Doods! I kept calm when I saw the domains, it definitely feels like progress for sure, but (to me) the effort for a corporation to do such thing is still relatively small. At least the domains were registered way back in September (around the time in which they explored interest and were "investigating" doing such a thing).

As I said before though, it's all still good progress I do want to be hopeful, but I don't want to set myself up for disappointment either (That time when that Sega marketing exec teased the shenmue and skies of arcadia ports still hurts).

However seeing that second (fake?) leak about an August release w/ both instalments (+Xbone) did get my heart racing there for a few minutes (darn that leaker!). Although it would be disappointing, I do see how SEGA would not port the remasters to PC (straight away compared to consoles) if Valkyria Revolution proves anything, because that game that pretty much thank its existence to steam, and yet they (for now) only announced PS, Xbox and Vita (I know it's a great handheld for this game, but c'mon I'm sure it would've performed better on steam in comparison). Hopefully to those who want it on steam maaaybe they just need to give it more tlc to make it a good port. SEGA have been doing great PC ports/games from their European division so I hope that has set a standard for them to match.

Hopefully E3 will bring many surprises instore... :)

I'm really excited to see what new art, images and assets they will conjure for this game! It's a nice cover OP but I think over time those images from the earlier games retro-fitted into new covers. Also the collage of characters are not well constructed/considered nor is the use of colour imo.

I know it has mixed opinions, but I really liked the Xbox (european) cover to Shenmue 2. The reason is because of the homage it pays to Drew Struzan's work from and all the Star Wars/Indiana Jones boxarts. It gives the game the right impression, that is of a world and story of an ambitious and unprecedented scale. What I liked most about it is that (unlike most things today) it's actually handmade (painted) which totally gives it the right, timeless vibe and imo stands out from the others, especially with that colour pallet.

http://vignette3.wikia.nocookie.net/shenmue/images/5/5b/Shenmue_2_Xbox_Cover.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20150616173941

Fantastic question OP!

I like @JohnDoom's suggestion a lot! More of Xiuying would be great!

Maybe this is the Yakuza 0 hype train talking, but I would love to see a prequel of sorts Shenmue 1, which would delve deeper into Ryo's personality and relationship with his friends prior to the day the snow that turned to rain. To keep it interesting as a game, maybe it could cut back and forth with a playable Lan Di covering the events that @southcarmain mentioned?

With it being a prequel and all, maybe this can be marketed to new players much like Yak0 did? Haha maybe we should all get together to create a pitch for SEGA xD

(I do think a 'Shenmue 0' could work using a medium other than games, like a TV series, animated or otherwise. I wish there were more 'published' Shenmue lore out there). Anyways, looking forward to tomorrows update!

Just for some light-hearted fun here:

As spags says, I'm sure the waiting game is the best thing going for us right now (at least until the 3rd of Feb), but I'm sure something tangible and cool is coming soon before Monaco.

So I thought I'd produce my own update for this month on my thread in the community section to summarise what I've been doing, hopefully it will fill some of the void of no kickstarter updates today, but no promises xD Hope you enjoy, stuff like this helps keep me sane from the day to day grind!

UPDATE: Apologies for broken image links, FIXED!

January 31st Update:
Greetings everyone, we're already towards the end of the first month of the year! :O Crazy! I managed to get up to quite a lot of stuff done for here, though I'd never talk about it 'till it was done, just like sony and the other big boys, I like to shadow drop, I'm sure you would agree it's more fun to see results rather than talk-talk-talk of intentions, I sure do! xD Here's the rundown!

SEGA DVD/Blu-ray Stand:
I've been wanting a cool desk stand for my games for a while now. This month I thought I would take soem time/steps to designing one:
https://i.imgsafe.org/11bc397c17.jpg
https://i.imgsafe.org/11bc322edf.jpg
After the design/3D modelling phase was over, I was ready to start printing the pieces:
https://i.imgsafe.org/11bbb67e73.jpg
And through that journey, there were many setbacks and failures, that's the name of the game when it comes to product design, you can't let yourself get discouraged for too long, you must persist!
https://i.imgsafe.org/11bbc23965.jpg
And then we get to post processing and assembly to complete the final product. As a one-off personal piece, I'm happy, but going forth if I wanted to produce some more, I would think about improving some of the draft angles on the sides of the design as well as producing a more cost-effective+weighted piece. (I haven't printed the back part of the rack connector yet due to some work commitments with my machine and not being happy with its current state)
https://i.imgsafe.org/11bb883f3b.jpg

Coin Series - Poker/Chess Pieces:
I like iconography and appreciate good graphic design and art, especially from video games! I thought it would be cool to print a set of 5cmx5cmm study coin pieces.

