Shenmue 3

Yu Suzuki’s Shenmue 3 Kickstarter Twitch Q&A: Looking into adding physical PS4 copies

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It seems that the world needs to know more and more about the Shenmue 3 KickStarter as each day passes, so Awesome Japan got Yu Suzuki to do a live Twitch stream answering fan questions regarding the KickStarter. While the stream had some issues starting up and the quality in the video being behind times it did answer quite a few important questions.

One of the biggest requests is for Shenmue 3 is a physical copy on the Playstation 4, so far they have only been offering up a digital copy for Sony’s newest machine; while the PC got both digital and physical. Yu Suzuki says he is looking into adding it as a tier.

Yu Suzuki also clarified how some of the mechanics work on some of their stretch goals, like the ‘character perspective system’ will let you play as Shenhua and Ren in Baisha. Another question he answered was about how much story would be cut from Shenmue 3 and according to Yu Suzuki he decided not to cut much of the story out; thus Shenmue 3 won’t not conclude the saga after all. 

He also announced via Twitch that he would be adding a few grab bags of old Shenmue merch as rewards, but those where gobbled up rather quickly.

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Yu Suzuki issues a statement regarding Shenmue 3’s budget

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The Shenmue 3 kickstarter has now been updated to include a new statement made by Yu Suzuki regarding the funding and budget of the project. Lots of websites and  some YouTubers have been questioning if people should be donating to the KickStarter, some thinking that Sony is going to ‘fund the game anyway’. Most of these allegations are put to rest by Yu Suzuki himself, again, considering this isn’t the first time he has spoken about Sony’s involvement.

Sony and Shibuya Productions have been wonderful partners because they believe in Shenmue and want to see the best for the fans and the game. Their investment in (and support of) Shenmue have helped to realize a sequel that will stand proud with its predecessors. While it is not business practice to discuss the specific details of such arrangements, I can say that with their assistance on the production and marketing end, and in Sony’s case with some publishing support as well, Ys Net is able to use more of the money we collect through Kickstarter purely for Shenmue 3’s development. It is also important to note that your funds are going strictly to Ys Net for development of Shenmue 3 – Sony and Shibuya Productions are not seeing a cent of your Kickstarter dollars.

Like I stated in our podcast, this is basically what I assumed: KickStarter money goes into development of Shenmue 3 while Sony helps with marketing (announcing the KickStarter at their stage is a big advertisement push) and helps publish it on PlayStation 4. I would consider this to be fair, considering as fans we want all donated money to go towards a better Shenmue 3 video game and not advertising. Having this deal set up lifts the burdan of YS Net of trying to also fund a marketing budget. One more thing to note is that the whole statement didn’t mention SEGA once, making me think they licensed the name as they would stuff like the vinyl release of the Shenmue soundtrack. That means that SEGA will just make a cut on top of what the game sells.

Yu Suzuki stated in the update that he will try to be more transparent about Shenmue 3‘s development. What do you guys think of Yu Suzuki’s statement talking about the budget of Shenmue 3?

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Yu Suzuki reveals more Shenmue 3 secrets and details in Reddit AMA

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Last night Yu Suzuki held a Reddit AMA, revealing even more Shenmue 3 details for fans. While the event itself was initially confusing, failing to mention if the event was 9:30 AM or PM, what time zone it was in, and where on Reddit it could be found, eventually everything was sorted and the AMA took place at /r/IAMA. Suzuki answered several questions pertaining to the length of the game, how many chapters the entire Shenmue saga would cover, potential gameplay elements, and more. Most interestingly, he laid out the exact numbers he hopes the Kickstarter will hit to make the game not only a reality, but as close to his vision as possible:

I will say this: if we reach the $5 mil mark, one of the things I really want to do with Shenmue 3 will become a reality. At $10 million, it will truly have the features of an open world.

After the break, check out a full breakdown of what Suzuki revealed about Shenmue 3!

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Swingin’ Report Show #79: Shenmue 3 E3 Reveal & Kickstarter

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We’re still pinching ourselves, because we can’t believe this is real life. Yu Suzuki is finally set to make Shenmue 3, having just announced the long awaited game at E3 and launching a Kickstarter to fund the project this week. On this episode of the Swingin’ Report Show, George and Barry discuss their reactions to the news, share opinions on the Kickstarter, and tackle the misconceptions of Sony’s involvement. We also speculate what Suzuki has planned for the third game based on past interviews and recently revealed details.

Check out Shenmue 3 on Kickstarter at kickstarter.com/projects/ysnet/shenmue-3

[Download] [RSS] [iTunes] [Archive]

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Sony’s Shuhei Yoshida says Shenmue 3 IP deal was between SEGA and Yu Suzuki

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While Sony announced Shenmue 3 on stage and even admitted that they are involved with some funding for the project, fans are starting to wonder who owns the IP and what Sony had to do with getting the kickstarter going. If Sony’s involved why don’t they just fund the whole thing? According to Playstation President of Worldwide Studios’ Shuhei Yoshida, the deal for the Kickstarter was done by Yu Suzuki and SEGA.
During a interview with Engadget, they asked Yoshida-San the following: ” Why did Sony PlayStation decide to allow that crowdfunding announcement as opposed to funding it?”

