I have sometimes wondered what it would be like if Ryo had the ability to jump under player control. I hadn't seen this being done before - or more likely it has been but I've missed it! Anyway, inspired by the great modders we have here at the Dojo I gave it a crack for What's Shenmue.

The result is successfully being able to replace the kneel/crouch action, which is activated with the X button in What's Shenmue, with a jump animation for Ryo instead.

Here's a sample of Ryo trying to jump onto the boxes of fish at Uokichi on the Dobuita main street (unfortunately, it's not possible though):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uKDI48nmbog

General description of the change made:

Most of the time was spent investigating the contents of the MOTION.BIN file to find out how it's structured. I eventually located the place that points to the 3 kneeling animations - kneeling down; kneeling position; getting up - and updated these to point to the animation for Ryo's jumping instead.

Here's my best-guess translation of the text on the whiteboard that is briefly shown in the video.

*** WARNING: SPOILERS! ***

The text on the whiteboard does reveal clues about the game's story and content. Don't click below unless you wish to reveal potential story spoilers!

http://i.imgur.com/ax99HkR.png

As usual Yu's handwriting is quite hard to make out. Additions/corrections are welcome (Kiyuu, David...?).

Here's my best-guess translation of the text on the whiteboard that is briefly shown in the video.

http://i.imgur.com/ax99HkR.png

As usual Yu's handwriting is quite hard to make out. Additions/corrections are welcome (Kiyuu, David...?).
Excellent work as always! Here's a little help with the "??" parts:

[Top left]
りゅ（=龍）: dragon
ほう（=鳳凰）: phoenix
白（=白虎）: white tiger
玄（=玄武）: black tortoise

Must overcome (?) these. --> Must be in this order.

[Around the big circle in the center]
白こ（=白虎）: white tiger
玄ぶ（=玄武）: black tortoise
すざく（=朱雀）: red phoenix

[Bottom right]
りゅう（龍）: dragon
すざく（朱雀）: phoenix

3 pieces of concept art (composites) from the June 2016 Kickstarter update video.

Edit: plus 2 more.

http://i.imgur.com/9Iqhm8u.png

http://i.imgur.com/OPmw5P6.png

http://i.imgur.com/hKIJz3K.png

http://i.imgur.com/P5oXV8a.png

http://i.imgur.com/38KuFeh.png

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=208859785&postcount=2741

Downloading now. Will update the OP with interesting info about Shenmue III, Yu Suzuki, and the series at large.

EDIT 1:

Ryan Payton is working on Shenmue III as part of its advisory board. He meets with Yu Suzuki every two months.

EDIT 2:

Yu's passion for creating games has been ignited, he's sleeping at the office, and is full of enthusiasm working on Shenmue III. His game creation style is very different to what Ryan Payton is used to (likely waterfall vs agile development methodology), but says there is "method to the madness".

Ryan Payton keeps prodding and poking about the Saturn Shenmue build. Yu doesn't know where it is.

The team are working hard on making Ryo look like he should.

Yu has been able to hire back a lot of veterans of the series, dating back to the Shenmue Saturn build of the game.

The ambition for Shenmue as a series was to release two games, the first part would be the story of Shenmue + Shenmue II, and the second Shenmue III onwards.

EDIT 3:

Yu and Ryan have had constructive arguments over the game, with Yu pushing revolution and Ryan pushing for evolution. They seem to have met a compromise that works for both, and their overall goal is to make a great game for the fans .

The team are fully dedicated to both the game and Yu, a lot of the people working on the game are there for Yu's benefit as someone they know, love, and respect, Ryan Payton included.

-----

Overall not hugely informative, and the Patreon exclusive content isn't too big on information. The largest bombshell is that Ryan Payton is actually working on the game in a supervisory role.

Excellent work as always! Here's a little help with the "??" parts:

[Top left]
りゅ（=龍）: dragon
ほう（=鳳凰）: phoenix
白（=白虎）: white tiger
玄（=玄武）: black tortoise

Must overcome (?) these. --> Must be in this order.

[Around the big circle in the center]
白こ（=白虎）: white tiger
玄ぶ（=玄武）: black tortoise
すざく（=朱雀）: red phoenix

[Bottom right]
りゅう（龍）: dragon
すざく（朱雀）: phoenix
Fantastic, thanks Kiyuu!

Here's the updated image:
http://i.imgur.com/N3LhjUN.png

Although the bicycle riding functionality was disabled in What's Shenmue before its release, it turns out that the animation data for Ryo has been left on the disk, tucked away inside the motion.bin file.

So as the next video following my investigation for the "Ryo jumping" mod, here are the unused animations for Ryo's interactions... minus the bicycle.

https://youtu.be/6lHtA6WllCs

Edit 2016/10/08: added the bicycle animations contained in the PLYBCYL.MOT file on the Shenmue II disks to the top post.

Ryo pedaling bike

RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_KOG_LP [=RYOM_RYO_0043E_JITENSTA_KOG_LP]
http://i.imgur.com/ZcjzcEQ.gif http://i.imgur.com/zBAl3Nc.gif

RYOM_RYO_P_BIKE_TATIKOGI_LP
http://i.imgur.com/yrZBW4D.gif http://i.imgur.com/xqv6VIH.gif

Ryo seated on bike

RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_NORU_LP [=RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_MATAGU_LP], RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_F_0
http://i.imgur.com/CrKNGZs.gif http://i.imgur.com/BT529by.gif

RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_A_1, RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_A_3
http://i.imgur.com/AMmAsPv.gif http://i.imgur.com/N1DGUjn.gif

RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_A_2
http://i.imgur.com/Bk10Rmk.gif

Ryo mounting bike

RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_NORU [=RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_NORU_F, RYOM_RYO_0043E_JITENSYA_NORU]
http://i.imgur.com/laO5tzK.gif http://i.imgur.com/VqJU03M.gif

RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_NORU_ST [=RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_A_0]
http://i.imgur.com/0lCChOf.gif

RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_NIGIRU_LP, RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_D_2
http://i.imgur.com/CljaHpV.gif http://i.imgur.com/noKlxIc.gif

Ryo dismounting from bike

RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_ORIRU [=RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_ORIRU_F, RYOM_RYO_0043E_JITENSYA_ORIRU]
http://i.imgur.com/CYwsmPO.gif http://i.imgur.com/wK4erqT.gif

RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_NORU_EN, RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_NIGIRU_EN
http://i.imgur.com/Aib24i5.gif http://i.imgur.com/cSz3Exv.gif

RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_D_1
http://i.imgur.com/kTmuFsk.gif

Ryo moving bike

RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_D_L_30, RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_D_R_30
http://i.imgur.com/I5NeqK8.gif http://i.imgur.com/rE2lghn.gif

RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_G_0, RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_H_0
http://i.imgur.com/uPHurBq.gif http://i.imgur.com/7sEHOxu.gif

RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_G_L_45, RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_H_R_45
http://i.imgur.com/X5zmJbp.gif http://i.imgur.com/cX4YZqR.gif

RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_G_L_90, RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_H_R_90
http://i.imgur.com/jUgzopl.gif http://i.imgur.com/n01mH86.gif

RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_G_L_180, RYOM_RYO_P_TAOSU_C_TURN180_JITENSYA
http://i.imgur.com/6Uaxsls.gif http://i.imgur.com/HAoNmqA.gif

RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_E_0
http://i.imgur.com/QYtYD7L.gif

Ryo kicking stand up/down

RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_STAND_UP, RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_STAND_DOWN
http://i.imgur.com/Rp7fBR5.gif http://i.imgur.com/G9gmbXB.gif

RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_C_0
http://i.imgur.com/C3ujqeG.gif

Changed camera angle. How Ryo actually buys a drink

I found this set of place name titles that were left on the What's Shenmue disk, referring to major locations in the full game.

While some of them are seen on loading screens of Shenmue I & II, some like the Ship were not used.

Guess we'll be seeing the last one in a year or two!

http://i.imgur.com/XRIOUbum.png Yokosuka
http://i.imgur.com/O97IO4zm.png Yokosuka - Winter
http://i.imgur.com/4ZPKjbKm.png Passenger-Cargo Ship
http://i.imgur.com/avmfsRAm.png Hong Kong
http://i.imgur.com/SxcAeivm.png Kowloon
http://i.imgur.com/BZZjQ1bm.png Li River
http://i.imgur.com/yJJMWkem.png Baisha

That reminds me - I need to finish off translating the remaining parts of this article (if people find it of interest).

That would be amazing if you could! Thanks again switch! =D>
The translation of Part 2 ("The World of Shenmue") will be coming this weekend.

Update: Part 2 is now up, here .

It's interesting that in Shenmue II in MISC folder there's a file called PLYBCYL.MOT with following text
RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_C_0 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_D_1 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_D_2 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_D_L_30 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_D_R_30 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_E_0 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_G_0 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_G_L_180 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_G_L_45 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_G_L_90 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_H_0 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_H_R_45 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_H_R_90 RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_NIGIRU_EN RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_NIGIRU_LP RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_NORU_EN RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_NORU_F RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_NORU_ST RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_ORIRU_F RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_STAND_DOWN RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_STAND_UP RYOM_RYO_P_TAOSU_C_TURN180_JITENSYA RYOM_RYO_0043E_JITENSTA_KOG_LP RYOM_RYO_0043E_JITENSYA_NORU RYOM_RYO_0043E_JITENSYA_ORIRU RYOM_RYO_P_BIKE_TATIKOGI_LP RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_A_0 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_A_1 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_A_2 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_A_3 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_F_0 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_KOG_LP RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_NORU RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_ORIRU RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_MATAGU_LP RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_NORU_LP + data that could be related to bicycle animation. In the end of the file there's date - Wed Aug 9 10:26:57 2000
Interesting find! Some of the motion names are very similar to the ones that can be found in the MOTION.BIN file in What's Shenmue, but this is potentially a larger set so there could be some additional animations like the ones seemingly labelled with angles like 30/45/90/180. Some hints from the Japanese meaning of the naming: JITENSYA_NIGIRU=hold bicycle, JITENSYA_NORU=get on bicycle, JITENSYA_ORIRU=get off bicycle, KOG=pedal, TATIKOGI=pedal while standing, JITENSYA_MATAGU=straddle bicycle.

One thing that should be fairly easy to try is merge this data into the What's Shenmue MOTION.BIN file then redirect Ryo's crouch action for each of them to confirm how they look. (This assumes that the data structure matches).

Here is the second translated installment of the January 1999 edition of the Dreamcast Magazine, which contained a multi-part feature on Shenmue . The theme of Part 2 is "The World of Shenmue".

http://i.imgur.com/tPiMPntt.png

Background to the article : as part of the build-up to the release of Shenmue, and following on the heels of the Shenmue Premiere event that had been held the previous month in Yokohama, the Japanese Dreamcast Magazine ("DoriMaga") published this 16-page special report covering various aspects about what could be expected with the as-yet unreleased Shenmue.

The feature consists of these parts:
Part 1. Shenmue Premiere Event (previously translated here)
Part 2. The World of Shenmue (this post)
Part 3. The Hero and Other Characters (future post)
Part 4. It's Magic! Special Effects and Production (future post)
Part 5. Interview with Yu Suzuki (future post)

PART 2: The World of Shenmue

http://i.imgur.com/rNcvXwAt.png http://i.imgur.com/m2SIloyt.png http://i.imgur.com/kSWtLWht.png http://i.imgur.com/px5STGCt.png

Shenmue’s Most Distinctive Feature: Its Immense Play Area!

Here's what Yu Suzuki has to say about Shenmue’s new genre, FREE (an acronym of "Full Reactive Eyes Entertainment"): "It imposes fewer constraints than the games of the past, and lets you play as you want and without stress. It’s about making sure anyone can get through the game smoothly, without being frustrated - that’s what I wanted to create. Even a 10-year old can play. When the boundaries between generations and countries are overcome, people from all over the world can share the emotion of its themes, and feel as if they have experienced a different life from their present one. To put it another way, I want to give the player a complete, self-contained world."

A World Whose Creation Has Spanned 3 Years

This game is the product of 3 years spent by SEGA’s top developer, Yu Suzuki, after taking on the challenge of creating an RPG. The project got underway in secret in 1996 at AM2’s research department as development was in progress on Virtua Fighter III, a game greatly anticipated by all game players. Things took shape steadily, and a massive number of image boards were created in the construction of the world. Work on Yu Suzuki’s masterpiece came to be known by the code name " Project Berkley ". And now, at last, the time has come for the veil to be lifted.

Yu Suzuki’s goal with the game is the "creation of a huge world" - nothing less than a reconstruction of the real world. Something that’s easy to say, but for a game to take ordinary, everyday things and recreate them before our eyes is one of the most difficult challenges. For that reason, in games before now objects have always been symbolized or simplified: the symbol of a castle; a 3D sandbox world that lacks authenticity; badly-shaped characters... It’s only natural to question why this has become the accepted method of expression in conventional RPGs. Yu Suzuki took this as his starting point, along with a vast and complete world. Indeed, Yu Suzuki took the concepts everybody had taken for granted and made them his point of departure. Upon seeing the world that Yu Suzuki has created, players will surely catch their breath.

http://i.imgur.com/2lZxf2p.png
Above: One of the locations in Shenmue: the bewitching capital of Hong Kong. Kowloon City, standing in the evening sun, may be a town that best reflects the impressive scale of the game. Enclosing all kinds of people, this giant city is a complicated tangle, forbidding access to outsiders...
※ All images are work-in-progress.