I know for a fact we have splinter cell fans at the dojo! :D I'm sure you'll recognise that this is from SC Blacklist (the icons for each of the distinctive playstyles: ghost, panther, assault). Printed with transparent filament to give it a cool camo/armour effect. Been thinking to paint the middle icons gold)
https://i.imgsafe.org/11bc2d1ade.jpg
And a set I've very much been wanting to make, Valkyria Chronicles wooooh!!!1 Again, I just need to sand+paint the inner icon.
https://i.imgsafe.org/11bb20fdc0.jpg

I also produced two more wooden plaque engravings for my collection from stratch (only references): one based on a movie nobody's heard of, the other based on Asura's Wrath.
https://i.imgsafe.org/11bc5b8e6d.jpg

And finally, I produced some graphic design art yesterday for kazuma kiryu called 'the beast is unleashed' to covey his inner dragon spirit in a very altered beast/Bill Bixby sort of way. I hope to make an engraving of this as well! :-)
https://i.imgsafe.org/11bb066bbc.jpg

And that about wraps the month! Thank you for viewing, hope you enjoyed the journey, I knowthere is a distinct lack of shenmue this month but after i lost the files to my previous shenmue project I did loose a bit of steam in the stort term. I hope to pursue and complete it by the end of Feb but we shall see how things turn out. 'Please be excited' for the end of February, hopefully it will bring many new and interesting stuff. Hope by that time, we do get an juicy update for Shenmue 3! Thoughts? Love and Respect everyone! :-)

UPDATE: Apologies for the broken image links. Google, you've failed me!

Loved reading it Switch! Thank you so much for this!

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celsowm wrote:
Can we imagine those kind of reactions:

phpBB [video]

oh my gosh I'm crying I've not seen that and i can honestly watch it forever, great share!

Hmmm, seems the pieces are coming together, I'm going to keep my wits together like you lot in case this doesn't work out (i was burned pretty hard by that sega exec guy from 2012 about the shenmue/soa xbla port lol), but man i can't help but feel excited about this, this is great news! I would love to see what shenmue would look like now...
In fairness to the SEGA PR guy, it seems people misread what he was actually saying in that interview.

He was talking about what fans would ask for next, not what is coming next, but he muddled the messaging.

Yeah in retrospect I do agree with you, it seems like he really buckled under pressure his wording. It was a different era mind you, I imagine I exploded back then just because for shenmue to get any recognition (from anyone!) back then was spectacular in itself. Knowing less about the industry too, I assumed anything said from him reflected sega's true motive and give more weight to all the journalism/articles out there at the time would've resulted in a comeback. I remember lots of my favourite franchises like street fighter, mortal kombat, monkey island etc were getting reboots too. I kinda regret not buying jet set radio on day 1 in retrospect too :p but ohhh well, here we are, and if this shenmue hd is a thing, i'm going to buy the crap out of it!

Hmmm, seems the pieces are coming together, I'm going to keep my wits together like you lot in case this doesn't work out (i was burned pretty hard by that sega exec guy from 2012 about the shenmue/soa xbla port lol), but man i can't help but feel excited about this, this is great news! I would love to see what shenmue would look like now...

http://i.imgur.com/gYIORyE.gif

Please though, 1080p widescreen, Jap+Eng Voice options, (achievements/trophies are mandatory anyway)

Physical release would be cool. less pop-in+faster loading (if possible). bonus features would be cool. again, wishful thinking but shenmue saturn would be hype. in-game brands are a acceptable loss for me.

sorry I'm already jumping the gun i'm trying to tell my heart to stop oh my gosh *collapses, starts foaming from mouth*

Well, we are rapidly approaching mid-March. Soon, we will all be clinging to hope of a Match update as we head into April.

