Nahovil wrote:People are fooling themselves too, if they believe this is "merely developmental", "that it's a WIP and there's still one whole year to go".

Um, that's entirely true though? Literally objectively true.

but in all it shames you a little by your assessment of it by calling someone "delusional" with such ease.
I'm all for criticism, I don't like the first model shown in this update at all, but to think that the animation won't improve over the test we're shown here or the character models won't improve even though Yu says they're placeholders, well then you're ignorant at best. Sorry.
https://media.giphy.com/media/3owvKgeLlPXWv67W7u/giphy.gif
This but with slightly better models is all I want from the game aesthetically, and more than I thought possible. If it looks this good I'll be over the moon.

with this budget, for instance, if you make a 6 hour game, "AAA standards" are possible.
Do you know the exact budget? Even before Deep Silver got involved, there was more to it than just the KickStarter money, Cedric said that Shibuya had invested "several million" in the project. You're right about elements of the campaign being mishandled, and they definitely need a good PR firm, but I don't think it's reasonable to make judgement calls about how the full game will turn out based on this.

Yeah the (potential) lack of NPC routines doesn't really bother me at all. Not being fully voiced would be a deal breaker though. It needs to be fully voiced, having text would take me out of the game so much. Especially if some NPCs are voiced and some aren't. I'd rather some NPCs were cut or the amount of dialogue was scaled back rather than have use text like in Yakuza. It's one of the reasons Yakuza feels like merely a (good) video game, whereas Shenmue feels like an immersive and remarkable experience.

^ That's what I thought too. When Yu said he could make the full game we all imagined, all my anxieties about the game disappeared. Now he says that it might not have full voice-acting. Maybe he's just being overly cautious, but I'm getting mixed signals here.

The supernatural is coming. That's been the plan since day one. Accept it or stop now, those are your choices.

Personally, stories that mix realism with a little bit of the supernatural or otherworldly are my favourite. Stuff like True Detective season 1 or Battlestar Galactica. Stories that try to be believable, but there's just a sense of something more going on too.

Joy's butt single-handedly raises Shenmue II from a 9/10 to a 10.

The option to view a 5-minute "previously on Shenmue" video at the start screen, plus some flashbacks during the game seems like the best option to me.

There's not going to be fireballs. There's going to be some mysticism for sure, but no Dragon Ball Z moves.

There were fireballs in Shenmue Online because MMOs need range attacks.

We getting an update today or what?

It seems that they have updated the kickstarter page's front image with the one that they showed as advertisement at te gamescom. They use the new Shenmue font by Suzuki.

I wonder if they'll show the complete and revised version of the 1st teaser with facial animation and everything before of the end of the year :-k

This is a great sign! The company that I asked to donate $50M refuse to answer whether they've donated or not. You know what this means? Ys Net obviously asked them to keep the information classified or something like that. Big things are going to happen, I'm sure!
Oh stop it.

Probably not a cliffhanger, but it'll no doubt set up the next one.

Riku Rose wrote: Although I still can’t wait for the review thread here and watching everyone cry when someone dislikes the game.

Sounds like you've got a lot going on in your life.

I assume at the very least this is written by AJ, they even specify which part is by Deep Silver.

Can't help but to express my frustation. We are a few days away from what was the original Intended release date for this game when the Kickstarter ended and have yet to see a single glimpse of gameplay, in-detail scenario or even characters besides some random NPC.

My hype and overall expectations are reaching an all time low and I am beggining to forget about his game altogether.
Come on now. With the agile methodology, the game isn't fully polished until the final stages of development. They could show plenty now, but it would be rough and there would be plenty of placeholders, but dummies would take it for the final build. You can't exactly blame them for holding their cards close to their chest.