The May 21st Dreamcast Demo:
Was “The Tower of Babel” a Glimpse of Things to Come?!

21 May, 1998: at the Dreamcast event, along with demonstrations presented by Mr Irimajiri [the then-CEO of Sega] , a demonstration video of "The Tower of Babel" was shown. It is said to have been put together by three staff members in just ten days. This demo bears a striking resemblance to the walled city of Kowloon in Shenmue. What would have been produced if three years had been spent in the creation of the city? The answer to that is: Shenmue.

http://i.imgur.com/7ODFYxJ.png
Above: from above, countless stores and houses surround the huge tower. Creating something like this in a period of just 10 days is now within the realm of possibility.

http://i.imgur.com/rgFjKbtm.png http://i.imgur.com/sSiJARfm.png?1
Left: this is how it looks viewed from afar: one large island. Right: going in closer, the detail in the work can be appreciated. Is this the kind of world that will exist in Shenmue?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P4fAbTrhvto



http://i.imgur.com/k401lnil.png
Above: this is where the protagonist of this game lives, the area of Yokosuka. With its slightly retro feel, the town feels more than a background to an RPG - the sense of realism shown in this screenshot makes it easy to believe that it actually exists: the aerials on the houses, the power lines, the store signs and post boxes... Just as in the real world, the player can navigate around using them as landmarks when navigating around.

http://i.imgur.com/ir8XYAUl.png
Above: in stark contrast is the landscape of Hong Kong. The player will realize immediately just by observing the differences in the city’s appearance that they are in a different country. It is as if an entire world exists there. A boundless expanse awaits the player.

"A system that can be enjoyed at any age, where simplicity and depth stand side by side; a realistic world with fine attention to detail enticing you to see what’s around the next corner; a space that feels real. These are the kinds of things I wanted to create." Just from this brief glimpse of the stage on which Shenmue is set, Yu Suzuki’s thoughts can be clearly understood. However, Yu Suzuki isn’t content with just creating a realistic world: "A story and experience that will leave players with lasting memories". We mustn’t forget this crucial aspect of the game. To put it another way, the purpose of constructing this great world was to evoke such emotions. What sights will be in store for you in this vast world?

http://i.imgur.com/4IaP4R7l.png
Above: the Hong Kong cityscape, a sight familiar also to Japanese. One of a number of cities in Asia said to boast a million-dollar night view, the gaudy signs of its shopping district will no doubt leave an especially strong impression. In Shenmue, such views of Hong Kong city are faithfully reproduced, down to the last detail. Those who see it will be amazed!

The protagonist’s name: Ryo Hazuki!!

China’s expansive history and vast lands spoke to Yu Suzuki’s heart. At first, in order to give the world consistency, only the theme music was created, and this helped to fan his imagination. Then, two years ago, in order to flesh out the visual images, a CG movie was created. That movie was the one seen in places such as the Virtua Fighter 3tb special disk and the TV commercial for the premiere event.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tu86tlnFLVE

However Suzuki says that the creation of the most important character, the protagonist, turned out to be much more difficult than he had been expecting; recently, it has at last been firmed up.

The main character’s name is Ryo Hazuki. A Japanese youth, he pursues the mystery of his father’s death, setting out on a journey to a country in the west he has not laid eyes upon before: China. What awaits him there?

http://i.imgur.com/Wc0E7Kkl.png
The main protagonist, Ryo Hazuki, revealed at the premiere event. He was modelled in 3D using an actual plaster bust. Having lost his mother when he was a child, Ryo’s childhood days were passed training under the strict instruction of his father. Although reckless and with a quick temper, he has a strong conviction. He is the main character of the game.

Is this really a game?! A fully-interactive world using no pre-rendered movies. The town, the rooms, the people... everything, even the dogs and cats, are drawn to full scale!!

Shenmue: a townscape that has been crafted to reproduce the real world in fine detail; and among the development staff, there are even a few hallucinatory souls who ask themselves if this is truly a game.

The townscape that has been crafted is not a spurious sandbox; you can round corners following a smoothly-curving path, and if there are obstacles in the way your pace will automatically slow as you avoid them. In other words, if there is somewhere that you want to go, it’s just a matter of pressing a direction button.

Pressing Up moves you foward; Down and you turn around. If you press Left you move to the left; if you press Right you move to the right. Furthermore, if there is something you wish to look at, you don’t need to come to a halt. Just press the analog stick in the direction you wish to look as you walk along. Indeed, just like in real life, you can search for signs that show the way, or look up at a building while you walk. It’s also possible to look down as you move, and search for dropped items on the ground. Players can go where they want, looking at what they want. Naturally, the controls are simple even for a child. One of the main features is that everything has been made to be user-friendly.

http://i.imgur.com/SWbrHKkm.png http://i.imgur.com/3yPqzBXm.png
Above: in the world of Shenmue, there is no disconcerting switch to a movie scene, with the commonly-seen obvious change in graphics quality. All scenes are created and displayed on the fly.


Furthermore, in Shenmue there are many characters who don’t have a direct connection to the development of the story. People who helpfully tell you the way to go, people who hurry past you and in-your-face road-side vendors. The player can progress through the game without having to converse with all the characters, just as in the real world. Of course, a quick conversation might turn out to give you an unexpected clue. If you are lost, or don’t know what to search for next, just as in the real world you can try asking people at the wayside.

http://i.imgur.com/OL49lS9.png
Above: the inhabitants are rendered in high-quality, real-time CG, and the story unfolds seamlessly – just as if in the real world.

The Story Starts in the Winter of 1986, in Yokosuka!

The setting for Shenmue is Yokosuka. Yu Suzuki comments regarding the time period: "I’m planning to have the story start in Yokosuka, in the winter of 1986. That’s something that probably won’t change". When asked the reason for choosing Yokosuka as the setting: "There’s not really any great reason per se, but I wanted to use a town in Japan with a bit of character – like Kamakura, Kurashiki or Kyoto. Even now there are towns brimming with the atmosphere of Japan. Yokosuka and its surroundings feel right: somewhat exotic and out-of-the-ordinary. And the time period that I thought was the most Yokosuka-like goes back 10 years, to around 1986".

