Also, it should be possible, but I was thinking to encourage more people to actually do the extra $30, you could create a second backer account, perhaps with the details of wife / spouse whatever etc, and pick the $29 tier. This would in theory allow you to own a digital copy for the PS4 and PC / or if you've already selected a higher tier, digital of either to go with your physical PC. This way I play the game on the PS4 aswell, and have my physical PC version also :), and obviously if ever they add a PS4 physical release, I would definately buy for essentially a third time to display the game box in all it's glory on my shelf and with the Adam Koralik head on, when the inevitable digital going offline situation arrises, Shenmue 3 won't vanish in thin air :)

As much as I hate DLC, and wouldn't want it in Shenmue, i've been recently thinking as long as it's done in a good way, it could help Shenmue bring in loads more extra money which would allow Yu to not only consider 4, but also take his time again with the plot and achieve his original vision of 5 or whatever amount of games. Even basic DLC like, what seems to be slightly already planned, with the backer only alternative Jacket style, or whatever, imagine if there was an alternative costume for each of the main characters, or just extras that wouldn't normally be in the game, but could become optional bonus's through means of DLC. It's annoying to say because it goes against everything I feel about DLC, but again if done in the right way, could bring in a great amount of extra revenue, and Yu wouldn't have to run down this Kickstarter route again. Someone keeps mentioning that other project, the star one I forgot it's name, that supposively brought in 10's of millions more money just because of things like DLC and stuff? As long as it's not blatant, and game breaking, like some of the shit in Assassin's Creed unity where they make it really hard to progress without spending a bit of cash in the ingame shop, where day one you could be a 1 hit killing machine. Shenmue could have a lot of novel bits of extra content. Like look at the Ryo Hazuki vehicle in Sonic Racing Transformed, that was released like, a year after the game came out...I bought one...i'm sure many other people did. As long as it doesn't negatively hurt the gameplay of the game, it could be a potential way of extra funding for S4 - if only in the game for that reason alone, to help S4 (Maybe it says in the menu, every purchase helps towards S4, like an ingame S4 kickstarter :))

I used to quite like these guys, they do a podcast called The Patch, which i've been listening to every week whilst working, but lost a lot of respect now, left this comment for them:

I listen to The Patch whilst working every Thursday, but really lost a lot of respect for these guys. Obviously i'm a massive Shenmue fan and biased, but even so, if this is just a 'let us know what you think in the comments below' discussion type of video, why label it so poorly and use the word Scam, and talk about Scam, and say Scam...especially when your own facts about Sony's involvement are incorrect. I don't understand why if you are interested in the game, are a fan of the first 2 and would be excited about a third and buy it in a shop, would you not spend $29 now...which is already rediculously cheap for a AAA game, essentially preordering it to help make it a better experience when it is actually released? Seems crazy to me.

I seriously think Sony is just funding the game. They've said that they needed the $2 million to prove that there was an audience and Adam Boyes pretty much said that they needed it to show the higher ups this was a project worth funding. Most of the stretch goals sounds like they're mini games and side quests which I imagine we will get anyway but just not as many without the stretch goals being met. One of them is for a part time job in a village but I doubt there won't be a single job in that village if the goal isn't met or the structure of the whole village and how it operates will have to change since money isn't available.

I think no matter what goal we hit at this point we will get a game similar in size and scope as the first two but the more the Kickstarter makes the more bells and whistles will be thrown in. The guy in charge of Sony Europe said they consider it a successful series so I doubt they're throwing spare change at the project. There where even job ads going up the minute the Kickstarter went up, why would you start hiring when you don't know how many people you can hire?

My final thoughts: No matter how the Kickstarter ends we will get a sequel that isn't a point A to point B type experience with corners cut too fit into a small budget. We will get a Shenmue sequel similar to the first games but obviously a bit shiner since it's on a console two generations ahead of the originals.

