A few months ago, Sony announced the formation of the Third Party Productions team, a new group within Sony’s third party relations meant to facilitate the localization or porting of content between regions or consoles. The first project announced by this team was the Vita port of Borderlands 2, which is a pretty major feat to accomplish in and of itself.
The team has since asked fans to send in requests for the kinds of games they’d like to see on their Playstation console of choice, and according to Sony’s Adam Boyes their top two choices were none other then SEGA’s Yakuza and Shenmue franchises. For what this means, please check out the full quote below the fold. For the full interview, please visit Kotaku.
Schreier: With the caveat that this is all up in the air, this is all in negotiations, are there any that you guys have in mind that you would really like to bring over here?
Boyes: I think a lot—we get a ton of requests for Yakuza, a ton of requests for Shenmue. We see the lists. Like everything that people have tweeted Gio, literally we have a person that compiles those lists and prioritizes based on how many requests we’ve gotten. And I think to date there’s well over 10,000 mentions across like forum threads and stuff like that. So those are the ones we’re focused on.
But I think the challenge is always that there’s so many different intricacies, going into is the creator there, what’s the current status, does the publisher have other things going, so it’s not as easy as like, ‘Why are you taking so long?’ There’s a lot of things you have to do. And because it is a new thing that we’re doing, it’s also difficult to sit down with a partner saying, ‘Hey, we’re gonna do this, it’ll be fine.’ You can’t imagine that the Gearbox team and Randy Pitchford would be like, ‘Oh yeah yeah yeah take our baby and just whatever.’
They want to be really involved and they want to be sure we build trust. So I think what you’ll see is the first couple will take longer, and then once we get a couple of those games, especially ones localized from Japan over here, then I think you’ll see the cadence increase.
Before everyone gets excited or accuses Sony of being mendacious if there are no Yakuza or Shenmue related announcements six months from now, I’d like to add that the article states repeatedly that nothing is guaranteed and everything is still in negotiation. All we do know is that Yakuza and Shenmue are both highly requested by Sony’s fans. With luck, something awesome will come of this! We’ll just have to see.
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Excellent news that the top two crowned were two of Sega’s finest. Though I wonder what power Sony can wield over these franchises without Sega’s permission, seeing as Sony only has authority on what software gets the licence agreement of production on their branded hardware.
Clearly, Sony is in no position to deny Sega’s choice (or decision?) to bring forth future installments of these beloved Sega brands, especially as they are the top two crowned, but without Sega’s cooperation, they can’t possibly do nowt.
I’m really not sure what they could do for Shenmue. Would they really be willing to fund a third game? Or assist with a port of the first two games for Vita? I don’t know…
I really hope they’re also trying to get Valkyria Chronicles 3…and I hope SEGA can reach an agreement with the (other) localizations at least.
bring sakura wars to america
I second that.
I wonder what people request for their Vitas?
I wouldn’t mind Valkyria Chronicles 3 in English, but I also would love them to do the 7th Dragon and Shining Series (at least Hearts/Blade).
Why is everyone so bothered about Valkyria Chronicles 3? No one cared about the second one or was even bothered about whether it came west or not, is VC3 that good that it’s worth bringing west?
I have only ever done the first one.
I would instantly buy a PS4 if Shenmue 3 (or any remakes/ports came to it), or Yakuza titles come to it. With Ishin possibly coming to US, I will undoubtedly buy a PS4. All I want is my yearning for a Shenmue ending to be fulfilled with a final installment! Yu Suzuki needs to be working on it now.
I don’t think Ishin will come west, they said themselves there are no plans and seem to be going about it exactly the same way they did with Ryu Ga Gotoku 5/Yakuza 5.
Seems Yakuza 4 was the last real nmbered entry in the series that told Sega everything they needed to know about the feasibility of the western market.
Though after this poll, hard to say now.
Yu Suzuki has already let slip a hint of what happens in the end of the Shenmue series, but it would take at least another few installments to finish the 1st series off. Though now we have 50GB duel layered disks as standard, (with 300GB disks eventually – next gen probably), much more of the game can be fitted onto a single disk than ever before.
Can you attach a link of when he said that? I don’t remember that
Said what?
Hopefully this leads to Yakuza 5 and Ishin getting localized. Maybe Sony will fund a Shenmue III as well.
If this does happen, it will be good for us obviously, but the sad thing for the Sega legacy is that it actually took another company foreign to Sega to actually convince them to re-ignite their own IP, oh the shame of it, hopefully it does happen any way and Sega will be praised rather than criticised.
Please, Sony, bring Shenmue I-II HD and/or Shenmue 3 to fans! Thank you,
for listening to every fan! This is unprecedented! Bring Yu Suzuki and
Mark Cerny together, and release the majestic conclusion to one of the
most requested games ever! Shenmue has a cult following and fans will do
anything to get it. It will ensure a great boost of sales for Sony’s
consoles, be it (oh yeah) PlayStation 4! We have been waiting for 13
years! Don’t break our heart once again. We need to depend on you! 😀
“TeamYu: Fans can encourage Sony and Sega to strike this deal by targeting both companies in the upcoming Shenmue Tweetathon: http://TeamYu.net/Dec3rd“