In the 70s. Same as every game that doesn't have a $100 million ad campaign behind it/the reviewer isn't personal friends with the developers. Take some points off for being Japanese too.
http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/weirdalfoil_2322.jpg
Oh please. To deny that the gaming media isn't massively corrupt and in bed with certain publishers is wilful ignorance.
I would love for you to bring up any evidence you have, but I'm sure you don't have any. enjoy your tinfoil hat.
Off the top of my head:

Polygon accepts $750,000 from Microsoft before they even launch: http://rebrn.com/re/polygon-accepted-from-microsoft-to-create-a-promotional-document-367703/

Polygon writer gives positive coverage to developer he is not only friends with, but supports financially via Patreon: https://archive.is/kLRaf

Kotaku claim that anyone who complains about Call of Duty is "stupid", "idiots", "obnoxious elitists" and "assholes" whilst also running an extensive Call of Duty ad campaign on their site - https://archive.is/KntqD

Kotaku and Polygon both extensively defended Diablo III's always online DRM, going as far as to attack anyone who criticised it as "ignorant" whilst also running extensive ads for the game - https://imgur.com/Rka05H1

Journalist is flown to resort by Activision, later whilst other reviewers marked the latest Call of Duty down for poor AI, linear gameplay, and uneven pacing, he praised it as the “ultimate refinement of the franchise formula” and “the best Call of Duty ever.”

Ubisoft hands out free $200 Tablets to reviewers at Watch_Dogs event. Coincidentally it's critical score is almost double the user score on Metacritic - https://wolfsgamingblog.com/2014/04/15/ubisoft-handed-out-free-nexus-7-tablets-to-watch-dogs-preview-event-attendees/

Oh and remember when review copies of Dante's Inferno came with $200 in cash? There's something to be said for bluntness - https://www.engadget.com/2009/09/09/ea-marketers-send-joystiq-a-200-check-and-we-save-their-souls/

And let's not even get into the big ones like the Driv3r debacle. Or the Kane & Lynch controversy. Or DoritoGate.

The idea that games journalism isn't massively corrupt and incompetent is just insanity. All journalism is rotten, I've worked in 2 different fields of journalism, but games journalism is the worst of the worst. I cannot fathom why anyone would ever defend it (unless they're a games journalist).

4- One last thing, in the previous "update", we were clearly told that updates will be coming up less frequently, and guess what? we ended up getting a new update two weeks later, which is yet another example of the disastrous marketing and communication strategy this project has had since its very early days.
Jesus Christ are you fucking reaching.

I'm 100% sure Suzuki said in an interview maybe a year or two ago that they were going to outsource the character modeling. I can't remember where or when it was but I know he said it. So outsourcing isn't a sudden thing, it's been planned for quite a while.

EDIT- Higher res image here. Thanks to Switch and Spaghetti!

https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ZUFJ6OxgjYY/WjEWmQvmHNI/AAAAAAAAD5w/mh3CXmjvgOIfRN5-oPgFQN492JeSqvCCwCLcBGAs/s1600/mik_20171129_01thryv.jpg

Shenmue Master uploaded an interview they did with Yu-san at Gamescom - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SIjwGe3X5uw

No English translation yet.

Little bit confused by the number of characters in the game, here Yu says it's 100 but a few months ago he said it was 200 in Choubu alone?

Please don't besmirch Harman Smith or Killer7 with your garbage.

Another interview from Monaco - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rwl-CROL_Q4 via http://www.segasaturno.com

In Spanish but with English subtitles.

Dual-language is the absolute most important improvement by miles and I'm very glad they've included it.

Also -

- Skip time/save anywhere in Shenmue 1
- Removing fade-in for NPCs
- Uncompressed and less scratchy audio (assuming SEGA still has all the source material)
- Some textures need to be redone (mainly trees and some of the scenery in Guilin)

I still play Cosmic Smash and Crazy Taxi 2 all the time, so no.

myshtuff wrote: I wonder what theyll do about Coke or any other real world companies that were in the games. Are we going back to Bellwood cola?

Even if all the licensed stuff is removed I guarantee modders will have them back in the PC version in no time at all.

Spaghetti wrote: Shenmue III was announced almost three years ago.

Three years? Jesus Christ I've done nothing with my life.