Hope you're right dude! :)

Hmm, just been doing a little bit of research on the watch that's included in the 1k grab bag tier. I managed to secure this reward whilst the twitch stream was live, and the amount has been on my mind all day. But I got home to find they added photos of the items you'd receive (last night it was just "Random items"). So I was excited to see that everyone did infact get a replica timex watch! Then the amount was even more justified as i'm actually excited by the hand drawn illustration. At first I assumed the watch was a cheaper replica of Ryo's, in the colour blue, so I understood the difference between this one and the mega amazing official sexy boxed limited edition replica $5k watch! However something about the watch didn't look right, it looks like a digital display...So I just google imaged watches and found this photo, which matches the style of the watch in the kickstarter rewards and uggghhh, is this really the watch?

http://www.videogameauctions.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/Shenmue-Japan-Prize-TIMEX-ATLANTIS-100-Rare-wristwatch.jpg

Apart from the Shenmue logo on the wrist, what on earth has that got to do with Shenmue lol? There might be another $1k reward up for grabs if anyone is interested lol, i'm gonna sit on it for a little bit and get back to you, I know there's a couple of people in this topic that would be happy to grab it from me. I really would like the illustration though, so will need to sit on it a little, just thought i'd give you guys a heads up.

Doom_Infinite wrote: Cedric Biscay so far has proved to be rather awesome but let's not forget his team has a job already, they can't just take the KS organization load on, it's not even their specialty to begin with.

And yet he's already done more social interaction than AJ

Seriously after 14 years, i'm in no rush, I personally would rather a complete experience, which is why I also don't want to be selfish and expect Yu to cut the story short for the sake of an end to this amazing series! I would much prefer the slight risk of Shenmue 3 doing well to guarantee a 4th or 5th game! The series always had the potential to become the most epic story driven game in existance, I often look at my Dreamcast shelf and look at the 2 boxes for Shenmue 1 and 2, and imagine another 3 or 4 in a row, it would have been something special. We have this back right now, and I don't particularly care as long as it takes, as long as it's before I die :), I would prefer the complete experience!

If the environments look anything like the Kickstarter trailers ones, I think it'll look amazing. What with the leaves falling and the bunched up leaves on the floor looked perfect! Just depends on the gameplay mechanics they use whether or not the game feels the same standard, pretty graphics don't mean everything.

Dunno if i've missed the topic of discussion on this, if so please delete this, but just brielfy looked and couldn't see any discussion on it - so maybe it's only just happened? It's quite easy to miss, since there's no email update as of yet, but if you look at the rewards on the kickstarter page, there's a new $1000 tier which includes the $500 tier, and also you receive a special personal voice message from Ryo! Not sure if this is the big update, and how long it's been there for, but just done my regular check and I spotted it!

It's not limited so no rush, but cool little reward :) Thoughts? Corey Marshall confirmed for Shenmue 3 then :)?


It says:

RYO VOICE MESSAGE BY COREY MARSHALL

Corey Marshall, the english voice actor who plays the main character Ryo in Shenmue 1 & 2, will do a special voice message for you as Ryo.

Includes the $500 Reward.

I see it as a plus as most fans heard Corey in the west on Shenmue 1 and 2 and if they brought in different voice actors it would be a fucking dumb move.

Goddammit at least for continuity sake!

Well hope he has improved since the last decade and a half,i will be playing with Japanese VO anyway as i for one think corey is terrible at VO.

Thanks for letting us know.

Seriously don't know why people have to bash the English voices, same people would moan if they replaced Corey with someone that doesn't sound remotely similar to Ryo from the first 2 games. This is a massive plus as Corey was fine I thought, and did a great job voicing Ryo. His support towards the series has been second to non, and it's not like he's been stagnant for the last 14 years, he's always done interviews, spoke to fans, I reckon he probably would do the work for free as long as they paid for him to get to Japan or wherever they plan to record VO.

Just be happy that the people who grew up with the English voices are going to enjoy the experience of playing Shenmue 3 just as much as the people who grew up preferring the Japanese, since it's obvious we're gonna get both now. There isn't 2 releases anymore split between Japan and EU/US, it's 1 release, so it will have both VO's.

NeoShredder wrote: And Awesome Japan apologise!

Haha, seems like they waited for the right time to apologize I think everyone will completely forgive them now lol!

Look out for James Brown's face in Choubu !

I like this idea be better than spoiling the atmosphere by seeing some random dudes face blown up lol

Seems he may be a little too forward-thinking in some regards. Including the Dojo scroll is a "good idea" the he might "look into"? Including items from Shenmue I & II can't be done? What? Are these just translation issues (eg assuming the question meant carrying over game saves) or is he just disregarding everything from the previous games bar the plot?

