It was a pleasure too, pal !
Since your cam was filming everything but the screen, I obviously had to do it (I missed the video of the saturn dance game he's been involved in, but I believe I've got all the others)...

Here are those pictures at a higher resolution (3600x2700) : http://dl.dropbox.com/u/51587875/Yu%20Suzuki%20screens%20from%20Monaco.rar ;-)

...and I know it's already been said in here, but if Yu did insist on the dissolution of the Soviet union, it's because military forces had the best computers at that time, and he's been able to buy some cheaper elements from the USSR in 1991. Those high-end computers sold cheaper made the development of real 3d game possible...

Here a video of the complete conference of the Sunday March 3.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=il8bSiWu_CA

Thank you for the video. Now that I can hear the Q&A part clearly, I've fixed the inaudible part in my translation.

Can you please add time stamps to the duration of each Shenmue question.

Time stamp example: Shenmue question 1 (8:40-9:00)
Japanese Translator: blablablabla (translation)
Yu Suzuki: blablablabla (translation)

Time stamp example: Shenmue question 2 (18:22-19:55)
Japanese Translator: blablablabla (translation)
Yu Suzuki: blablablabla (translation)

I can edit those parts together into a single video. Once together I can add English subtitles to each question, from original interviewer to the translator, and lastly Yu Suzuki.

Here a video of the complete conference of the Sunday March 3.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=il8bSiWu_CA

Thank you for the video. Now that I can hear the Q&A part clearly, I've fixed the inaudible part in my translation.

Can you please add time stamps to the duration of each Shenmue question.
Here's the translation of the Shenmue related Q&A:

21:24-TR: What is the most memorable game to you?
21:29-YS: Every game is memorable to me. But, Virtua Fighter is the most memorable as it was
the hardest game to make, having had to go through various hardships. Shenmue as well.

24:01-TR: Is there any regrets?
24:04-YS: Ah... I hate this (kind of question.) Not having been able to make Shenmue III yet, of course.

24:43-TR: Do you have any plan or project for the next-generation consoles?
24:52-YS: I don't have any concrete plans, but I'd like to do something for them.

25:23-TR: What do you think about using the service like crowd-funding, such as Kickstarter?
25:33-YS: There's such possibility, I think.
(Here, the translator took the liberty of connecting the answer of YS with Shenmue III, and the MC got excited.)
15:47-YS: That was a leading question, wasn't it?

26:06-TR: Perhaps you've already been asked this a lot, but everybody wants to know it. How is Shenmue III
going at the moment?
26:17-YS: I want to make it for sure, if a good partner is found.
26:30-YS: If the circumstances allow, I want to make it.
26:41-TR: Everybody wants to help you in anyway.
26:45-YS: Thank you. Merci beaucoup.

26:51-YS: May I speak a little here? French fans, especially, have been caring about Shenmue a lot and
always ask me about Shenmue III. I'm very glad about it.
27:18-YS: I sincerely want to make it, if circumstances allow.

36:50-TR: Now, there's a rumor that Shenmue I or II will be playable soon by downloading with PSN or Xbox...
37:06-YS: Where is it from?
37:10-TR: Huh? He (the questioner) says so.
37:15-YS: Well, I don't get it. Every year a rumor says Shenmue III is coming. I wonder who is making it.

42:24-TR: Do you have a plan to make Shenmue HD?
42:50-YS: The license of Shenmue I and II belongs to SEGA. Now that I've left SEGA, it's not my decision,
but SEGA's, to remake and sell them like that. It'd be possible for SEGA, I guess.
43:27-YS: I could make anything related to Shenmue series, though, by getting the license from SEGA,
if they say OK.

45:10-TR: Instead of a video game, will there be any chance that you depict the story of Shenmue 3
in other forms, like movie or novel?
45:24-YS: There will be such possibilities, I think. Even in such forms I want to do something related to Shenmue.

I don't know if it's the reason, but I'd rather someone took their time to ensure they're presenting accurate translations than jump on Twitter five minutes after the interview with a bunch of half-truths.

Some things are worth waiting for if it means getting them right.

Going to edit the topic title a bit so this can gain a bit more attention. At the moment it sounds like a theory topic only.

I know rumors and whatnot suck the big one, but theres somethint about Mark Cerny being involved in this news thats sparked my interest and provides a slight bit of hope. There are two things that id like to suggest:

can anyone get in contact with the person who tweeted this for a bit more information%

is there any way to get an answer from Mark himself%

He did ask Yu pretty direct Shenmue questions when he hosted the confrence last year. Something says to me he is pro Shenmue.

Nothing short of amazing, I agree that it definitely should be featured on the KS page.

