Interesting writeup. I can't say that I fully agree with the idea that Shenmue 3 has to be as equally ambitious as the previous Shenmue games. I think what made Shenmue so ambitious among other things was the whole FREE concept. It had such a great sense of exploration and being able to knock on any door though mundane was awesome. These days we have the GTAs and other huge sandbox games that I think Shenmue paved the way for.
Ambition is important but I don't expect to be blown out of the water as far as gameplay is concerned when/if I finally sit down to play Shenmue 3. I really just want an experience that echos the other games with interactivity equaling today's games. Of course there will be those who won't look twice at Shenmue 3 if it doesn't allow you to enter first person mode and mow down Hong Kong with a machine gun(fist), but who cares about them?
And I also see what he's saying about keeping Shenmue unfinished because of the mystery. But I selfishly just don't care about mystery or magic that would remain intact when reminiscing of the first two games. I want to finish the story so badly. If the story had been finished in the first two games and people were crying for some sort of a sequel...No, I wouldn't want more done because the story is intact.
I'm trying to think of other games that were set up to be a series like Shenmue and flowed into each other and were actually finished. Not just sequels with individual stories or whatever.