What if Shenmue IV happens but is not Directed by Yu-san?

danielmann861

danielmann861

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Let's get straight to it. I HOPE Yu finishes this series. It's his baby and I would love for him to see it through until the very end. But at the same time, Yu is not getting any younger. He's already in his 60's as is.

So a thought occurred. What if the series were to end but to end under the direction of someone else? Obviously Yu would still be involved as the Producer and guiding father...but what if?

Or...what if Shenmue Anime becomes a success and SEGA somehow decided to reboot the franchise with the Dragon Engine, but their one compromise is new Director for said rebooted series.

Would you be okay with a Hypothetical Shenmue IV or Shenmue Reboot that isn't Directed by Yu-san?
 
Yes, absolutely, as long it retains the core elements and style of what makes a Shenmue game a Shenmue game. As long as Yu Suzuki is still involved and is there to 'pass on the torch' so to speak, then I'm ok with it.

To be honest, I've even come to the conclusion that I would be fine with Shenmue being modernised and changed to a certain degree as long as long as the story is good and the tone of the series and the personality of its characters are retained.
 
I'd take it as long as Yu Suzuki remains involved in some way. That's a must.

The ideal situation would be that the Anime takes off and SEGA go in on the 4th game and use Yu Suzuki to either direct or advise the game.

Time will tell.
 
Suzaku said:
Shenmue = Yu Suzuki.
Would you take a Metal Gear without Kojima? Of course not.
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Actually yeah, and was supposed to be Murata and/or Fukushima before Konami held Kojima hostage for MGS4 and later.

As long as Suzuki produced, Shenmue will be good and feel right
 
In theory everything could've been great, in reality we got Metal Gear Survive...

Shenmue without Suzuki could risk the same, in the best case scenario it would become a poor's man Yakuza game.
Even some "fans" were trying to force it to become a "Life is Strange" kinda game.

Suzuki involvement is mandatory, being it the producer, the director or both.
 
Short answer.

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Long answer It depends on the director of course. If the director is good it might turn out to be a good game but it won't be as good as game made by Suzuki himself.

Unlike other directors of game series like Kojima, Mikami and so forth Yu has a plan. He planned the whole series look time ago. There is script.

The Mikami and Kojimas try to invent the wheal again and again with each series so the games of these people lack continuity in story telling and gameplay.

Even after a long break Yu made it to make S3 to feel and play like the old games. A Kojima would be never able to achive that.

I also cannot think of another creator that could take Yu-Sans place.

It would not be Shenmue without his involvement.
 
Suzaku said:
In theory everything could've been great, in reality we got Metal Gear Survive...

Shenmue without Suzuki could risk the same, in the best case scenario it would become a poor's man Yakuza game.
Even some "fans" were trying to force it to become a "Life is Strange" kinda game.

Suzuki involvement is mandatory, being it the producer, the director or both.
Click to expand...

Fairly certain neither Murata nor Fukushima were involved--Fukushima was gone by MGS4 IIRC. Survive was an obvious corporate gimmick, and should be discounted.

Anyway, back on topic... with Okayasu at the helm I'd be very content and Suzuki producing.
 
Short of topic. A MGS without Kojima would not be a big deal. Kojima was the face behind MGS but he was not the only one. Fukushima for example is not well known but did a lots of work for the early gams as well to make them great. Jermey Blaustein also does not get enough fame for writing the good English script with helped to make the game popular in the west. The voice directors also had a great in casting the main characters.

And compared to Suzuki Kojima is clueless in the bigger plot of the story. Yu wrote everything in advance while Hideo was not thinking about the whole story. He wrote the story just for one game and when making another game he forgot most of the stuff he wrote for the previous game.

For another MGS Kojima is expandable while Suzuki is not. expandable for another Shenmue.

Hideo is not bad designer I liked his early work but he is a bit to famous for his own liking. And poor Yu San is not well known enough considering his contributions in the gaming space.
 
MG Survive is the proof about how lack of original direction (Kojima-Murata) can damage a series.

For Shenmue, if Okayasu is involved it means that Suzuki is behind, so no problem.
Now a scenario with an Okayasu-only Shenmue? I'm not sure.

Or even worst, a scenario with all fresh guys from Sega or whatever? A big NONONONONO!
 
Suzaku said:
MG Survive is the proof about how lack of original direction (Kojima-Murata) can damage a series.

For Shenmue, if Okayasu is involved it means that Suzuki is behind, so no problem.
Now a scenario with an Okayasu-only Shenmue? I'm not sure.

Or even worst, a scenario with all fresh guys from Sega or whatever? A big NONONONONO!
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I'm broadly with you on this, but think a Okayasu-only Shenmue would *probably* be okay based on their long history of working together and the fact that Yu Suzuki's influence is all over the source material.

Truthfully I only see this scenario happening if Yu is no longer with us (which hopefully will not happen for a long time yet), because I doubt even if SEGA decided they were taking Shenmue IV back in-house that they would depose Yu Suzuki from the director's chair if he still wanted it.
 
Yeah, I'd be perfectly happy with Okayasu only--the guy has been with Shenmue and Suzuki since day one and was there during Shenmue 3 (only pre Deep Silver?) helping teach the youngins how to decipher Suzuki's vision.
 
xatruio said:
Yeah, I'd be perfectly happy with Okayasu only--the guy has been with Shenmue and Suzuki since day one and was there during Shenmue 3 (only pre Deep Silver?) helping teach the youngins how to decipher Suzuki's vision.
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He was sub-director from about 2016ish until the project completed IIRC.
 
Reprise said:
I would...
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Me too. I would even to go that far that it might turn to be a better game than a Kojima game. As I said Kojima is not a bad designer but he is not the right man to make a franchise with a convincing story. He is not the biggest fan of MGS. He wanted to leave the series since MGS 2 (stated that in many interviews and he was more the fan of making new unique games. Konami forced him to stay put so he treated every new MGS game as a new game. That hurt the continuity of the franchise and also the gameplay. Turning MGS 5 into Grand Theft Metal Gear is the best prove for that. Kojima wanted to make new stuff try out new gameplay mechanics for many years and nothing wrong with that. It is Konami too blame to keep him making MGS games. So he used the MGS as vessle for his new ideas despite the fact that it killed the essence of Metal Gear.

I used to be big MGS Fan. MGS 1 to 3 are among my most favourite games of all time but since 4 I lost interest because at that point I could feel that Kojima is done with MGS. He just wanted to make other games but he could not. That's why he first turned MGS peace walker into a RTS game and 5 into a open world Game with RTS elements again.

But that is not MGS. MGS is a story driven stealth game and not a genre mix with many pointless side tasks akin to your average modern open world game.


Such things would never happen under Suzuki. Shenmue is passion project for Yu-San and he has a plan. He is way more important for Shenmue than Kojima is for MGS at that point. A shenmue without Yu-san is unthinkable while a MGS without Kojima could lead to best MGS game since MGS 3.
 
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As long as Yu is involved in some kind of consultant or advisor role, I don‘t see why not. It seems to work for the anime so I don‘t see why an advisor role would not work for a Game.
 
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