Hi all,

I’m the other guy that attended the dinner yesterday. I don’t know if it was the best day of my life, but definitely one of them! Couldn’t have hoped for a better reception and atmosphere, and everyone there played their part in creating an unforgettable experience. Making many new friends along the way, Amir, Rob and I were very lucky indeed...

(As Amir said, I’m unable to disclose much of the actual details of the meeting or post pictures, at least until I have been given permission by YsNet and Shibuya Productions, so please bear with me. Good things come to those who wait 8) )

Throughout the day Suzuki-san gave me the impression of a father figure - a kind leader who always looks out for others, yet very humble and unassuming himself. You can’t tell by looking that he’s a superstar in any way. He’s also very curious, from inspecting details of the Eze buildings to asking about us (jobs, hobbies etc), and you cannot help but feel inspired by his energy.

Once we got down to business (so to speak), you can see another side of his character: dedication. Shenmue is his legacy, and seeing what we’ve seen (incredible, by the way), there’s no doubt that he’s giving his all to the project. Given his talent, and with passionate comrades like Mr Biscay, we should have a lot of faith about the quality of the finished article, so please be patient!

Thank you Dojo-ers all again to make this project a reality, I know everyone would have jumped at the opportunity to experience what I have, but perhaps different circumstances prevented you from doing so. To be honest I didn't initially choose this reward, but considering how life-changing Shenmue is to me, I felt compelled to sacrifice my savings to help Suzuki-san. It's taught me values which I took for granted, and I think has made me a better person as a result. And what's money worth when compared to one's own values?

If you believe the same way, and do still have some capacity to help (money or otherwise), then please do so. Suzuki-san is grateful already to the contributions you have given to him, but with more support Shenmue III can become even better!

Best regards,

Chao

@ rdk_nl:

Three lovely daughters, a beautiful wife with enough understanding for your passion for Shenmue to accompany you to MAGIC and enough money to take a family of 5 from Holland to Monaco. You're a winner, dude! You win at life. Even though I don't know you, these pictures just make me very happy for you. :D Congratulations! You must be a happy man, I guess. =D>

Especially[ the picture with Yu's mile-wide grin and these two young "2nd generation" Shenmue fans. :king: I'd totally print that one out extra large and frame it on my living room wall.

Loving my new wallpaper!

Wow, I still can't believe this is happening.
I can't even listen to the Shenmue theme anymore without hearing the "shing" noise where the logo was revealed in the E3 video. It's literally been burned into my mind.
This new material is so exciting. If it looks this good in a prototype stage, then I just can't imagine how good it will look upon release. Thanks to everyone involved for providing live updates and translations.

Peter wrote: I got actual chills watching that!!

Amazing video Shenman!

Wish we could all go back and do it all over again!

Yeah, life back in the real world seems a bit dull after last weekend

Sorry I didn't get to know everyone's name during the conference, but hope to see you again sometime!

Great job. It's really cool to go through and to see Yu's full answers to the questions instead of the snippets we heard reported and paraphrased.

Wrote an article about the Eze tour and Monaco dinner: https://medium.com/@MoosaviAmir/a-weeke ... f4d9d9edb6

Nice to be the comment picked about the series :) Fairly pleased with the answer anyways, atleast it is in their thoughts! Something like Shenmue would be better announced at something like E3 rather than on Sega Europes youtube channel anyways, so in a way expected them to be cagey still, they're not gonna use that medium to reveal the game :)

http://i.imgur.com/UulkjZo.jpg

As you may know I am currently living and working in Tokyo. A couple of months ago Ziming sent me a private message telling me there was a special Sega event coming up in Tokyo celebrating Sega music from all consoles. Luckily for us Shenmue was included. I am not sure how strict the rules are with cameras but I tried my best to get a good recording for you guys without getting thrown out.

It was absolutely amazing to hear the music played to perfection. After the song was played there was talk of Shenmue 3 but I don't know what was said as I can't understand Japanese but I will give the footage to Ziming at some point.

I've linked the website so that you can see all the songs that were played and also all Sega composers and musicians who were there.

http://gamesymphony.jp/concert/2016/sega_special2016.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hcEn6Fgbdgo

Hope you enjoy and sorry for the odd positioning and scuffling noises I was trying to be stealthy!

Amir..... That's just a tease man. 44 days :lol:

Did anyone notice the camera pan out at 4.15??

http://imgur.com/r0CNXUN.png

Look over the top of his cubicle, is that the size of the dev team?!?! That's on Shenmue 1 scale (not 200 staff mind) but that's a lot bigger than we have been led to believe they even had working on the game. That's a lot of rows of cubicles!! :shock:

It's not part of a trailer. That whole "Meeting With Yu" section of the video looks like a collection of live gameplay demonstrations and checks. It does look like a cutscene of some kind included in the part they were checking, though.