Suzuki says that under the scenario currently created, the setting for the first chapter will be around Yokosuka, where the main protaganist Ryo Hazuki grew up. With Yokosuka as its departure point, the world of Shenmue will gradually expand out. The size of this world is bound to exceed our expectations.

http://i.imgur.com/O6NDdmR.png
Above: the atmospheric streets of the suburbs around Yokosuka. The historic Hazuki dojo, also the home of Ryo Hazuki, and its surroundings together with the area of Shin-Yokosuka harbor make up the setting of Chapter One.

http://i.imgur.com/ei3AuNq.png
Above: once you have become somewhat familiar with the area of Yokosuka, the setting moves to Hong Kong. The recreation of the complicated buildings is remarkable, its composition serving to give a sense of height.

http://i.imgur.com/r1Vr6no.png
Above: the people there carry out their lives just as in the real world. Don’t hesitate to have a chat with them.

Answers to Our Quiz

Aerials

In the December 25 [1998] edition of Dreamcast Magazine, we showed you pictures of several aerials. So what meaning did they have?
http://i.imgur.com/rdOGyAT.png
http://i.imgur.com/SrND7kh.png
Here’s the explanation: the huge environment that has been created for Shenmue is not merely large in size, but has been built with an insane level of detail. Aerials are one such example. Aerials have been recreated and placed throughout the expansive town, with each one a shape different from the next. This result of this ludicrous amount of effort is that the world in which the player moves feels realistic, giving the illusion of being in the real world. Indeed, a "world" really does exist there!

Animals

We showcased these animals in the December 18 [2015] edition of Dreamcast Magazine.
http://i.imgur.com/JsQKPuV.png
Yu Suzuki has this to say about them: "My aim was for a game where everything develops at full scale – while the player moves around, animals like dogs and cats will also appear at full scale." "I think something interesting can be done using these animals." Let’s wait to play the game to find out what he means.


*** End of Part 2. Translation by Switch ***

something along the lines of:
"Shenmue is coming out. They sure made us wait a long time. I hope it's a big hit like me."

http://i.imgur.com/UulkjZo.jpg

As you may know I am currently living and working in Tokyo. A couple of months ago Ziming sent me a private message telling me there was a special Sega event coming up in Tokyo celebrating Sega music from all consoles. Luckily for us Shenmue was included. I am not sure how strict the rules are with cameras but I tried my best to get a good recording for you guys without getting thrown out.

It was absolutely amazing to hear the music played to perfection. After the song was played there was talk of Shenmue 3 but I don't know what was said as I can't understand Japanese but I will give the footage to Ziming at some point.

I've linked the website so that you can see all the songs that were played and also all Sega composers and musicians who were there.

http://gamesymphony.jp/concert/2016/sega_special2016.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hcEn6Fgbdgo

Hope you enjoy and sorry for the odd positioning and scuffling noises I was trying to be stealthy!

http://i.imgur.com/xA8JI9T.jpg

All the music from the Guilin chapter of Shenmue II is now available as a single compilation video. The music has been compiled in the same order as how the story progresses in the game.

Listen : YouTube | Download: Mediafire

Technical Support: LanDC , BlueMue , Giorgio , Radar
Image Enhancements: Riken Productions

Something like this?




In cheat engine chage this

Code: Select all

2C27E100
00000000

This will place the camera behind Ryo, even on cutscenes, leaving to some hilarious results.

http://i.imgur.com/dqJMVQj.png
http://i.imgur.com/UAA3ilM.png

Very happy with the update and for the 'new' incorporation to the team! With every upddate I can feel that it'll be a great game with the true Shenmue essence!

Could anyone translate the japanese subtitles of this picture?
I must say it's nice and helpful of them to leave hints of Japanese text in each video so that we can analyze them to death.

Anyway, the gist of the subtitle is:

"Occasionally, there are even times when the mountains along the Li River bring misfortune..."

First Shenmue III 'ingame' sample

https://gfycat.com/ConstantCelebratedBunny

Shenhua's model has definitely been updated since then, don't worry ;)

I have a feeling these videos were shot a while ago. Still, great update, very happy to see more veterans come on board, and looks like I'll be able to play it on PC with my wired 360 controller no problem :)

Looks like YSnet prefer rather to play Shenmue II on the black Xbox 360's emulator than the Dreamcast which are always unplugged.

https://i.imgur.com/VQLW5lM.jpg
https://i.imgur.com/HRxU0k1.jpg

http://i.imgur.com/00uNsH8.jpg

In this months Kickstarter Update we get introduced to Keiji Okayasu, Sub Director for Shenmue and Shenmue II, who just joined the Shenmue III developement team.

The details and an interview video can be found here .

Links: Kickstarter Update #58 - Keiji Okayasu Returns for Shenmue III | Forum Discussion

Anyway, Switch signal is up again:

http://i.imgur.com/UiqxUBe.jpg

Any chance of figuring out what the stuff on the right means?
I missed noticing this, you've got eagle eyes! Each figure has a name written next to it.
http://i.imgur.com/aZAqfQeh.png Nozomi
http://i.imgur.com/Sozzm7Qh.png Seiji
http://i.imgur.com/dW7l5wKh.png An [truncated]
The drawings have a very simplistic style... wonder what these represent.

It's interesting that in Shenmue II in MISC folder there's a file called PLYBCYL.MOT with following text
RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_C_0 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_D_1 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_D_2 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_D_L_30 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_D_R_30 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_E_0 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_G_0 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_G_L_180 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_G_L_45 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_G_L_90 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_H_0 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_H_R_45 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_H_R_90 RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_NIGIRU_EN RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_NIGIRU_LP RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_NORU_EN RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_NORU_F RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_NORU_ST RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_ORIRU_F RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_STAND_DOWN RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_STAND_UP RYOM_RYO_P_TAOSU_C_TURN180_JITENSYA RYOM_RYO_0043E_JITENSTA_KOG_LP RYOM_RYO_0043E_JITENSYA_NORU RYOM_RYO_0043E_JITENSYA_ORIRU RYOM_RYO_P_BIKE_TATIKOGI_LP RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_A_0 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_A_1 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_A_2 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_A_3 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_F_0 RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_KOG_LP RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_NORU RYOM_RYO_P_BYCICLE_ORIRU RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_MATAGU_LP RYOM_RYO_P_JITENSYA_NORU_LP + data that could be related to bicycle animation. In the end of the file there's date - Wed Aug 9 10:26:57 2000
An update on my progress at trying to view the bicycle animations: it has taken a bit of playing around to get the testing set-up working properly, but the proof of concept was successful and I am now working through each of the animations (the first five have been tested so far).

Testing details:

Since the PLYBCYL.MOT is from Shenmue II, to reduce the chance of incompatibility of the animation structures between games, after consideration I decided to test them within Shenmue II by injecting the data into the MOTION.MOT file of Shenmue II (which turns out to be the equivalent of the MOTION.BIN in What's Shenmue, sharing the same file structure).

