Shenmue 3 Article
I'll put this here, long story short looks like we may be getting a Shenmue 3!
For years, fans of one of Sega's most celebrated series, Shenmue, have waited and prayed for news of a sequel - a third instalment that would supposedly conclude the epic story, avenging the death of Ryo's father with the demise of arch villain Lan Di. Today, Kikizo has good news for them - Shenmue 3 DOES exist, and IS planned for release.
Under conditions of strict anonymity, sources close to the development of Shenmue 3 revealed to Kikizo that the project has essentially been close to finished and 'ready' for some time - but in hibernation, pending a deal for the entire series on at least one next-gen console. Kikizo's source is authentic and reliable.
And it may come as a surprise that Yu Suzuki, father of Shenmue and perhaps Sega's most famed game creator, has had very little involvement with the project, bar the original story, which remains in tact. Those are the facts - now let's take a look at everything in more detail.
Most devoted followers of the Shenmue series will remember that the first Shenmue, released on Sega's Dreamcast console in Japan at the turn of the millennium, contained the first "chapter" of Yu Suzuki's opus, while sequel Shenmue 2, first released on Dreamcast and later ported to Xbox, contained chapters 3-6. The second chapter supposedly consisted of Ryo's boat journey to Hong Kong, and was unceremoniously skipped.
AM2 had previously gone on record in 2003 to say that the remaining chapters 7-16 chapters would be included in a current-generation Shenmue 3 - but we can reveal that last year, that ceased to be the plan. Our source confirmed that there was very nearly an announcement for an Xbox Shenmue 3 at last year's E3 show in May - which makes sense considering AM2's Shin Ishikawa (who was in charge of Xbox Shenmue 2) had promised at the start of 2003 more Shenmue for Xbox, back when it seemed the system's popularity could still come back in Japan. But, because of poor sales of Xbox Shenmue 2, the deal behind that announcement with Microsoft fell through, and for a while, Shenmue 3 was indefinitely shelved.
Since then, the new plan for Shenmue has been to include the whole series - chapters 1-16 - on at least one next-generation console, although whether or not that would be in one standalone game is not yet clear, and therefore neither is the title "Shenmue 3", ultimately. However, what is certain is that the game, or games, are theoretically complete and ready to be ported to Xbox 360, PS3 or Revolution, depending on a deal with one of the hardware manufacturers - although it could just as easily end up as a multiformat next-gen release. Our source explained, "it will depend on a hardware manufacturer deal - if they get a profitable deal it will be exclusive to one format, but, if it makes more sense, it might be worthwhile [to release] on multi platform. The options are still open."
The latest twist in the Shenmue tale at SOJ
But why "all chapters"? Why go over what we already know from Shenmue 1 and 2? Says the source, "it is considered that many players will not have played the first two games, so this would be a complete product." We'll admit to being a little confused about how that's going to work. But nonetheless, that appears to be the current plan.
Yu Suzuki has very little involvement in the Shenmue 3 project, and that's something that may come as a surprise to many Sega followers. What we learned in relation to Suzuki-san is pretty interesting, but all that could be confirmed was that, "since Suzuki left AM2, he is off the core Shenmue series, which remained at AM2" - and despite the fact that Shenmue.com is still linked from the website of Suzuki's would-be Sega studio, Digital Rex, it seems all that is now irrelevant and, presumably, simply out of date. Our source clarified, "the series is under the AM2 portfolio. Shenmue remains at AM2 while [suzuki] pursues other things."
Yu Suzuki - "pursuing other things"
Interestingly, more insight into the "Suzuki era" of the Shenmue series became apparent in a Kikizo interview conducted with Yuzo Koshiro last week. Yuzo Koshiro is a god-like videogame music producer, with as much respect for his work at Sega as any other development executive at the company, having worked on the legendary beats in titles such as the Streets of Rage series, Revenge of Shinobi and of course, Shenmue. In the exclusive interview to be published very soon, Koshiro-san told us, "we had a meeting once a week, just about the music, and [suzuki] said, 'this scene needs this kind of music and that scene needs that kind of music' - it was difficult; he was very strict, he judged everything and ruled on everything." We should point out that Koshiro-san is most certainly not the source of the rest of this report however!