To me, the biggest sign of a delay was when someone(forget who) said the SB could run to the end of the year. I don't see any reason it could feasibly do that unless a delay was imminent.

To me it looked as if Suzuki-san didn't have the right staff/talent at the time he needed it, whether it was a lack of UE4-equipped staff or an unforeseen circumstance, as the recruiting process would (naturally) create some setbacks to his original goal. (On this subject, does anybody know if those positions at YS.net were filled or are they still open?)

However, I do want to shed light on how I interpret Yu's work ethic: Correct me if I'm wrong but I'm (pretty sure) I read somewhere shortly after the Shenmue 3 was funded that Yu-san found it quite daunting to share work-in-progress projects for reasons relating to scrutiny and favouring a more organic process with his dev team rather than one that is completely driven by player-feedback and iteration. After all, he's adopted a very versatile project management system (agile) which is often not been popularised or designed for game development in mind. So, considering all this and that he is most comfortable to doing things the same way that he did during the sega-hardware era, I really think that this is his strength here and what's best for the game.

Sure, I get the opinion on engaging in light banter on month's where they don't have updates or have a community forum of their own with the devs on it, I do enjoy that from other KS projects and all that's good but I think things like that reflect the personality/ethos of the company and benefit smaller scale projects more. As Peter mentioned prior, it's definitely not straight forward for them to do that as they have to go through AJ etc. Obviously if there is any concern I do think it's important for them to be transparent about it (like Doublefine was) but we also have to be prepared to give them some breathing room, however long that may be. Personally if I was Yu I'd be like "Thx everyone but stfu now i got work to do please give me some time!" xD but I'm sure it's difficult for them to communicate that as plans change. After all, Shenmue 3 is probably the most ambitious crowd-funded game project seen so far.

With Shenmue 3, I think that silence is golden and I look forward to whenever Yu-san decides to splash it all, E3 or otherwise. I'm not sure about everyone else here, but my attention has leaned more towards how/if sega will be handling the shenmue hd ports, it's still difficult to imagine what they'll be like running on current gen hardware/pc's, I genuinely think I'd cry seeing that announcement.

And I agree with you @Spags , I know that they have a bunch of surprises we haven't seen yet, but especially with how game marketing is done today I definitely think it wouldn't have been announced yet.

SledgeNE wrote:1280x720 is enough for me.

Screw that I'm going all out and force cropping to 4:3 and 480p via VGA on an old dell CRT monitor for the truest Shenmue experience!

Tangent: this whole story reminds me of a tale I was taught as a designer. A EU car manufacturer (I've forgotten which one) consulted with a product firm to design a car cd/stereo unit following their guidelines verbatim. The design firm agreed to produce it as best as they could in order to prevent that contract going to competitors.

Through lots of great research, they actually built a stereo system that was smaller, better with more features, more power efficient and cost-effective (cheaper). They struck gold and the head of the design firm was so happy he green-lit it.

However, once the car manufacturer saw what they produced, they were like "wtf, this isn't what I asked for!" and they refused to purchase all the units that were produced.

Granted, this was in the late 90'-/early 00's and design communication has changed rapidly (it's better and yet somewhat worse now lol) but still there's an important lesson to be learned in that that I think pertains to shenmue on the switch. It just isn't a priority. Most firms would now collapse over good intentions like that sadly.

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Thanks for sharing this OP. I like the photoshop render of the controllers! It's great to hear the enthusiasm that comes from different communities, the Switch community sound really passionate for this to happen. The idea for this port has been perusing in my head since that awesome 'Snake Pass' game trailer.

Sadly, I'm going for have to agree with the others here, not with the intention of supporting the switch, but for the sake of YS.net not retreading the same pitfalls as other kickstarter devs (like comcept) who over-promised with really ambitious stretch goals that included ports which ended up making the end game suffer more as a result.

Even if it does just take a week or two (like it did for Snake Pass) I would rather YS.net spend those two weeks of development, polish or preparation for launch.