When I read the answer about items from 1 and 2 I think in his head he thought the question was asking about transferring items you earnt form those games...such as capsule toys etc. I might be wrong though, but then apart from photographs, the scroll and the leaf, is there anything else of value to carry over?

If the lucky hit boards all sell they'll be an extra 15 I Am Shenmue 3's aswell bringing the total up to 143. I'm a little bit disheartened by it aswell, I agree a bit with Rig, but at the end of the day, I just want the project to get as much funding as possible to make the actual game the best it can be. I'll check to find my photo obviously, and show friends and family, but then after that I just want the game to be as kick ass as it can be!

I'm talking about higher tiers, seems like it's exclusive to $800. Odd

this concerns me too. i'm not too keen on missing out on the in-game items like technique scrolls, but i'll need a whole new $800 donation to get this?

(having ones name in kanji appear in the game is a great idea though)

Yeah agreed, I love that everyone gets the phone reward, and not being greedy, because we have name and face in the game at $1500 reward, but missing out on a move scroll seems a bit disheartening after pledging so much money :cry:

I've done $1500 on one account, and $80 on another. The second account started at $30 for $30 on the 3rd lol, then it went to $60 for the physical PS4...cause I want to have both physical versions (PC/PS4), then today i've decided that I need the phone card for both versions of the game, just incase I prefer playing on one platform more than the other.

As for the $800 technique scroll, they need to just give it to everyone above $800 imo, since we're all patreons at that amount of money lol, i'm not asking for the Chinese names in the temples, that is specific to that reward, but to alienate a unique technique scroll - regardless of what we currently know about technique scrolls - slightly lets people down who have pledged more.

If you make two accounts, can you use the same card? I'm not going to, but I'm just curious.

I have an it didn't give me an issue. Whether it will or not on the day the money comes out, we'll have to wait and see, but I can't see them not wanting money :D

That's what I am worried about, I don't want on the final day to have the pledge from one account cancelled and the lesser pledge to go through.

Just sent Kickstarter a ticket to ask, will let you know the answer when they get back to me :)

Here's the reply guys.

Kickstarter Support (Kickstarter)

Jul 8, 11:51 AM

Hi James,

You should be totally fine! Let us know if you need anything else.

Best,
Alfie

skilljim

Jul 8, 9:58 AM

Hi, I am a big Shenmue fan and have backed for the $1500 tier on this account. I also wanted to get the $80 tier so I would be able to receive both rewards, and I have backed this tier on a second account. I have backed it using the same debit card as I thought this would be okay, but I wanted to just double check before the project finishes that my card will be successfully charged twice, one for each of these 2 accounts. I needed to use 2 accounts, as it's not possible to back more than one unique reward tier, that the Shenmue 3 Kickstarter project happens to have.

Thank you for your time and help :)
James.

Just noticed the $160 reward has 20 capsule toy tickets, was that always there?

Yea it must have been Amir, because they said that once someone backs a tier they can't change the description for it.

"*Changes to Reward pledge buttons are not allowed after they are pledged for, so please see the "Rewards" section below for complete reward details"

Adding $1200 to all higher tiers, which they could easily do since apart from the physical calligraphy print all this content is just digital would definately mean the rest of those $1500 tiers would be snapped up imo, and then possibly might increase the $3000, and $4000 tiers aswell if everything higher included from the $1200 tier downwards.

ElephantStone wrote: Shame the comments are already a shit show.

Tried to correct a lot of people, but it's basically falling on deaf ears with these 12 year old trolls.

RiGoRmOrTiS wrote: $1500 I AM SHENMUE.. (will choose PC Phsyical)

+ $80 for PS4 (Phsyical)

I'll never reduce my pledges for that would be disingenuous and cause too much heart ache for those like me who watch the total day in day out

Exactly the same as you dude $1500 first account, $80 second

Kobe wrote: Shenmue HD is not coming ever and I could easily bet Bill Gates salary on it.

Shit, how much did you lose on the announcement of Shenmue 3?

Surprised, I thought it looked gorgeous. Considering they've had a couple of weeks and still not received our funding.

I clicked Add Member Name, and put it there, but this is great. Genuinely hope the guy is okay though, and there's a reason for the year absense.

I messaged them and they replied saying it shouldn't be a problem.

Kickstarter Support (Kickstarter)

Jul 8, 11:51 AM

Hi James,

You should be totally fine! Let us know if you need anything else.

