by RyoDC » Fri Nov 22, 2013 6:18 pm
Can't say for sure if they recorded the sound from real source but I want to add next: for some time I was interested in sound engineering, it's a science or better call it art to make sounds using the knowledge of nature of the sound. And I can say, it's relatively easy to create sound in the studio using oscillators, filters and kinda stuff neither going outside, setting up the equipment, trying to filter out the noise of the moving air (wind), bringing the actual bicycle to a place, finding a driver to start and control it... much, much easier. I did some simple sounds (like car engine sound) myself just combining some sinusoid waves into a mix.
Also, take a notice, that most computer game developers (and Shenmue developers are not an exception to this rule) use so called sound libraries - that is, the collection of different sounds organized into categories on 12 CD's or like so. So what they must do was just to sat down and pick an appropriate sound that satisfied their requirements.