The first step was to decide a way to trigger the new bicycle-related animations. Since in Shenmue II Ryo has no convenient A-button action (like the kneeling in What's Shenmue) which is useful for testing various animations, instead I decided to use Ryo's "walking" action. However locating the position of the walking data in the MOTION.MOT file turned out not to be completely straight-forward though, since for some reason in this file all of the 300+ animation names have been simply named "p", instead of a helpful descriptive name as found in the other motion files. After some trial-and-error adjusting I was able to identify the walking animation as the 5th action in the file (luckily not too far down!).

The next step was to overwrite Ryo's walking animation data in the MOTION.MOT file with data from each of the bicycle animations. The main complication is that the length of each bicycle animation data will differ (usually being longer) compared to the original walking data, meaning some of the data for the following animations may also be overwritten. To avoid the game crashing, it is crucial that the game continues to find the same number of animation entries in the file as before. I found this could be done by adding short snippets of "dummy" animation data (just the first several bytes, since each entry in the file starts with an identical sequence of bytes) to replace those that had been overwritten, and also adjusted the look-up offsets at the start of the file to match accordingly.

The method of testing each animation is then to copy across the bytes of a single animation entry to the MOTION.MOT file, overwriting the "walking" animation entry; rebuilding a new disk image; running it up in an emulator and then simply getting Ryo to walk forward and observing the animation.

Results of testing all animations coming soon.

Ok, here they are - all of Ryo's bicycle animations extracted from Shenmue II's PLYBCYL.MOT file!

The core animations are the same as those found on the What's Shenmue disk, but this set is much more comprehensive and includes many variations. Some of the interesting new ones are:

⋅  [While standing next to bicycle] Ryo picks up the bicycle and turns it round 180 degrees.
⋅  [While seated] Ryo swings the bicycle round 180 degrees.
⋅ Ryo looks behind him and scoots the bicycle backwards a little way.
⋅ Ryo sits back and places a hand on his hips (perhaps when stopped and the player has not carried out any action for a while).
⋅ Ryo leans forward onto his left arm (wonder when this would be used?).
As you can see below, the animations of Ryo on an actual bicycle riding around Dobuita taken from the "What's Shenmue" VHS promo video match up pretty closely.

The process for generating each animation is still a bit manually intensive at the moment, but with some streamlining of the process it might be fun to investigate other animations stored in other files (even those of NPCs). Potentially there may be a lot of unused animations that have been left lying in the data.

Anyway, onto the riding animations from PLYBCYL.MOT...

(Edit 2016/10/08: moved the animations up to the OP for easier future reference.)

August 8, 2016

I just finished my first session of Shenmue. Here are my initial thoughts.

After an exciting intro, I quickly discovered that unraveling the mystery of my father's murder would not be an easy one. I quickly found myself wandering around my neighborhood, getting used to the controls. One of my neighbors found an orphaned kitten and, not knowing how the menus worked, accidentally chose to give it tofu instead of the obvious fish. Oh well, lesson learned. I did learn that the kitten's mother was killed by a speeding black car...not unlike the one Lan Di, my father's killer, and his thugs were driving...

I asked some neighbors about the men and their car, and although I got a lead on someone who saw the car, I couldn't find them before nightfall. I headed home for the night, feeling very unsure of myself.

I spent the remainder of the evening exploring my home, and just as I was starting to get frustrated, I found something very interesting in father's study. A letter addressed to myself, giving some advice on life. It definitely seems like he knew what was coming.

I decided I would not get much done at night, so I called it a night. I went to bed and saved my game.

I am quite impressed by how atmospheric the game is. It's a very unconventional game, with a leisurely pace, but also quite charming. Even just walking around my home, I found a cutscene where Ryo saw an old tree that reminded him of happier days, training with his dad as a child. While walking around town, I bought a few capsule toys from a vending machine. My first one was a weight. Ryo's unimpressed reaction mirrored my own. Luckily, trying again yielded better results, earning me figurines of Sarah from Virtua Fighter and Amy Rose from Sonic. I decided to not spend any more money for now.

So far, I am pleasantly pleased with the game. I will definitely be playing more in the near future.

August 10, 2016 1:45 pm

I started off my second day with the intent of finding Yamagishi-san to ask him about the car, but life is never clear-cut. I decided to see how Fuku-san was doing, so I went to the dojo. I found him working on a punch called the Pit Blow. His injuries from the other day were still effecting him though, so I decided to work with him a bit on improving his (and my) technique. After a little practice, we managed to get the hang of it.

I quickly realized that I still have much to learn, though. I wasn't paying full attention to my surroundings as I entered town, and something unfortunate happened. Two boys playing soccer kicked the ball at me, and before I could react, it smacked me in the chest, bounced off, and hit a little girl in the face. I was unharmed. The little girl...not so much. I felt very disappointed with myself as I continued down the hill.

Another surprise occurred shortly thereafter. As I looked for Yamagishi-san, I met a nearsighted old woman looking for the Yamagawa residence, but she couldn't read the nameplates. It took a while, but I finally found the place and guided her there. She was quite grateful.

While searching for the Yamagawas, I found the Yamagishi residence as well. Yamagishi-san was very helpful, telling me that Lan Di's car sped off in the direction of the shopping district. As I started there, I noticed a map by the side of the street pointing out all of the homes in the area. Doh!

Asking around, I learned that the local hot dog vendor had a run-in with Lan Di, and after a little more investigation, I decided that my next step should be to get some insight about Chinese people from...a local Chinese restaurant. It was getting late though, so I slowly made my way home.

While I was out, I got a soda from a vending machine...and got lucky! I got a special can that I can redeem for a prize! I also bought a couple capsule toys, which were a super ball and Sonic the Hedgehog.

I think this was a very productive session. I might play more later today.

I've added a couple of pages to the Shenmue Mods site:

1. File structure of the MOTION.BIN file for What's Shenmue. This basic file structure for animations is used throughout the Shenmue games.
https://sites.google.com/site/shenmuemods/whats-shenmue/motion-bin-file-structure

2. List of animation names & index numbers contained in the MOTION.BIN file of What's Shenmue.
https://sites.google.com/site/shenmuemods/whats-shenmue/animations-in-motion-bin

https://youtu.be/y1cZhDErMRA

https://youtu.be/zOFvWCCAWSg

It's finally time to break my silence on this matter. I've been working on Shenmue II: The Movie for almost two months now, and recently finished recording disc 2 of the game. I've set Christmas of this year as the deadline, but hopefully I'll be finished much sooner, and will have time to do some kind of promotion. If you have any ideas and or would like to help, feel free to PM me.