Best,
Alfie

skilljim

Jul 8, 9:58 AM

Hi, I am a big Shenmue fan and have backed for the $1500 tier on this account. I also wanted to get the $80 tier so I would be able to receive both rewards, and I have backed this tier on a second account. I have backed it using the same debit card as I thought this would be okay, but I wanted to just double check before the project finishes that my card will be successfully charged twice, one for each of these 2 accounts. I needed to use 2 accounts, as it's not possible to back more than one unique reward tier, that the Shenmue 3 Kickstarter project happens to have.

Thank you for your time and help :)
James.

I'm talking with my best friend, and some of the guys going to Japan and it's such a hard decision. Maybe if the Monaco tier was just a 1 person deal then maybe yes, I'd take that. But those scripts of Shenmue.... you all know I am a die hard Shenmue collector.....

Jesus. First world problems eh? :lol:

Either way, I hope all the tiers get filled. This is about Shenmue.

Yeah, forgot about the script aswell, that is some super cool merch right there!

Tough decision tho Peter...maybe I could help in suggesting...second account, back both :P?

Here's the bit with his reaction if anyone was interested.

I think someone said the max you can pledge is $10k anyways, so if Sony wanted to drop 40 mil into Kickstarter, they'd need to start making new accounts now

You are not authorised to read this forum.

Thanks for posting this John, my posts about this have gotten lost in the midst of the middle of about 2-3 topics, so this makes more sense

Done aswell cool

Great news, if it's a Patron style sort of thing i'll deffo put up like reocurring $30 payments for the next 2 and a half years or something!

When I woke up today reading that interview, I too had concerns like shenmue852 said up above. I hope again it has been poorly translated as to me the answer to that question does sound as though Yu is trying to squeeze the rest of the story into Shenmue 3. This would be a huge mistake in my eyes, as not only would the story feel rushed, but his original vision of the series would be completely crushed when say 3 or 4 more games were originally planned and all that content is completely cut just to tie the knot in the third game. I know nothing up until this one question has sounded at all like he's planning to crush the story into 1 more game, but it has been over a month since the last update and alot can change. My other concern with this, is that finally we have the media coverage, we can self market this game through loads more mediums that we previously could when the Dreamcast was around, we have youtube, twitter, facebook, all these highly sharable and self marketable avenues to spread the word about Shenmue...which is one of the reasons Shenmue 3 is actually happening. The hype around the series right now and especially when the third game is close to being released, I think Shenmue this time around could be a success, and I would hate that Yu and his team realise the potential was there in this era to return to his original plan and have a Shenmue 4, and maybe even a Shenmue 5, but everything was cut to compensate for wrapping the series up in Shenmue 3. I can understand the other side of the argument that is saying that it would be another risk not finishing the story and people don't want to have to wait another 15 years for another game that this time likely won't be returning...but I don't think it will be as hard this time around for the series to bomb when we already have the attention of millions of people from the E3 conference, we hold a couple of world records on Kickstarter now, and the game is being released on the best selling console compared to the Dreamcast which was potentially the worst selling console at the time. Things are different this time around that mean that Shenmue can live on successfully through a game or 2 more.

Again, it's just one question and one weirdly worded answer, I hope that it was just slightly mistranslated :)

Hey guys, I watch a dude on Twitch called TheMediumStream, and he recently just cleared Shenmue 2 for the first time. He spoke to this particular NPC in Guilin, who says something at the time rather innocent, but since we now know differently, it comes across really funny and as though Yu Suzuki trolled us all those years ago :D

Here is a link to the part - https://youtu.be/XoaBPJGzV7Q

"How long does it take to get to Bailu Village?"

"I wouldn't know...If you can keep from getting lost, it'll take two days..."

"Two days..."

"But it could take...your entire life."

"My entire life?!"

"Just kidding. But do watch for wolves."

Haha, I thought it was pretty sickening :rotflmao:

Dude don't worry about second account and same card, they told me it should be fine.

Kickstarter Support (Kickstarter)

Jul 8, 11:51 AM

Hi James,

You should be totally fine! Let us know if you need anything else.

Best,
Alfie

skilljim

Jul 8, 9:58 AM

Hi, I am a big Shenmue fan and have backed for the $1500 tier on this account. I also wanted to get the $80 tier so I would be able to receive both rewards, and I have backed this tier on a second account. I have backed it using the same debit card as I thought this would be okay, but I wanted to just double check before the project finishes that my card will be successfully charged twice, one for each of these 2 accounts. I needed to use 2 accounts, as it's not possible to back more than one unique reward tier, that the Shenmue 3 Kickstarter project happens to have.