“Ah, no, no, no. It’s a very exciting project and there are lots of PlayStation fans asking for it. But it’s a Sega IP and of course Suzuki Yu-san is the creator. So somehow Suzuki-san was able to work out with Sega to allow them to Kickstart the project. And because we liked the project, our third-party relations team struck a deal to help Kickstart the campaign at the E3 conference. That’s great PR.”

Sony has stated that they are willing to help promote the game and have shown that by allowing the Kickstarter to be announced on their stage at E3 in front of millions. Fans have been a bit angry with Sony’s involvement, in my opinion in the end of the day all the money funded by fans and Sony will go into Shenmue 3 to make it a better game, so in the end the consumer wins. No one is forcing anyone to donate to the Kickstarter, you can always wait for the released product. What are your thoughts?

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Yu Suzuki will be on Reddit tomorrow answering all fan questions

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It has been updated via the Shenmue 3 Kickstarter that Yu Suzuki will be answering questions tomorrow (Friday) via Reddit.  Sadly the post doesn’t really say the time they will be on answering the questions or what subreddit they will be using. I will assume it will be either via /r/IAmA or /r/Shenmue. You’d think they would have details like time ready a day before the event starts, but they did say they will keep us updated.

So get your list of questions ready and keep checking on Reddit tomorrow for your chance to ask one of gaming’s most legendary developers all your questions. We will update you when we find out the time and place of the event, so check back.

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New Shenmue 3 information uncovered including PC version’s publisher

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While I jumped in and donated to the Shenmue 3 KickStarter right when it was announced, the whole thing just left me with more questions. I think a lot of fans right now are just so excited (like myself) that most forgot to question some of the aspects of the campaign. I see lots of gaming journalist assuming lots of things, but let’s get some facts out of the way. While the gaming press is discussing Sony stating that they are giving Shenmue 3 ‘some funding‘, we don’t know who the publisher is going to be… till now at least.

We know that the PC version (which is getting a physical release) will be published by Shibuya Productions. That would mean that SEGA will not be publishing that version of the game, sadly. They did say that SEGA and Yu Suzuki have a good relationship, so much so that they are allowing Yu Suzuki to use all the elements he needs from the first two games to complete Shenmue 3.

One of the new gameplay systems that the Kickstarter is promoting is the use of scrolls, while the older games had them to learn moves it seems that Shenmue 3 is set to expand on that. Skill scrolls are still part of the fighting system but will also unlock mini-games, gambling and other side quests.

It has also been confirmed that Shenmue 3 will take place right after Shenmue 2‘s cliff hanger. Cédric Biscay has been confirmed to be in charge of the PC version.

[Source: NeoGAF]

Vauio

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Shenmue 3’s Kickstarter has been funded

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Shenmue 3 is Real

No more waiting. No more false hope. Shenmue 3 is alive, it’s coming, and one day we’re all going to get to play it. As of a few moments ago, Shenmue 3 reached its $2 million goal on Kickstarter, breaking all sorts of records along the way.

Shenmue 3 has become the fastest game on Kickstarter to break $1 million dollar and the fastest to reach a $2 million funding goal, hitting it in less than hours with more than 24,000 funders. The game’s funding moved so quickly in its opening hours that it practically broke the kickstarter page, hitting prospective funders with errors.  It’s also currently on track to outpace Bloodstained, which recently became Kickstarter’s most funded game ever at $5.5 million. For comparison, Bloodstained required 24 hours to reach half of Shenmue 3’s initial funding goal.

Of course, this is just the beginning. With more than 30 days left in the campaign, the project as more than $2 million worth of stretch goals lined up, ranging from Shenmue 1 & 2 cinema shorts at $2.5 million to an expanded Baisha village and additional mini games at $4 million. According to the Kickstarter page, we’ll be hearing more about these stretch goals after initial funding. We’ll post more details as they come in!

Shenmue 3 is being developed by Yu Suzuki’s independent studio YsNet. It is currently unknown how (or if) SEGA is involved, and whether any outside parties are will be performing publish duties or providing outside funding. The game is currently scheduled for a December 2017 release. For additional information on the project and its developers, check out the official kickstarter page and the game’s website. For a look at a list of all the known stretch goals, check out the image below the break!