Shenmue I and II are much more different on a technical level than I expected, and with changes come new challenges. In some ways, Shenmue II: The Movie will be superior to its prequel, but in other ways I've had to make compromises. I can't go too into depth about this right now, but I will say that despite what's seen in the trailer, fights have to be done in 4:3 since the camera does not work properly in 16:9. That being said, I am once again using the 16:9 Auto Fixer created by Dojo members Esppiral , Masterchan777 , and Sappharad , and for the most part it works wonderfully (naturally, there's glitches that can't be helped).
As a result of that poll I ran in the old thread, and for consistency's sake, the movie will be in English thanks to the fantastic mod created by Sm1th . I've played through Shenmue II a few times in the past using the mod, and initially I was worried that I'd run into a plethora of sync issues during conversations. There have been some, but thankfully it's been very limited so far, and nothing I can't work around.

I don't have an estimate for run time yet, but I think it'll be shorter than the 5 hour marathon that was Shenmue: The Movie Remastered . This time, I'm trying to limit myself on the number of secrets and extras being shown. My ultimate goal is for newcomers to actually play the games themselves, since there's so much they'll never experience simply by watching. However, that doesn't mean the movie will strictly contain story elements. Similarly to the first project, I've made it a point to include a variety of gameplay features and cutscenes.

That's about it for now. If you liked the trailer, please share it, and as always, if you'd like to help out with the project in any way, send me a PM. Thanks!

It's been more than year since I tried to do anything with sound, but from what I remember this is how I approached it
http://i.imgur.com/5vME1ze.jpg
This is how snd file looks like. First part I believe consist of data, like where samples located,Volume,Pan,DSP effects, notes(frequencies) etc. and etc.. Second part is pure samples. So my approach was to locate certain sample(s), fill them with "silence" and that's it!

Of course knowing the file structure,it would be much simpler to just edit first part of file,I mean there must be information somewhere about where each sample located or their sizes, or their volume information? but who knows where these bytes are.. Maybe it worth asking FamilyGuy? I think i've seen him at assemblergames.com.

I was able to extract the full set of sounds from the file after making a small edit to the python script dfsdtpk.py (which is called from SND2WAV). A DTPK sound file contains a certain number of sound "groups", each of which can have multiple "tracks" that represent a single sound. The Shenmue SYSTEM1.SND file does not specify the number of tracks so the script was extracting only the first track from each group. To extract all the sounds, set the number of tracks directly (around line 96 of dfsdtpk.py) to something larger e.g. "ntracks = 0x10".

Anyway, these are the sounds that make up the third "group" in the file - mainly the QTE-related sounds plus the notebook page turning sound:
Tracks 0-7: short QTE beep
Track 8: four quick beeps
Track 9: QTE action correct sound
Track 10: QTE action incorrect buzzer
Track 11: notebook page turn 1
Track 12: notebook page turn 2
Track 13: short beep
Track 14: short beep (quieter)
Tracks 15, 16: silence
Track 17: warning chime

Looking at it, it could be a pointer to where the sound file is at, or the length of the audio file after that header.
Maybe you made the game keep trying to play the sound at 0x0000 (because that's where you set it to) for a certain thread of the sound engine (not sure if thread is the right here, not sure what the DC arch is like), causing it to become an infinite loop there, and thus not play any sound from that file/thread or something?
Yes, something like that sounds likely. And since the four bytes correspond to the third group of sounds, all the sounds in the group listed above get muted after if these bytes are modified.

It's been more than year since I tried to do anything with sound, but from what I remember this is how I approached it

This is how snd file looks like. First part I believe consist of data, like where samples located,Volume,Pan,DSP effects, notes(frequencies) etc. and etc.. Second part is pure samples. So my approach was to locate certain sample(s), fill them with "silence" and that's it!
That's great! I did not realize these samples could be played directly from the file. I think this is the easiest way to achieve BlueMue's goal for now.

I referenced your old post here and tried loading the file into AWave Studio after renaming it to SYSTEM1.YADPCM and can play & view the waveform as in your screenshot. Now it should not be too difficult to locate the position of the QTE-related sounds from within the waveform.

About the DTPK sound file format, I was able to glean some interesting clues about the structure from kingshriek's extractor python scripts but not enough to be able to identify how specific samples are treated. Some more poking around might pay off though.

What is this mutilation of innocent code? You'll never get away with this.
O:)

Yeah, I remember, it was at the time when I made this video :D
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YTnhlmKY43Q
Very convincing! If I didn't know Ryo's character I would think it was straight from the game =D>

After spending a fair amount of time with Awave Studio (30-day trial version is a free download) I eventually managed to precisely locate and mute out the QTE sounds in the Shenmue SYSTEM1.SND file. In Awave Studio the sounds play at a different default speed & pitch than in the game so are a bit harder to recognize, plus the interface for playing and editing is pretty restricted so it took much longer than I'd expected. Oh yeah, the trial version of the software makes you restart after every file save too. #-o

After editing the soundwaves and resaving in the same format (Yamaha 4-bit ADPCM @8000Hz) I reinstated the header bytes from the original file since they are corrupted after saving from Awave. Finally I copied the file back on top of the original SYSTEM1.SND file in the MISC directory, and rebuilt the disk image to test. It worked nicely!

The modified SYSTEM1.SND can be downloaded here .

Quick video of the result:
https://youtu.be/dhlv_8Vgd2g

Although it would still be kind of nice to get the result without the hassle of editing the actual samples.

⋅ Note 1 is titled "MVN Development" with some notes underneath. One looks like it might say "fly". Aha! That makes sense. MVN Studio is the name of the software used to develop with Xsens, the 3D motion tracking technology being used in Shenmue III.
⋅ Note 2: looks like business contact details, having a phone number, the name of a shop, name of the contact and an email address.
⋅ Note 3: is a single word with the number 1 after it. Er... I hope it's not a password as that would be bad security practice! (I won't give it here just in case).

Here's my interpretation:

Note 1: First line - "MVNのドキュメント化" = MVN documentation?
Note 2: The name of the shop - " ハウスコム五反田店 " which is a real estate agent
Note 3: I don't remember seeing any PC-related password in ひらがな. It could be his personal shopping memo, when the 2nd note is apparently personal. " すだち " improves the taste of some Japanese dishes. ;-)

Hey, guess what? My sister came over this morning and I finally had a chance to show her the game. We actually almost made it back to where I was before, and I even found a couple of secrets I had missed before! I experimented a lot more with the zoom feature to investigate objects in my house, and I am amazed by the amount of detail in this game, especially when it seems superfluous. I found I was able to rummage through all of my desk drawers and cabinets, and found a cassette player, an additional tape sitting on my desk that I had missed before, and a photo of Ryo and his friends. I also found lots of spare sets of clothing that I will most likely never change into. :P

I also found a Sega Saturn under the TV, but I couldn't get Ryo to play it, or even turn on the TV. :sad:

This time, I fed the kitten the fish, and got some additional dialog with Megumi. I also figured out how to name the kitten. My sister and I finally decided on Mimi, although I did jokingly recommend Sasuke, just to tease my sister with her disdain for Naruto.