Just so you know, this is coming from someone who only owns an xbone to play current gen games atm! As much as I'd like to see a port for it on that (or heck scorpio compatibility) I would always prefer they deliver exactly what they envision to accomplish really well over promising more when it isn't a priority. I'm planning to buy a PS4 for this game so I can play in an environment familiar to the dreamcast. It would be cool to see xbox one and switch ports after launch though. Going through a scenario similar to mighty no. 9 would be really painful if it were to ever happen... :-/


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Just revisiting Yakuza 4 for some sidequests today and I was laughing my ass off when I stumbled across this:

https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170321/6fd7abc626a950a2b9a7028ff9f3d3b1.jpg

A Shenmue reference?! I had no idea about this if true! Kazuma is reading the cover of a porno-dvd that some ex-yakuza scrubs gave him (to which he reads what's shown in the above image). Oh devs, thank you for not forgetting your roots...

Really looking forward to getting a ps4 and playing Yakuza 0 in a couple of months from now.

Hey everyone! I haven't really written my reaction to this awesome update outside of the twitch streams etc but I want to shed light as to why I am excited. This game is coming along really well and I also think these updates will slowly help to set peoples expectations onto what this game will actually be like as it heads towards its eventual release.

Before the kickstarter announcement ever happened, I expect whenever people envision a potential Shenmue 3 it was something similar to what was seen in the Yakuza 6 trailer perhaps where it would be really grand in its budget and aiming to redefine the genre that it's in etc. And I actually feel that a more modest budget (even though it's still a decent amount!) is going to do more good for Shenmue 3 than a blank cheque was ever going to do.

Shenmue 3 from the get-go seems to have a lot more focus/vision in terms of what they want to accomplish and the new update really communicates that well. The notebook, the simple act of opening cupboards and the chair, the QTE's and (potentially) the Nightfall fade that Himuro speculated all give the impression of this being a direct sequel without any other concerns/guff based on contemporary trends. It just feels as if I can jump into the game with the same mindset as if I was 12 year old again! :-) It's so cool to see all the dev's team comeback and be willing to do it (I'm sure fans of many other franchises could say the same thing!)

Another great reason to get excited about Shenmue 3 is that this is by FAR the best generation for it to happen outside of DC/Xbox OG. Could you imagine if Shenmue 3 was made for the Xbox 360/PS3 era? Not only would it present more limitations tech-wise for the team but it would've incredibly more expensive for them to produce. The best advantage of current gen isn't necessarily in CPU+GPU but just the ease of the development environment and the tools/engine (like UE4) allowing indies to do more faster and spend much less. It doesn't surprise me at all the pace at which Peter describes was accomplished, and it's great to hear that UE4 is indeed doing wonders for them.

I want to also convince some of you guys that I don't think the budget will be too much of a concern for it's impact on quality the game, especially in terms of scope and fidelity. I think the team is making the right decision in terms of focusing on the world/game logic elements first atm, that imo is the real star of Shenmue, not how pristine Ryo's hairs looks like atm. You gotta 'feel' Shenmue as well as see it (+the audio is obviously a HUGE part of the shenmue experience, no doubt is it guaranteed to strive in this regard). Despite what we've discussed about different teams handling different assets, the world looks incredible and the attention to detail. As Spags mentions, it is often better to leave the finishing touches like the models for later especially if they're working in a small group, which often brings its own advantages especially in terms of communication. A lot of this reminds me of what I saw during the Broken Sword 5 kickstarter, especially when details such as the face sticks out to the fans, but eventually:

https://ksr-ugc.imgix.net/projects/279861/posts/299579/image-154133-original.png?w=560&fit=max&v=1346437496&auto=format&q=92&s=b74b81a71b1afa2e355f0036f6e302f3
https://ksr-ugc.imgix.net/projects/279861/posts/299579/image-154135-original.png?w=560&fit=max&v=1346437509&auto=format&q=92&s=a270d6dd4bcf59a2ec7b065379758384
I'm glad YS.net have included disclaimers at the bottom of the game footage whenever they show this stuff now!

There are a lot of videogames achieving so much with so little these days, people often mention the Witcher 3 in terms of budget+output of quality but I actually want to instead bring up two other games with pretty low budgets (+ don't have the advantage of tax breaks etc in their country) which are getting their own 3rd entries after so long within the next month: Dreamfall Chapters (for consoles) and Syberia 3. The originals were point and click adventures as you can see but it doesn't mean the latest entries are lacking in their vision. For me this genre is one of the reasons why I've always like shenmue so much at the time with aspects of how the game felt like an evolution to the storytelling seen in adventure games. It still seems crazy to me what is accomplished here with so little.