Japanese games are seeing a big resurgence. Games like Yakuza and Persona suddenly have big audiences in the west, and I think people who like those games will find something to love in Shenmue too. Shenmue couldn't have been revived at a better time.

Bizarrely enough, I’d be rather relieved to hear that the release has been delayed until 2019. It would indicate to me that they haven’t rushed anything and that the makers are delighted with the finished article. For whatever reason, a 2018 release wouldn’t fill me with much confidence that we’d be getting a game that Yu is over the moon with; I don’t know why. Anyone else feel this way? We’ve waited this long for S3, what harm’s another year?
I feel the same way, a delay sounds great to me. I think it wouldn't even be that big of a deal now that I & II HD are coming out to tide people over. It would probably give newcomers a chance to get totally caught up with the series.

https://www.deepsilver.com/en/shenmue-iii-release-window/

Deep Silver today announce that their upcoming release Shenmue III has been moved and will now release in 2019.

The extra time will be used to polish the quality of the game even further, to the high standards it deserves and release the product in the best possible timeframe.

No futher information at this time. Personally I'm glad, the more time it spends in the oven the better the finished product.

Edit - Kickstarter email just went out.

Hello Everyone,

Along with our publishers, Deep Silver, we have an announcement for the release date of Shenmue III. Our report follows with a comment from Mr. Suzuki.

Announcement by Deep Silver:

“ Deep Silver today announce that their upcoming release Shenmue III has been moved and will now release in 2019.

The extra time will be used to polish the quality of the game even further, to the high standards it deserves and release the product in the best possible timeframe. ”

Original Announcement: Deep Silver

Comment by Yu Suzuki:

To all of our backers, we are very sorry for the delay. After much discussion with our partners, Deep Silver, we have concluded that extending the release will allow us to deliver Shenmue III at its best. We promise to use this time to improve the quality of Shenmue III.

We cannot thank you enough for your enduring support.

^ Jesus this is stretching even for you.

Edit - aimed at Technophilz (of course)

Of course, everyone is entitled to their opinion... As things stand.

But what's important to remember is it's all still in progress, and if they can finally crack Shenhua after all of these years of complaining, then there's no reason why the Ryo model won't be given the same treatment over the course of the coming months.
Yep. Plus Yu has said he's finally happy with the way Shenhua looks, but to my knowledge he has not said that about Ryo yet. Don't panic, Shenhua shows that everything is moving in the right direction.

Nice update! Proffesional, informative, no spelling errors that I noticed. Hopefully this is the beginning of the Deep Silver era.

For me it's more important how is possible Ryo is the one that the poem mentions, how do Shenhua and Ryo are bond to destiny?
I think if you're looking for a realistic explanation for the mysticism in the series you're going to be disappointed, they ain't gonna explain shit (and shouldn't IMO, it's mysticism, not science).

No non-Sonic characters is obviously disappointing, but the last time that Sumo made a Kart racer they ended up making the best one of all time (fuck you Mario Kart), so I'm still interested.

Ryo's Japanese voice actor has tweeted an image of the script. It's huge! From what I can get from Google Translate the pages are double sided too. https://twitter.com/matsukazest/status/ ... 3463392256

Choubu alone will have around 200 NPCs (Shenmue 1 had 250 in its entirety). It's gonna be somewhere between 1 and 2 in scale.

Shenhua's voice actor has updated her blog - https://ameblo.jp/palblog37/entry-12383933163.html

It's not much, but there's another little image of Shenmue III on the screen

^ I seem to recall him mentioning some sort of crippling medical/anxiety issues; it might provide some context here.

In any case, he’s a good poster, so it’s unfortunate (and frankly a bit silly) to just abruptly quit like this, especially over an informative discussion.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Come back dude, it’s a good time to be a Shenmue fan.
Yep. He's one of the best posters imo. Shame to see him go.

Start saving every penny you can, sell a kidney and steal from loved ones, get ready to buy multiple copies at launch.