I bought a soda, mostly to show my sister all the things you can do in this game, and wouldn't you know it, I got another winning can to make up for the one I lost when I deleted my save! Am I just lucky? Or is it because I tried to pick the same soda I did the first time? In any case, I should try booting up the Passport Disc next time I play and see what I won.

In one game day, I managed to make it back up through talking to Yamagishi-san. Next time, I will most likely get to new parts of the game, and I will definitely let all of you know what happens! I got permission from my sister to play without her as long as I show her the more interesting or exciting parts. Just to be clear, she liked the game and appreciated its "realistic fiction" vibe, but she doesn't have much free time (19 credit hours in one semester!? I would die within a week!), so playing the whole game with her doesn't make sense logistically.

In any case, that's all for today. See you next time, when I will most likely tread some new ground!

I've just finished a translation of an article from the Japanese Dreamcast Magazine back in March 2000, in which they announced their own "Grand Prix" awards for various Dreamcast software categories. This was a time when Shenmue had recently been released to wide acclaim.

Shenmue scooped the trophy for Best Title (out of all software released for the Dreamcast until that time) and there is an award acceptance interview with Yu Suzuki and Keiji Okayasu.

http://i.imgur.com/uacOBTCl.png

Here's a link to the blog post:
http://www.phantomriverstone.com/2016/09/shenmue-wins-best-dreamcast-title.html

One comment from Keiji Okayasu that I thought was quite revealing was when he says he thinks Shenmue II development will go "more smoothly than the previous game", hinting at the magnitude of effort and management complexity involved with getting the first Shenmue out the door.

Shenmue featured in several other awards also, so I'll translate these further parts in the future.

Maybe the idea is that Ryo has to work his way down to a particular carriage in order to find an exit hatch in the ceiling, use that to climb on top of the train, and at some point after doing so, this happens:

http://shenmuedojo.net/images/Projectberkley/berkley20.jpg
Could there be a person of interest in a guarded carriage, and the only way Ryo is able to make contact with them is by infiltrating in this way?

Reminds me of Broken Sword :D
I was watching the snippet of train video from Project Berkley again, and noticed something I hadn't before.

To me it looks as if Ryo is falling facing upwards (may have been pushed?) towards the speeding train from somewhere at the side. He just has time to twist around to grab on to part of the carriage with a single hand, clinging on for dear life as his legs are swept behind him.

Here is the sequence, slowed down:
http://i.imgur.com/zL9Q1ed.gif

The second translated part of the Dreamcast magazine article awards from March 2000 is now up.

Shenmue also claimed first place in the award for Best Script ("Best Scenario" in Japanese).

http://i.imgur.com/9h0a0Agm.jpg http://i.imgur.com/UNLKWzpm.jpg

It has an interview with Yu Suzuki and Keiji Okayasu.

The common theme that stands out from their comments is how much in flux the script for the game was. One part that particularly stood out for me is the reference to the decision announced at the March 1999 Tokyo Game Show, to release the game in several parts with the first part (Chapter One) all taking place in Yokosuka. It has been hinted at before, but working on Shenmue was clearly a pretty draining experience for the whole development team.

Keiji Okayasu: "It was a real ordeal! Figuring out how to adjust the script, and how to build the excitement up to form Chapter One, set within Yokosuka".

Blog post here:
http://www.phantomriverstone.com/2016/09/dorimaga-awards-part-2-best-script.html

I don't know if this has been discovered before, but I found a way to move some stuff and people around in Shenmue.

I still don't completely understand how everything works but things like these can be achieved by editing RAM:
http://i.imgur.com/HiGuMbf.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/qc5k1XT.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/drG7Oze.jpg
http://i.imgur.com/39XPQKx.jpg

Not everything and everyone can be moved though , like buildings and etc. I will post how to do it when I get my thoughts together. Maybe it could be useful for mods?

This can be achieved by editing certain values in RAM .
To summarize:
Search for string CEWP
Higlight "P" in CEWP and add next addresses:
+7 - position1
+B - postion2(how high object is)
+F - position3
+16 - rotation1
+19 - rotation2

Sometimes you'll see ID's like AKIR or TAXI that can help you to identify who is who or what is what, sometimes you'll just have to guess , some addressees doesn't work at all.
It's a little difficult to explain so I made a video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LmA99IicD4c
In Dobuita additionally to "CEWP" there is "D000" for people and transport, works the same way as "CEWP" with difference that these seems to be a spawn points coordinates i.e point at which objects will appear when Ryo approaches them. Also I have found that there's almost no Id's to work with, so you'll just have to guess which is which..
addressees are :
+17 - position1
+1F - position2
+41 - rotation
It work best with characters standing still like Tom or Nozomi..
In addition to all that, if you change all D000 to JD00 you can move all characters from Dobuita to Sakuragaoka, video will explain it all
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k53qqYL4kI4
There's still things to be figured out, but for starting point this will do, i think :-s

As an example I made this Cheat Engine table with some objects for Sakuragaoka https://www.dropbox.com/s/6ogms49bis6oesl/Sakuragaoka.CT?dl=0
This one should work for PAL Shenmue 1 disc 1

UPDATE!

We are now on:

iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/shenmue-am2-podcast/id1166752613?mt=2

YouTube: youtube.com/shenmueam2podcast

Google Play Music: https://play.google.com/music/listen?gclid=CjwKEAjwutXIBRDV7-SDvdiNsUoSJACIlTqlcst-kyZ6QgquAwac-meEfXOJttFYJ5sEPuuVi57LqxoCmz7w_wcB&dclid=CJCmx4yj6tMCFUW1swodpJMOqg#/ps/Ifqeivg4bovpuc6wdg7v7wadrxq

Some of the detail was lost, so it's not quite as nice looking, but if it's any use to you I was able to convert the picture into vectors and scale it up to a higher resolution:

I'm just gonna quote myself this time.

BlueMue wrote:Iwao is voiced by Hiroshi Fujioka. In other words, Ryo's father is none other than Segata Sanshiro.
If there's one guy that's able to have a Saturn in 86, it's gotta be him. I keep bringing this up, do I?

Category "Most Wanted Game".

If you have a moment, you can cast your vote here:
http://www.gamesradar.com/goldenjoystickawards/

Shenmue is not just entertaining (that is, as a new kind of interactive digital/virtual entertainment) ,
it's also soul-fulfilling ( sapienti sat ) .