So who exactly is working on Shenmue 3? Frustratingly, we have learned answers in that regard, but can't name names. We know that Hiroshi Kataoka, the highly respected development talent and president of AM2 since Suzuki-san left, is not involved in any hands-on way with Shenmue 3, and is currently concentrating on the arcade side of output on titles like Virtua Fighter 5. There are however some key, familiar AM2 faces looking after Shenmue 3, including some relatively new talent from within the studio - but unfortunately we can't be more specific, to protect the sources of this report. Knowing a bit about the backgrounds of some of the key staff however, we'll say we're both relieved and, well, intrigued. Meanwhile, a final producer has yet to be internally named, but AM2 Development Director Makoto Osaki seems a likely candidate...
"Likely candidate" for producer? Didn't we already say that Shenmue 3 is near-complete? What precisely is the status of development completion? First our source confirms what most fans already knew, "the story is entirely done", (we're pretty sure the story had been finished since before the release of Shenmue 2) before elaborating, "the texture and modelling work is ready, they know what their characters look like and there's hundreds of gigabytes of [uncompressed] textures. Game designs are done. There is no more research to be done. It's a matter of 'porting' to whatever [console]."
As we touched on earlier, a final platform, or platforms, for Shenmue 3 are yet to be finalised. Indeed, we weren't able to clarify whether the exclusivity discussions with the firstparties have actually started yet. But from a purely speculative point of view, it seems most likely to us that Xbox 360 will be the initial host for the future of Shenmue; Microsoft has been absolutely determined to sign up exclusive Japanese-developed content for its new console, yet Sega signings are largely conspicuous by absence.
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If Microsoft recognises and accepts that an all-new, sequel-based Shenmue consisting of original content could, quite inevitably, perform better than a rehashed Shenmue 2, then combined with the imminency of the platform, and the global appeal of the franchise (as opposed to certain other Japanese signings which focus on the local market), it's surely a question of when, not if, Shenmue 3 turns up exclusively on Xbox 360. Of course, console exclusivity these days can mean for a period as brief as six months, so when PS3 is released next year maybe it will also see its share of Shenmue; it certainly makes sense for the title to reach as broad an audience as possible.
But we're getting ahead of ourselves. All that has yet to be determined. But what is "extremely unlikely", according to the source, is that the project could surface on current-gen consoles: "it would be too much work", cites the source. Interestingly, the source explained that it is cheaper to finalise production for next-gen machines than for current-gen, because of the nature of development work that is already complete. "It would be a struggle to get everything in [on current-gen]." It seems to make sense. Our source offered, "360 looks most likely, but we shall see what the future brings."
It's probably worth re-clarifying that Shenmue 3 has nothing to do with Ryu ga Goto Ku, announced earlier today by much-loved Sega development guru Toshihiro Nagoshi. The game looks and feels similar to Shenmue in many respects, and looks absolutely incredible for a PS2 title (for the record, you can learn loads more about it in our upcoming first-hand impressions). And just to be sure, it should also be made clear that the Shenmue 3 project is, and always has been, absolutely separate from the recently canned PC project, Shenmue Online.
While the bloated, initial costs of Shenmue were offset by former Sega President Isao Okawa and parent company CSK, the project now seems to exist as a more manageable, practical and affordable entity, for which most of the background work has always been complete since the original games. And while the future of many previously unprofitable Sega franchises remains uncertain, Shenmue - the title most frequently associated with big Sega losses - is getting another chance.
Unfortunately, we can't elaborate on the sources of this information, to protect certain people close to the project. And let's face it, if their jobs were risked, we could end up back at square one in the seemingly endless drama that is Shenmue 3. Nobody can say for sure that Shenmue 3 will 100% definitely see the light of day, but Kikizo can guarantee the integrity of the source; this is the current status of Shenmue 3, plain and simple. Which means it's likely you'll be seeing off Lan Di once and for all sometime soon. Now, we just have to hope it doesn't turn out to be disappointing. After all, the rest of the RPG genre has done quite a lot of innovating in the last five years.
Of course, the official Sega line on Shenmue 3 is "no comment". But when this story is dissected all over the web and quite possibly ruled "bogus" from certain quarters, all that means is that the official Sega line is "no comment". If you push Sega a little harder, it will possibly even make official noises about how it all seems "unlikely" - but nonetheless, this is factual information.
With titles like Virtua Fighter 5, Afterburner III and now Shenmue 3 to look forward to, it seems difficult to remember why we were all so worried after last year's Sammy takeover. And from what we hear, there's more to look forward to just on the horizon.
Adam Doree
Editorial Director, Kikizo.com
Looking pretty damn cool, I hope this all works out becasue that was a series we deserved a conclusion to.