Thank you for your time and help :)
James.

Great vid! Shows off some of the best gameplay i've seen, nice use of moves :D...it's videos like this where it's outstanding how much there is to do in these open worlds, even more so than most open world games these days - and actually have somewhat of a point to the open world, because of the incredible story. When I play games like GTA5, i'm just not really entertained, not because there isn't loads of shit to do, but because it doesn't feel like there's any real purpose to it, it's just loads and loads of filler content so they can boast double to triple hours of gameplay, it just gets very old and repetitive fast, especially when more than half the missions have no plot line.

This looks incredible, i've just added my support. I think that figure, although the clothing is extremely similar to Ryo's I think that's actually the Yu Suzuki figure

Yeah bought it aswell, good enough as anything to show a little bit of support. They definately cannot gauge demand from a single ringtone though. But can only help eh

Anyone that pledged on 2 accounts checked there bank account info to find Kickstarter took it all out as 1 payment? I was expecting a big payment, and a small payment seperately, but I just had 1 even bigger payment instead. Both of my Kickstarter accounts have confirmed that the money has been collected for both pledges, so I should be good, but just weird :P
Yup mines just showing as 1 charge for both accounts.

Now my bank is now showing the 2 seperate charges, which I good to see now, and so that first big one they took out wasn't combined in the end - but I didn't lose anymore money, so the second must have gone through but just took an extra day to show.

Was Zippo not also a branded product?

Update:
For listeners that need the center channel mono sound here we are with a new version.

https://soundcloud.com/theshenmuecast/the-shenmue-cast-2-mono

Also the iTunes Store now has The Shenmue Cast available for direct subscription.

https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/the-shenmue-cast/id1021084450?mt=2

Thanks for this Axm! I listened to the show today, and was very good! Appreciate you changing the audio for people like me :)

Adam brought up some good points about Shenmue 1 and 2 HD, there's so many trademarks and licenses in those games that they'd have to renew, i'm sure that could be quite costly and difficult, for example Timex, and that backpack company, or even Zippo - I guess they could just convert everything to that knock off lighter brand zuppo haha :D

Hey guys,

Just picked up 2 magazines from my local newsagents here in the UK, I got the Official Playstation 4 mag, and Games TM. After reading through both magazines, I would say Games TM sound more like fans, as alot of the early "hype" in the magazine bearing E3 mentions Shenmue 3 quite alot. I took shots of the main Shenmue 3 related pages though incase you were interested. Feel free to post your own shots from your own magazines you might find with Shenmue 3 tidbits in :)

Games TM:

https://farm1.staticflickr.com/348/19787150568_f956ca1c9d_k.jpg
Games TM August 2015 Editor Note by James Brown , on Flickr

https://farm1.staticflickr.com/512/19354231983_0cba5cf7bd_k.jpg Games TM Shenmue 3 Article by James Brown , on Flickr


Official Playstation 4:

https://farm1.staticflickr.com/408/19788502979_f2584fcf64_k.jpg Official Playstation 4 Magazine Shenmue 3 Article by James Brown , on Flickr

These Rooster Teeth people really have it out for Shenmue. Another one of their programs (Funhaus) continues to run programs/podcasts bashing the series. Did someone at that company run a failed Kickstarter? I don't understand why they're spending so much time bad mouthing Shenmue.

Yeah dunno dude, that guy on the left was on about chucking $700 at that Star Citizen game earlier, which used to be a Kickstarter I think and now takes Paypal donations - so not much different to us pledging for Shenmue...they were then making fun at him spending so much money on a game that hasn't been released yet.

Misinformed and giving shenmue bad press, I hate their previous video and they did the same for this one
HERE IS THE LINK

yeah keep giving Them web traffic and letting them make money off of advertising for their shit
Good job smart guy.

Or...you could dislike their videos, leave comments that suggest the credibility of the things they are discussing to be false, up vote these comments, put people off their videos, and potentially hurt them.

Or like you say, don't click the link and let them convince viewers that don't know any better to not support Shenmue.

Either one of the above actions might be better than taking it out on a fellow supporter.