Syberia 1:
http://cdn-games.bigfishsites.com/es_syberia-parte-2/screen2.jpg
Syberia 3:
http://www.3dmgame.com/uploads/allimg/161006/244-161006105000.jpg
http://gematsu.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Syberia-3_08-18-16.jpg

The Longest Journey (Dreamfall 1):
http://cdn.akamai.steamstatic.com/steam/apps/6310/0000001816.600x338.jpg?t=1479319224
Dreamfall 2:
http://www.lillyblossom.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/01/dreamfall.jpg
Dreamfall 3:
https://nambulous.files.wordpress.com/2014/11/dreamfall-chapters-book-one-0022.jpg
https://3.bp.blogspot.com/-HCaBd1ZaCN4/V2WhCQqhLXI/AAAAAAAA6uA/eJKDbYKzFKQClOYjhKm3Asou_hMEq7PGgCKgB/s1600/20160614193737_1.jpg

Onto features, perhaps the notebook tabs will cover events from previous games and chapters? I think that would be really cool. I also think it would be really interesting to discuss/debate (formally! xD) what concessions fans are willing to make for this game if it comes to it (such as full voice-overs, lips sync and and fighting sequences) I can understand people's concern over time for them just because they're so challenging for any game of any budget to accomplish but we've gotta just believe and hope in this regard. And I believe the father of VF knows what's best for the game. Personally voice-over was important to me at one time but I think it's become less important for me personally (especially after the Yakuza games, funnily the lack of it at first was so jarring to me at first lol).

Apologies if this post was lengthy but as you can see, there's just so much to be happy about I couldn't keep quiet about it! I'm really excited about the direction this game is heading in, the timing and passion involved all-round. Revisiting the older game briefly, I don't it's out of question for them to achieve that Shenmue roaming experience in 2017/18 again, they've got all the ingredients to do this and imo the experience distils down to a matter of the dev's unique taste and approach I think.

(It's going to be a bit scary for when this game does get closer to it's eventual release though, I don't think I'm physically or emotionally prepared for it yet xD.)

Fascinating! Really appreciate everything you do! (I feel like I don't say that enough) Thanks :-)

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Great find! Looking through this and trying to make sense of it all, we can definitely start to piece a few things together.

I personally would also categorise the Shenmue series into the 'Action/Adventure' category but in the case of these listings I don't think it is. On the Atlus/Sega the devices listed here are super vast (WiiU, VR, 3DS,VITA, SWITCH, etc) and to me it doesn't seem to fit into those categories.

So I think the OP was right to predict that the Shenmue Remaster is a lot more likely to be listed under 'Role-playing' on the SEGA Europe page (as the only consoles listed here are PC, PS4 and Xbox). Some could see this as Valkyria Revolution but I don't think it is as we definitely know that is developed/published by Atlus/Sega and distributed by Deep Silver. And as far as I know, Sega Europe works of a very narrow/iterative style of Strategy/RTS/Simulation games, so it does stand out to see 'Role Playing' here, especially so for consoles (as they almost exclusively produce PC games).

Which leads us to: How possible is it for SEGA Europe to publish this game? As far as we know it's very much a possibility. They were the ones who (a couple of times) openly discussed about the possibility of the remasters and answered that fan question on the SEGA Youtube channel. I believe the url's from last September also traces back to them specifically.

The only inconsistency here is the RICE Digital rumour, in which cites an anonymous source at Atlus. While he never disclosed that Atlus was specifically publishing Shenmue (they could still aware/report rumours on behalf of its development at Sega Europe) but imo that rumour starting to sound slightly less credible especially when considering 'Shenmue 3 is getting delayed to 2018' and just the just how there's nothing tangible to it (people here joke that anyone could've said that after all).