Yu-san primarily sits in the position we have always seen him in. He rarely will leave that chair. The process is, like it's always been with Shenmue development, is that each of the developers will go to the main table at arranged times to present what they have been working on, on the main TV screen. Yu has a huge pointer stick and he will go through absolutely everything that is right, and also what he wants changed. Or that something he has asked to be changed has not been done right.
These meetings can be with an individual developer, or with a group of them together if it relates to developmental duties which cross fields. For inspirstion and reference, the cupboards on the side of the office contain all resources, from each game, guide books, and of course, the multiple folders which make up the Shenmue "bible" as it's known.

There isn't a single thing in this game, that has not been locked in without Yu-san having the final decision, and things are done exactly to his liking. Despite being a Kickstarted game, he is as relentless in his desire for quality as you could possibly imagine.

This doesn't look "anime" to me, personally. Honestly, it looks like Shenmue, brought into an contemporary engine and art direction.

I mean... it's not like Dou Niu, Chai, Ren, or really any major, non simple NPC character in the original Shenmue games, wasn't similarly highly stylized and "cartoonish" (I don't agree with that adjective personally, I would prefer "heightened" or "stylized.") Even major characters like Lan Di, especially in the face, were not exactly what I'd call "realistic." They were all very, very exaggerated. The mixture of lesser characters being "realistic" (though even that's debatable,) and the realism of the world, with those heightened, fantasy elements in more prominent characters is what made Shenmue Shenmue to me, in terms of art design.

This was inevitable, though. By using a new engine to bring to life their concept art, it was bound to be the case (as has been the case with literally every contemporary rebirth of an old beloved franchise from before modern graphical tech emerged that I've played - *Looks at the $#|+storm surrounding Dreamfall Chapters' Zoe model*) that many would be disappointed with the approach to the character models.

It's never going to look like Shenmue I & II. It's just not. And yes, granted, I know what people are going to say already: "But we didn't want it to look exactly like Shenmue, but just for it to have the same basic aesthetic direction as the originals, but using new technology." And yes, some of this is not down to the engine or how models are created, and more down to art direction - I get that.

But it's also true that as much as we love and are accustomed to the art direction in the first two games... it's a simple fact of reality that all art is a product of the time and place where it is made , and that hindsight is 20/20, and that looking back, most artists exposed to newer ideas, techniques, and technologies, would probably have done things differently if they did them today, vs 15 years ago . And the environment, time, and even the minds in which this new Shenmue are being created, are necessarily and inevitably different than they were back then.

Strict adherence to what was, may not be the goal here. For all sorts of reasons. But then... to ME... this actually looks like a character that would have fit in well in Shenmue 2 as a boss or some such so... I'll just have to agree to disagree with those who feel he doesn't look like he belongs in Shenmue. On the contrary, every single example people have posted here to demonstrate "realism" in the previous entries, looks "cartoony" (exaggerated and heightened,) to me. *Shrugs* Opinions. Whatchagonna do?

So, I'm fine with this personally, but to each their own. I'm not telling people they're wrong to dislike anything or to desire a different direction. I'm just saying I'm okay with it myself.

I love this design direction, precisely BECAUSE it demonstrates they've found a way to make characters that are similarly stylized to the first two games (rather than "realistic,") in my eyes, in the new engine. But I foresee there will be a large contingent that hates the final game's art direction, and that's their prerogative. No desire to debate it, as always. I don't do internet debates. :p

(If people think the uproar about this is bad, wait until they reveal the final Ryo model. I can already predict I'll probably be fine with it, and many people will be outright enraged.)

Such is life.

Some disappointing news, but for the greater good! Yu Suzuki has announced that Shenmue 3 will be delayed until at least the second half of 2018.



Media Articles

IGN
Eurogamer
Metro
Kotaku
MCV
VG247
Dualshockers
PSU
Destructoid

I can't say I'm surprised by this announcement. Not appearing at E3 was already a pretty strong indicator that Shenmue 3 was going to be delayed. I 'm not worried though, I trust Yu Suzuki and his team to make the most of the extra time.

Best news since the Advanced Free Battle announcement.

I feel a bit disappointed for Biscay and the other related actors though. The delay seemed to be inevitable, I hope their trust has not been abused by the project ambition.

You always manage to find something negative, don't you? :P

Do you think Cédric would rather have a rushed, half-baked game which may sell poorly instead of a polished, well crafted Shenmue 3 with better chances of selling well? (especially if Shenmue HD comes out by the end of the year)

Best news since the Advanced Free Battle announcement.

I feel a bit disappointed for Biscay and the other related actors though. The delay seemed to be inevitable, I hope their trust has not been abused by the project ambition.
I'm sure they were all well aware of this ahead of time. They're not going to disclose private information to people who bug them on Twitter, so of course they denied a delay. It's not Cedric's info to disclose.