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Shenmue 3 appears at Sony’s E3 2015 press conference, launches Kickstarter

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Shenmue is just one of those game franchises that make all SEGA fans sequel in delight, talk to any of the fans that played them and they’ll go on for hours about what makes the franchise so great. This year at Sony’s E3 2015 conference, Yu Suzuki announced that they will be doing a Shenmue 3 kickstarter and you can fund it right now! The budget of the game via the kickstarter is only 2 million dollars, so chances of reaching it are very high (since its at 150k right now and it hasn’t even been an hour!). But 2 million dollars seems a bit low of a budget and it also seems to have a new character models that seem out of place. This is obviously very early assets that will hopefully change down the road. The game will also be developed by Yu Suzuki’s new studio called Ys Net. It seems that the project will only be available on Playstation 4 and PC.

Regardless you can fund the game and enjoy some of the rewards offered. $500 dollars gets you a set of capsule toys, who doesn’t like capsule toys? Are you guys excited for Shenmue III? Let us know in the comments.

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Yu Suzuki interview at Gamelab 2014

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Yu Suzuki attended the recently concluded Gamelab 2014, a gaming conference in Spain. He gave a presentation (partially notable for one of his slides featuring a Roman numeral “3” stylized in Shenmue font, which attracted the usual modest amount of attention) and was the recipient of the fourth Legend Award, a distinction meant for honoring “key figures in the history of video games”, as written at the Gamelab website.

After Gamelab concluded, Yu Suzuki conducted a short interview, available above. The interview asks a variety of direct questions, on topics including his favorite arcade project that he worked on (interestingly, the interviewer also asks Yu Suzuki if he feels nostalgiac for any aspects of Sega’s more arcade-focused past,) opportunities for modern technology in a hypothetical next Shenmue game, and whether or not Kickstarter is being actively considered to fund the next Shenmue game should development be more seriously pursued. Check it out!

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Question for the SEGA Fan Community: What is the most positive and effective way to ask for Shenmue 3?

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Over the weekend a group of Shenmue fans came across an article I wrote over two years ago. In the article, I named five things I believed SEGA fans should stop doing, and one of these things was spamming SEGA’s Facebook page for titles like Shenmue 3. I love the Shenmue franchise and consider myself to be a huge fan. I read and reread every Shenmue article I could get my hands on in anticipation of the first game’s release, and bought it on day one. When the sequel was announced to be only available in Europe and Japan, with US fans having to wait nearly a year for an Xbox port, I learned how to play imported games and bought the European version on the week of release. Since then, I’ve debated with fans over what a third title would contain, bought Shenmue merch whenever the chance arrived, and even joined in on the infamous mass capsule toy mailings.

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Yu Suzuki: Shenmue City is not Shenmue 3

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Yu Suzuki sat down for an interview with Famitsu, to discuss the origins of Shenmue City and the future of the Shenmue franchise. He stated that Shenmue City is not Shenmue 3, so this should make most Shenmue fans breath easier.

“Shenmue has the image of grand scale.”But making something of grand scale requires appropriate preparation. I want to make 3 with the same volume as in the past. There have actually been a lot of requests from fans for 3 as well. There were even petitions signed by by tens of thousands of people. I wanted to carry out my obligations for the series.” – Yu Suzuki

So what made Suzuki interested in making Shenmue City a social game? Mafia Wars, the popular social game you might have heard of? Well, he said he tried the game, didn’t understand it then came to enjoy it after awhile. He said that having Shenmue in this perspective was odd since it didn’t require top notch graphics and sounds, two things the Shenmue series is known for.

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Shenmue City press event recap

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[Two mighty men walk on stage, only one leaves alive]

The press event for Shenmue City has come to a close. What did we learn? Well not too much, but more than we knew before. The event did have a lot of ‘looking back’ at the release of Shenmue, then Sunsoft saying “We will put our full power behind Shenmue Gai (City).” How nice.

Yu Suzuki (along with Takeuchi) took the stage, to explain what Shenmue City will have to offer. They show the game, you are a student in the Hazuki  Dojo and play along side Ryo. They showed the users ‘My Page’ that gives you a list of events (missions), Kung Fu and ‘Search’ options. Search lets you find more events, Yu explains that after you do most events, you will fight a boss in the end to advance to the next stage. In the Kung Fu tab, there will be a move list that you can master.

He also explained that sometimes you will find a ‘Match’ icon in your My Page, this is when someone is challenging you in the game, but this can only happen when you ‘level up’ enough to have your own Dojo. Depending on your success, your Dojo will be ranked, the ranks actually follow the Virtua Fighter ranking system.

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Shenmue 10th Anniversary!

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Yes! It is 10 whole years to the day… Erm, yesterday. But close enough right?

Shenmue was one of the most ambitious games ever made, it cost a whopping 70 million dollars in total, is the best series I’ve ever played and… Still isn’t bloody finished.

If you have yet to play Shenmue, well you may be a ‘gamer’ but you’ve still got your training wheels on, that’s for sure. Get your act together, go buy a cheap Dreamcast and enjoy a true classic.

If you have, fantastic you are a real man. Here’s to more Shenmue, sometime in the next 10 years! Come on Sega…

Until then, Shenmue City anyone?

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