Before I continue and sound like Jim Carrey in 23, could it be possible that it isn't in the listings yet? If it is indeed one of them (perhaps the SEGA Europe one) like Sonoshee I'm happy to see it (potentially) coming to Xbox! The bulk of games that I purchase does lean towards that platform and it'll be easier for me to purchase an additional copy/recommend to family/friends who only own one platform (I'll be buying it for all platforms I think, depending on whether my potato laptop could run it, otherwise Xbone/PS4). It does mean sony is unlikely to shadow drop it by releasing it on that day (which would cause so many people to make impulse purchases like with Ultimate Marvel vs Capcom 3) but perhaps it could come out shortly after or be a timed exclusive (like MvC3) for 3 months and tie that into it's announcement on Sony's stage only (and mention other platforms at the booth).

My body is prepared for excitement! 53 days left! :-p

(Also, props to SEGA supporting so many platforms! The Atlus/SEGA page is crazy! There doesn't seem to be any exclusives. The WiiU seems to be getting a lot of love there, hell even the PSP getting something! :-O)

Dude if I saw this as the Shenmue HD trailer @E32017 I would flip mai shyte!

Great trailer, 10 Jibbies outta 10!

I think it'll come at the end of May. No idea what it'll be. It'll be nice to see Waves frothing himself into a mess over a "HI AND BYE HARAM WINE SCHUZUKI PISS GOAT" update.
I haven't visited the kickstarter comments in some time and... oh my words, is that a rap song about Ryo getting high? WHY???

Can't even make it through the other posts and keep memory retention, waves is... one helluva spirited/imaginative fella xD

https://youtu.be/kLtZXu8eGZ4

Vanquish releasing on May 25th. Hopefully this trend of monthly ports continues, and that we see the samurai boy from Japan next month...

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https://youtu.be/kLtZXu8eGZ4

Vanquish releasing on May 25th. Hopefully this trend of monthly ports continues, and that we see the samurai boy from Japan next month...

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My dreams/bet:

- June: Shenmue 1
- July: Shenmue 2
- August: Skies of Acardia
- September: Resonance of Fate
- October: Virtua Fighter 5
- November: Anarchy Reigns
- December: Jet Set Radio Future
I think Shenmue I and II HD will release together.
Agreed, I don't want to sound spoiled or anything but I just hope that it'll hit consoles too :D And physical releases would be awesome too if possible!

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Agreed, great work @Kiske, you're last few findings on Shenmue HD have been great! We've got your back if shyte hits the fan! xD

This forum was built on hope, and damn be to us all if we're ever gonna give it up this easily!

I didn't place much credence to the rice rumour as the days progressed either, especially with the 'shenmue 3 delay' and I really do hope it doesn't follow suit in the say that Bayonetta/Vanquish has in that it's only available on PC/steam. Regarding that I'm sure we'll know more soon enough, but glad to see they were right on another rumour outside of the KOF14 one...

Right on @Peter! And I'm totally going to print that out @Jibby thanks for making that! xD

@jibby I have it setup in my workshop, now I know what I'm fighting for lol [emoji106] https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170515/20d9b4dca206b9c4fbbdc6047701f81b.jpg

And instead of having chocolates like a casual I'm going to have dry sliced carrots! XD

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I never did get to watch the PSX Dojo stream from last December (I gathered up with a couple of friends and they wanted to see the easyallies stream), but the events that unfolded sound really unfortunate. I had a lot of reservations of the games reveal back then (as I'm sure many were) until Cedric Biscay's comments on the matter... which was a unfortunate set of events that followed here but I hope it is something the community has live and learned through. And going by what we know of it planned have changed, and it's difficult to communicate those changes. I'm sure whatever went through was the best decision (if it were half-baked trailer that seemed incomplete I feel like things would've been much different).

The thing is: Despite PSX 2016 not having a Shenmue reveal... it was a really great event! Granted, I wish Marvel vs. Capcom Infinite wasn't leaked so that it had more impact on stage but that was really awesome to see. In addition, I genuinely never thought Yakuza: Kiwami would get a western release (you never know with that franchise) and it getting sandwiched 6 months between Yakuza 0 and Yakuza 6, that seemed totally insane to me and pretty much made 2017 the coolest year of all time xD. And heck, I'm not familiar with wingjammers, but I'm glad to see those fans have their game up in the limelight (and oh my I am so glad the event went smooth... unlike Sonic's Anniversary #TotinoStuffedNachos)
(memes are also okay especially outside of the big three xD).

