NEW SHENMUE III KICKSTARTER UPDATE - INTERVIEW WITH YU

[Shibiryo]

Just read the update and move on, there is nothing else you could possibly do more.

[Trent]

Yes, in fact Yu's answer in the original Japanese pretty much says exactly that. My translation:

However with Shenmue III it won't do to complete just one chapter's worth in one region, so I have restructured the underlying story to fit the budget.

Thank you Switch for your translation. It's a shame that Awesome Japan can't properly translate the interview in English. The word "scope" completely changes the meaning of Yu Suzuki's answer.

Well, we will see how many chapters Shenmue III will cover...

[Zoltor]

Yes, in fact Yu's answer in the original Japanese pretty much says exactly that. My translation:

However with Shenmue III it won't do to complete just one chapter's worth in one region, so I have restructured the underlying story to fit the budget.

Thank you Switch for your translation. It's a shame that Awesome Japan can't properly translate the interview in English. The word "scope" completely changes the meaning of Yu Suzuki's answer.

Well, we will see how many chapters Shenmue III will cover...

Yikes that was a huge screwup from AJ wasn't it. Granted It's understandable how a translation error like that can happen, but It's still completely unacceptable/extremely damaging in such a situation. Such a single word change, has a completely different meaning.

Sigh this is what happens when you pick a Japanese company, with only one person on staff who sort of knows English(nevermind the fact of why would there be a Japanese company out there, who handles KS, I would be shocked if most Japanese have ever even heard of KS before, the whole indi scene is extremely new to Japan, and they hardly use computers the way the rest of the world uses them, which is a major reason why the indi scene didn't really exist in Japan, until recently) to handle all the translations/relaying of info to what is a "primarily" English speaking fanbase.

[Himuro]

Anyone who thinks this interview makes it sound like Yu is ending the series with this game not only has an overly imaginative mind that gets supposed "observations" from literally nothing, they are also delusional. There's nothing in the text at all that suggests that Yu is ending the series with III. Stop panicking about every fucking little thing about this game, holy shit people.

Oh come on. The language used is poorly-worded at best.
“However, we cannot finish with just one chapter in one region, so I had to restructure the story to fit within the scope of Shenmue III.”

Face it, that sh*t is vague enough to mean anything, including condensing Shenmue’s remaining story into Shenmue III. Look at the flow-chart’s “explanation” for crying out loud: the composition stage has to do with the story; the story stage has to do with flow; the flow stage has to do with composition. The f*ck? I want some of what he’s been smoking.

Thankfully Yokosuka was kind enough to re-retweet THIS little gem:

Cedric Biscay retweeted

Team Yu ‏@TeamYuNeedsYOU 9m9 minutes ago
Shenmue 1 & 2 HD = New fans buying @Shenmue_3 = Budget for Shenmue IV.

…which makes it seem that Shenmue IV’s not dead yet. Good.
Round of applause for Awesome Japan’s confusion-inducing mess of an “interview” (i.e. a poorly-translated e-mail questionnaire with no follow-up)

Lol "vague." The reality is that the English translation is awful. I read it in Japanese and it is pretty clear. switch's reply shows you this.

[Hyo Razuki]

Alright, now let's go through it again. Now, if my memory serves me right, S1 was chapter 1 (fucking duh!), the trip to HK was the (manga strip) second chapter. Each disc of S2 was one chapter, making it chapters 3, 4, 5 and 6.

So now we've got chapters 7, 8, 9 10 and 11 left. If S3 will cover more than one cover per "region" as Yu said, what does that mean? If we take each village for a "region" that means we've got 3 "regions" in the game. Having only 5 chapters left, this would basically mean, one village is gonna cover more than one chapter and S3 therefor covering chapters 7, 8, 9 and 10.

That in turn would mean that we are gonna get a massive final (11th) chapter, if S4 will get made. Actually I really like that idea. We've had a really extensive introduction with the first game being dedicated only to the initial chapter and now Yu wants to make a really massive finale too.

Sounds like a great idea to me. A really big first chapter and a really big last chapter with chapters in the middle being a bit shorter each. Makes perfect sense to me. I'm hyped! Can't wait to see how this turns out!

We're getting Shenmue 3! Still feels so unreal to be writing that sentence.

[Yokosuka]

Alright, now let's go through it again. Now, if my memory serves me right, S1 was chapter 1 (fucking duh!), the trip to HK was the (manga strip) second chapter. Each disc of S2 was one chapter, making it chapters 3, 4, 5 and 6.

Not really according Yu.

[shenmue852]

it's best to ignore the boat chapter. Wanchai is chapter 2, Kowloon chapter 3, and Guilin is the beginning of chapter 4.

[Gen]

I don't think we should focus too much on the number of chapters, they are likely not set in stone and as Yu said there could be several 'branching' chapters too, whatever that means. Remember the original plan was 16 chapters.

[Hyo Razuki]

Alright, now let's go through it again. Now, if my memory serves me right, S1 was chapter 1 (fucking duh!), the trip to HK was the (manga strip) second chapter. Each disc of S2 was one chapter, making it chapters 3, 4, 5 and 6.

Not really according Yu.

What?

[Yokosuka]

I made a thread summing the whole thing.

[Hyo Razuki]

Oh, OK, great! I think we shouldn't get too hung up on the chapter numbering though. It's not set in stone anyway.

[shenmue852]

I made a thread summing the whole thing.

The whole chapter 2 on the boat thing confuses people. Personally I like to refer to the chapters so far by location, so Yokosuka, Wanchai, Kowloon and Guilin. It's just neater and more aligned with the GDC image than if we always have to include the boat chapter as chapter 2 when we're counting.

But of course officially, Wanchai is chapter 3, Kowloon chapter 4 and Guilin chapter 5

[shenmue852]

So Cedric Biscay said they can't end at Shenmue III but also can't do multiple episodes?

what does that mean then?

[Himuro]

So Cedric Biscay said they can't end at Shenmue III but also can't do multiple episodes?

what does that mean then?

Multiple episodes like Telltale games. They have one game but episodes are episodic and come out one a time.

[punkmanced]

Lol "vague." The reality is that the English translation is awful. I read it in Japanese and it is pretty clear. switch's reply shows you this.

“Traduttore, traditore.”
Quite appropriate in this case.