And some thoughts as an answer to closed-minded gaming-journalists and the vast majority of a certain type of gamers:
Some journalists criticize Shenmue by saying that it doesn't have a lot to
offer in gaming terms, and that they could perform the same activities in real
life. But that's exactly the point. To live (almost) a second life, different to
your own, while being immersed in a lifelike/believable world. To experience
it viscerally, with a gut feeling that you are organically one with what is being
shown on the screen. Yu Suzuki and AM2 created it based on standards of
the real world, and not as a video game. Players who prefer and are used to
'proven', traditional ways of gaming entertainment, of course, will disdain it.
Most of them come with a closed mind on what a video game should and
could be. Like there is a certain recipe that needs to be followed in order to
provide an accepted interactive entertaining experience. Their standards are
like a round hole and Shenmue is like a square peg. The easiest solution: to
mock it and its appreciators (as fanboys, lunatics, etc). The Shenmue series
is a new kind of entertainment. Almost two decades later, the vast majority
of players can't get why it is beloved, or, they do, but they can't stomach this
fact. They can't get that a game... is not like a game, and that, despite that,
people are still enchanted/entranced by it. At the end of the day, what makes
it seem empty for a lot of gamers is what makes it a unique, rich, natural,
and personally soul-fulfilling experience for others (even non-gamers).

http://i.imgur.com/ygk3Vvx.png
I do worry about how Shenmue III will be received critically. [...] Gaming journalism in this day and age is a complete and utter shit-show; not to mention the fact that some journalists are probably itching to give Shenmue III a bashing simply because of what it is. If the game turns out to be shit, it deserves fair criticism to the fullest extent, but that's the kicker: just because a critic might curse the game 'til they're blue in the face, does that mean it's an objectively bad game or do they simply not 'get' it? Shenmue is up there with the likes of Deadly Premonition as a game that people either love or hate - there's hardly any middle ground whatsoever - not because either are bad games, but because they transcend the very notion of objectivity.

Ride to Hell: Retribution is objectively bad, whereas Super Meat Boy , for example, is objectively good. Games like Shenmue and Deadly Premonition , however, simply can't be categorised in this way because they are entirely subjective - though not without obvious flaws - and handing the reigns over to a critic when something is 100% subjective is a very dangerous thing to do because it encourages bias and unnecessary personal opinion to float to the surface; instead of "This is [...]," it becomes "I think [...]."

Regardless, as long as we, the fans, enjoy it, and it makes a profit, thus allowing the series to continue on, critics can say whatever the fuck they want. It doesn't matter either way :)
There is confusion, everywhere where gaming is concerned, between objectivity and subjectivity. A gaming journalist's/critic's objective job is to objectively present to whom a game is addressed and then to objectively analyze if/why it achieves its ambition. For example, Shenmue as a new kind of entertainment, is addressed to players who enjoy an immersive, natural/lifelike/believable/living/breathing/based-on-real-standards, pro-social and story-dependent world, and it achieves its ambition for such and such a reason.

However, their objective job is not to share their opinion, and, thus, their subjective view and personal aesthetic judgement, on why they loved/liked or hated/disliked a game. Of course, some journalists/critics publicize their articles under the label "opinion" (but, sometimes, some of them abuse this, to present, at the end, an ode or a condemnation, to influence the public opinion through a website which gets a lot of traffic, or as a clickbait to get a lot of traffic).

Personally, I believe, Shenmue III will have the same fate as its predecessors. The vast majority of critics will try to find in Shenmue III something that isn't there and was never meant to be in there. They will criticize it based on the traditional standards (as I mentioned in my previous post) , and not based on the new/different standards of its unique/individual genre. [And the same applies to other games, too, which have a bizarre, capricious and/or idiosyncratic style (compared to the ones which follow the orthodox styles).]
Very well said, man. Even the biggest criticism the first Shenmue most often receives, the pacing, is not an objective criticism, because it fits with the aspect of being grounded to reality; some players will hate having to wait around, whereas others (myself included) love the fact they're able to kill time and explore the world, train moves, play arcade games, converse with the locals, or whatever else until the next event. Therefore, that's a subjective criticism that does not represent the overall quality of the game, and using personal opinion to dictate to others what they didn't like about something in the game, as opposed to being objective about it, is extremely poor practice. But hey, that's games journalism for you.

What are the truly objective criticisms of the game? The English voice acting? Yeah, it's poor (many of us, as fans, love it because it's charming and humorous for all the wrong reasons, but it's undeniably poor voice acting). Other than that, Shenmue is pretty much flawless besides personal opinion which will differ from person to person. Shenmue II is a vast improvement over the first, and, much like the first, many of the criticisms are subjective: the Ghost Hall planks, Freeze QTEs, first-person Free Battles, QTE crate transportation, etc. The objective criticism? The voice acting, again. (Some would argue the stupid elevator system is objectively terrible, but you have to consider the decaying, chaotic nature of Kowloon at the time, so perhaps that was what they were trying to represent?)

As you said, critics will look for every nook and cranny to rip apart, and if they can't find one, they'll create them, but because of exactly the the kind of game Shenmue is, and the genre within which it fits, they may as well be criticising a basketball game for not using footballs.

I've just finished translating a new video interview with Yu Suzuki. It covers his time at Sega and some of his arcade hits (Out Run, Hang-On, Space Harrier, After Burner).



The full interview is here.

Update!

http://i.imgur.com/p8DEnKD.gif
Higher quality gfycat link


As of today, I am totally finished with the recording workload for the project. With just over 2 months left, I should have plenty of time to get the editing done and finalize the movie before December 3rd.

Why December 3rd?

Now that I have sufficient bandwidth, I plan on doing a live premiere of Shenmue II: The Movie that day in order to help promote Shenmue III and the #SaveShenmueHD campaign. To keep it "timezone neutral," the screening likely start in the early afternoon for those of us in the US. The movie will be uploaded to YouTube some time afterward, probably close to Christmas like I said in the trailer.

With Ziming's permission, I will be streaming the event on the Dojo Twitch channel .

I hope to see some of y'all there!

In regards to Lan Di being labelled as the leader of the Chi You Men in the first game, I agree it was probably a translation error, and what they meant was he is a leader within the Chi You Men
Yes, the original Japanese wording bears this out. Here's a comparison with what Master Chen says in Japanese:

Official in-game translation: "An organization called Chi You Men, its leader goes by that name."
vs
Direct translation from Japanese: "I heard there's a man going by that name among the leaders of an organization called Chi You Men."

In Japanese the word "kanbu" (幹部) is used, which indicates a leadership group i.e. more than just a single person.