Its been a great journey.

Larger image on Deep Silver's website:

Funny how a few years back people were saying how satisfied they would be with a Shenmue 3 book, manga or even an unfinished Dreamcast build to be leaked online to give us closure to the story.

Now we're getting the real deal and we're all moaning about virtually everything we're seeing in each and every update. Suzuki must feel so encouraged.

At least Chai's new model is an upgrade.

http://i.imgur.com/ix1z5zU.jpg

Which 100% highlights the absolute point of lighting in a game, which Suzuki-san toiled over as we have seen during the "making of" of Shenmue by NHK.


I respect and tolerate a lot what is said on these boards, but when I hear the likes of "fuck this", and "this isn't what I want" I can't help be reminded of the previous generation of videogaming where Joe public was not allowed to see this shit.

"But it's a Kickstarter Peter, it's a Kickstarter!!!!"

"Our hard earned money went into that game. It may not be much to you but it's a lot to me"

"Here's this small change ive made"

"Here's what I think the game should be"


These are not direct quotes, but it sums up this thread, and it absoltely disgusts me. The majority of you generally do. That's right, a staff member here said you DISGUST him with some of the things you post. Don't like it? Theres the door. Leave. Unless you cross a major line we won't ban you.

I shouldn't have to watch my mouth because I am a staff member here, and I won't. Fuck no I wont. Im a loud mouthed Irish cunt. But I mean it when I say a lot of you really disgust me. You apparently sat around waiting for this game to become a reality. Clamouring at any sort of scrap that came from Sega or any part time employee by Sega who uttered the words "SHENMUE". They would be the biggest topics with literally hundreds of people coming to the domain to see what the hell was going on. This was a dead forum, long before 500k and Team Yu really to the word going again. The franchise was dead!! Gone forever. Sonic and Sega All Star Racing was not Shenmue 3, but we rejoiced like it was.

Fast forward to today and what I've seen, again disgusts me. It's a complete representation of the internet age. My opinion is better than yours. This looks shit, everything is shit, life is shit. In the general media life is shit when we live in a world of privelidges. It's crazy to think that this is a videogame where I begged my mother to let me go on the Dreamcast Passport disc for an hour (at £1 a minute so an hour cost her £60 and I never heard a word of it to this day, nevermind we were a poor family) to trade toy capsules with "Shenmue fans".

It's honestly a joke you people call all of the new material some of the names I won't repeat and I would like to reassure you, you won't be banned from here. Heck, you won't receive a warning. What I will say is I personally will absolutely seriously question you as a fan of this game. You may be here to fuck about, you may be here as a "casual" gamer, or you may be here for the craic. But honestly, from the bottom of my heart, sometimes something needs to be said. Go fuck yourselves. Go find something better to spend your life energy on because you are not wasting my time, you are wasting your own. We can argue all day over models and logos, but it's clear as day that there are those who passionately and diplomatically debate over this franchise. Who cares for it like Sonic and Mario fans who care for theirs. Who Superman fans get tattoos of their own fictitious hero, and who follow their favourite band around the globe for. But then there and those who love a one post deal. "Fuk dis. Being bak dem DC models fam". Really?

I don't regret this post. I love the solidarity amongst out community at the moment, and we are about to embark on an event which stands as the beginning of a very long future for Shenmue. I respect everyone within this community and want to work together, but sometimes, shit just needs to be said, and going forward, I intend to say it.


If anyone does have a problem with what Shenmue 3 is right now, maybe send an email. Let him know how you feel. That won't work? It worked with the initial fans grumbling about the models. It happens with the logo change last month. He is a 40 years experienced games developer with some of the highest selling games of all time, never mind record breaking gaming achievement both over coin-op and consumer. But you know better don't you? So email him.

Or better yet, book a flight, come and speak to the man face to face. He's been to Monaco in the past, and now Germany. Come on, what are you holding back for? Come tell this experienced video games developer that you know better. Please!

Experience is the key word there. Something which I don't a lot of people won't have, nor can they understand. Experience. It comes from making mistakes. From falling down. From fucking up! You don't get to be on his position without fucking up A LOT of the time. But you didn't see all of that. The point is, this is the man's LIFE! This is what he does. It's his thing. It's what puts food in his mouth and on his children's mouthes. What do you want him to do? Go work on bins? Take out your trash? Fuck you people. This is what he does best, and his career in what he does best is more than. What any of us will achieve in our lifetimes. You think I want Shenmue 3 to be a game that's had Yu Suzuki jumped to the beat of a few young Thundercats who spent 5 minutes on Photoshop?
No way. I want this game as Yu Suzuki intended it. It's that simple.

Why are you even here?