It's going to be exciting see such a grand event unfold from every competitor. And if all else fails, nothing can take away from the spectacle that was E3 2015 (shenmue frickin 3 was in time magazine and on bbc news website!) and the effort everyone put into that campaign watching the numbers increase... then plateau... then increase. That was one heck of a month.

This time I'm planting my feet firmly at the dojo stream if I can help it (if my internet is funny I'd have to go to a relatives or friends house like last time and watch it with them :/) and it's going to be magnificent.

Live to play, play to live! Now, time to try out this phantom dust port...

P.S: I'm so glad you went through the efforts of making that twitch channel and streaming despite any of that.
P.P.S. Spags beat me to it and said it better :p

Hey everyone, just checking in an... holy mother-chedding smokes! I was only gone for 24hrs! :p

But a few things come to mind (warning: heavy speculation): How would this CEO know of this sweet intel? Let's think of his connections shall we: he ports games, therefore may know of other independent port-houses in the UK. If we look at that list of those untitled E3 games at SEGA's booth from a few weeks ago, one stood out from SEGA Europe. It was listed as 'adventure' (or 'rpg', doing this off the top of my head) for PS4, Xbox One and PC. These platforms in particular stood out as sega europe rarely produces anything outside of of PC and strategy/simulation games.

May be a stretch for some, but I think those two can be linked. Which potentially means this 'port' or 'remaster' (depending on what they're actually doing) is happening in the UK or Europe by one and/or a combination of these studios:

- Blitworks (Jet Set Radio)
- Modern Dreams Games UK (House of the Dead Overkill)
- That other UK dev that ported Valkyria Chronicles and possibly Bayonetta/Vanquish to PC (forgotten their name; can't find their website)

I think he would have likely have known about it from them. Anyone noticed how a lot of these publications/rumour sources (RICE digital, that gameblog.fr journalist, this CEO from Just add water) are all within proximity of the UK? I'm starting to think it's less likely that bluepoint's project is in relation to Shenmue HD.

Sorry if this seems like useless fodder, it's just the first thing that came to my mind hearing all this, as the picture gets clearer and the dots connect. As someone pointed out earlier, it could also very much be a case of my cognitive bias especially with everything that's out there xD so let's remain cautious as always. As Shenhua says: I'll await whilst praying...

http://cdn.interestingengineering.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/The-Number-23-Jim-Carrey.jpg

By modern standards, how likely would a Yakuza Kiwami situation be? The games were ahead of their time at the time, but would a remake of 1 and 2 be remotely possible? Someone like Kidnocon recreated the environments with modern tech pretty easily, at least for 1.

Yakuza Kiwami was a special case from what I'm aware of, the developers of that game had only 6 months to produce that game, and much of that knowledge came from how Nagoshi-san and the Sega R&D team were so familiar and comfortable with using the Yakuza 5, 0 and Ishin engine (which is a modified version of the Yakuza Kenzan, 3, 4 and dead souls engine). All the time and experience they had with those tools meant that they could develop a 'HD' version of 1 by using the animations from the PS2 game cutscenes and build upon many of the gameplay assets and models produced in the later games. It was basically an easy and highly profitable port to produce. It is one of the reasons why the game is coming out in the west at such a budget pricepoint, it cost little to begin with because much of the investment came from the development of prior titles. Another reason why is the fact that the port faced a very mixed reception from fans/reviewer because aspects of the game felt poorly considered (e.g. the Majima anywhere system' where Majima disguises throughout the map and surprises you at any moment for battle).

So taking all that into consideration, approaching Shenmue in the same way isn't really possible. All the locations need to be built from scratch as well as the game itself. They are unlikely able to borrow much from the original games in which they can embed, it'd pretty much need an overhaul in that situation.

There are people to really want to see a Kiwami version to Yakuza 2 but it may be a while off because the Yakuza team have moved on from the Yakuza 5 engine to the 'Dragon engine' in Yakuza 6 (which the engine still isn't finished yet, and the locations aren't as open as prior games yet because the fidelity is so high and they were evidently rushed with that game).

