Giving this to backers would cost them zero and not have any impact on initial retail sales.

I sincerely hope all your refunds get denied

Now you are being obnoxious. They have already confirmed refunds, and the money comes from Epic, so by saying that you are either a fervent Epic supporter or mean-spirited towards those who have genuine concerns.

 

[hyo_razuki]

I've only ever backed Bloodstained Slacker Backer before and yes, now that you guys mentioned it, yes apparently they did give this 8-Bit style Bloodstained spinoff to backers for free. I backed the physical ps4 version but it seems they automatically gave you a steam key for the spinoff unless you told them otherwise before some deadline. It seems that email went straight to my spam folder and so I missed the deadline and got a steam key for that spinoff game even though I don't play on pc. How on earth they do not automatically give you the spinoff for the same platform you backed the core game for is beyond me but I just didn't give enough of a fuck about it. Those "pseudo 8-Bit games aren't really my thing.

So yeah, other Kickstarter campaigns have been more generous to backers I guess. I totally agree with you guys that it was a dumb pr move on YS Net and Deep Silver's part not to give that away to backers for free but my point still stands. No reason to create a fuss about it. Those people were looking for reasons to be outraged about. They'll take even something as insignificant as this and get all worked up about it.

I just find it incredibly disappointing and unprofessional on Deep Silver's part. I mean, Yu is an old geezer who doesn't have the slightest clue how social media or the internet in general work. I get that and I don't blame him for it. I just think there should have been younger people at YS Net or social media people at Deep Silver who would tell him that the last thing you want to do on the internet is feeding the trolls. And that preorder bonus move was troll feed at its finest.