Hi everyone!
I searched a little and found no topic like this, sorry if there is one already made.
What I'd like to tell and read from you guys is your personal story with Shenmue. How you got to know the saga, what brought you or any kind of thing you'd like to share.
Here goes mine. First of all, let me apologize for my english, it's not my native tongue and I may make some mistakes.
When the first Shenmue was released in the West I was 10 years old. I had no idea that the game even existed, by the time only recently I had the PSX (I used to play on PC to mostly older games and in a NES) and my knowledge of gaming was centered towards that system. I knew the Dreamcast was already out but in my country at least, Spain, it was pretty expensive. My family was humble and we couldn't afford to buy a new console, so I never even asked them to buy it.
While watching a satellite channel called "C:", dedicated to games (where I got to know most of the Dreamcast catalog, specially Space Channel 5 and Crazy Taxi), they made a coverage of a new Sega game called Shenmue. And I felt completely in love since the first moment I saw it. It had everything I could expect from a game. A realistic open world (open worlds was something I dreamt of a lot, PSX games weren't open or with many, many restrictions like Driver 1 and 2), an everyday life with its character, a cinematic story, unbelievable graphics, kung fu... I recall specially the fact that they said if you ran out of batteries for a flashlight you had to go to the shop to buy new ones and you had to work to earn money.
Nowadays maybe this sounds ridiculous but that was a dream for me, everything they said and shown was like out of this world for me. I became kinda obsessed, I was waiting to see if any emulator could bring the game to PC (although my PC wasn't strong enough even if it existed), waiting to see if the game released for PSX (yeah, yeah... I was a kid) or later PS2... all to no avail. So for a long time Shenmue was something that existed only in my dreams.
I had a PS2 in 2002 and all my gaming was for that console. But in 2006 everything changed at last. We had a better situation at home and consoles were no longer expensive. At the end of 2005 I had the Xbox 360 and soon after they added some backwards compatibility. I learned that Shenmue 2 released on Xbox but it wasn't one of the games that could play on 360. But in July 2006 I found Shenmue 2 for Xbox in a "Game" shop, it was second hand and for only 10 euros. I bought it. Even I couldn't reproduce it, I still wanted it just in case.
That night I watched the Shenmue movie and fell even more in love. But I still couldn't play. Later that month, maybe a week or two after having the game, my mom gave me a big surprise: she told me to buy an original Xbox which was pretty cheap by that time (I was 15 so I had no income of my own). So that 24th of July 2006 was, after almost six years after knowing Shenmue, when I could finally play it. And I was astounded when I started it and was even better than I could imagine. The music, the environment, the combat, the QTE's... I just can't describe it.
I reached Kowloon, but in August (I think it was around the 5th) a friend of my father lent me his old Dreamcast, I told him about Shenmue and he had it but almost never played it. He lent me the console with Shenmue and finally could play the first one. So I left Shenmue 2 aside to beath the first one. Still to this day Shenmue 1 is my favourite game of the saga and my third favourite game ever (only surpassed by two games that changed me way before: MGS1 and MGS2), I beated it and loved every second of it. But I didn't return to Shenmue 2.
Well, that's my story of how I got to know, play and love the saga. BTW I had a problem/curse with Shenmue 2 that I just never beat it. I played Shenmue 1 several times and although I started 2, never managed to reach the end for one reason or another. It wasn't until 2014 that I finally reached the credits. And I'm very happy I did that, because it was one of the last games I finished in my old house, where I lived since I was born and had to leave at the end of 2014. I have an illusion: if someday I get a lot, lot of money I'll buy that house again and I'll play a game that wished for many years to play there: Shenmue 3 (and hopefully 4, 5...)
Thanks for reading. What's your story?
I searched a little and found no topic like this, sorry if there is one already made.
What I'd like to tell and read from you guys is your personal story with Shenmue. How you got to know the saga, what brought you or any kind of thing you'd like to share.
Here goes mine. First of all, let me apologize for my english, it's not my native tongue and I may make some mistakes.
When the first Shenmue was released in the West I was 10 years old. I had no idea that the game even existed, by the time only recently I had the PSX (I used to play on PC to mostly older games and in a NES) and my knowledge of gaming was centered towards that system. I knew the Dreamcast was already out but in my country at least, Spain, it was pretty expensive. My family was humble and we couldn't afford to buy a new console, so I never even asked them to buy it.
While watching a satellite channel called "C:", dedicated to games (where I got to know most of the Dreamcast catalog, specially Space Channel 5 and Crazy Taxi), they made a coverage of a new Sega game called Shenmue. And I felt completely in love since the first moment I saw it. It had everything I could expect from a game. A realistic open world (open worlds was something I dreamt of a lot, PSX games weren't open or with many, many restrictions like Driver 1 and 2), an everyday life with its character, a cinematic story, unbelievable graphics, kung fu... I recall specially the fact that they said if you ran out of batteries for a flashlight you had to go to the shop to buy new ones and you had to work to earn money.
Nowadays maybe this sounds ridiculous but that was a dream for me, everything they said and shown was like out of this world for me. I became kinda obsessed, I was waiting to see if any emulator could bring the game to PC (although my PC wasn't strong enough even if it existed), waiting to see if the game released for PSX (yeah, yeah... I was a kid) or later PS2... all to no avail. So for a long time Shenmue was something that existed only in my dreams.
I had a PS2 in 2002 and all my gaming was for that console. But in 2006 everything changed at last. We had a better situation at home and consoles were no longer expensive. At the end of 2005 I had the Xbox 360 and soon after they added some backwards compatibility. I learned that Shenmue 2 released on Xbox but it wasn't one of the games that could play on 360. But in July 2006 I found Shenmue 2 for Xbox in a "Game" shop, it was second hand and for only 10 euros. I bought it. Even I couldn't reproduce it, I still wanted it just in case.
That night I watched the Shenmue movie and fell even more in love. But I still couldn't play. Later that month, maybe a week or two after having the game, my mom gave me a big surprise: she told me to buy an original Xbox which was pretty cheap by that time (I was 15 so I had no income of my own). So that 24th of July 2006 was, after almost six years after knowing Shenmue, when I could finally play it. And I was astounded when I started it and was even better than I could imagine. The music, the environment, the combat, the QTE's... I just can't describe it.
I reached Kowloon, but in August (I think it was around the 5th) a friend of my father lent me his old Dreamcast, I told him about Shenmue and he had it but almost never played it. He lent me the console with Shenmue and finally could play the first one. So I left Shenmue 2 aside to beath the first one. Still to this day Shenmue 1 is my favourite game of the saga and my third favourite game ever (only surpassed by two games that changed me way before: MGS1 and MGS2), I beated it and loved every second of it. But I didn't return to Shenmue 2.
Well, that's my story of how I got to know, play and love the saga. BTW I had a problem/curse with Shenmue 2 that I just never beat it. I played Shenmue 1 several times and although I started 2, never managed to reach the end for one reason or another. It wasn't until 2014 that I finally reached the credits. And I'm very happy I did that, because it was one of the last games I finished in my old house, where I lived since I was born and had to leave at the end of 2014. I have an illusion: if someday I get a lot, lot of money I'll buy that house again and I'll play a game that wished for many years to play there: Shenmue 3 (and hopefully 4, 5...)
Thanks for reading. What's your story?