I think a kiwami would be interesting (even in the Yak0 engine which many seem to be fatigued with even though I think it's great!) but I don't know well that would fly to everyone as a whole. I feel like that scenario would require a reboot from another director's vision as well as a budget similar to the Yak games now, which seen to be incredibly costly with all the facial capture, cutscenes and high profile actors they have.

Sadly I don't think a Shenmue Kiwami could happen, at the very least it could if shenmue 3 was a huge success and sega wanted to get more involved with the franchise, but even then would they be willing to use shenmue 3's code, animations, art and assets to build up is determined on the quality of how good of a framework shenmue 3 can establish.

Kidnocon's work is amazing and I look forward to seeing/hearing more of his involvement in shenmue 3. really intridged to try yak-kiwami, seriously six months sounds crazy! Glad they rerecorded the VO at least for a higher bitrate but i can imagine that's easier to implement alongside development schedule.

ARE WE THERE YET!?!? XD

I'm kinda looking forward to it (E3) and I'm kinda not because I'll be a year older just a couple of days after Sony 's E3 and that's always a scary time for me (kinda like new years), so I'm kinda selfishly happy time has slowed to a crawl for now lol.

#IBelieveInYu and I hope everyone here is super happy with the end result of all this :-) https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170522/696a4f12fcb72ac1fb564d3fdc3c58f2.jpg

UPDATE: Well butter my onions! Red Dead 2 is delayed till next Spring, I hope this gives Shenmue 3 more of a fighting chance if it's hitting it's target (Red Dead 1 already killed Alan Wake lol :sadface:)

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Fig CEO sees current build of 'Shenmue 3' during a recent trip to Japan, calls it "beautiful" :-D

Fig CEO discusses a little bit about visiting Japan recently to see 'Shenmue 3', calls it "beautiful" :-D

How this person has access to see shenmue 3?

Well, he is a really important person in the crowd-funding industry, I assume he just wanted to pay a visit. A part of me wishes he was able to strike a deal and provide some *cha-ching* in exchange for a cut of the profits but let's not go there xD. Great to hear his positive feedback, some may say he'd say the same for any game (and that may be true) but I find his choice of words seem considered/genuine (you wouldn't call any game 'beautiful' imo), and in general it's nice to hear of someone who's more up to date on YS.net's progress. It is indeed real, and it is indeed coming! :-D Interesting article and statistics all round, the only fig game that I've backed is that Jay and Silent Bob one...

Totally agree @Spags @darksniper! While making the headlines and aiming for deadlines certainly helps, games should be approached and developed in an organic fashion, this isn't a movie tie-in game that Yu's trying to produce where compromising for a specific deadline is a must, it's well and truly a work of art to us and it's always satisfying to see him take the craft so seriously.

I don't think I've shared my opinions outside of the Shenmue streams (@Peter's and @Ziming's) regarding the last update but I was really impressed with the attention to detail with the level of work presented, it's unprecedented and quite ambitious as far as any kickstarter project I've seen/backed, especially when you consider it's legacy.

I believe it was mentioned by a few how Shenmue 3 should resemble an art style closer to the Yakuza games/Shenmue online. While I can understand and appreciate that, it's not anything I expected for this project to fulfil, I think that it's an unfair limitation to place on it due to the difference in the games budget as well as really restrictive from a development perspective if Yu-san and the team indeed wanted to challenge/change from that.

Personally I think Shenmue's biggest advantage is that artistically it's so distinctive that it can flex and be interpreted in many different ways, we've seen examples of this from things such as the Shenmue manga, art illustrations and even the fanart! Whenever we've see that saturn version it looks memorising from so many different perspectives to seeing someone's snes-looking fangame looks just as exciting. Trying to imagine Shenmue 3 in a stylised cell-shaded graphics sounds just as appealing to me. In conclusion, I think what they've shown so far is great and Shenmue is a sensory experience, the music, ambience, colour pallet, how Ryo walks, passage of time and interactions etc are just as important. It's nice to see that cold, hard decisions have been made with this game for it to be a reality (this can't have been easy for the team), that's what I've really wanted to see. Saying that, my favourite footage so far is still the one from March where we got to see the QTE, chair moving, closet opening etc specifically that gameplay snippet where we see Ryo standing and his brief idle animation and transitioning to nightfall, THAT is what Shenmue needs to evoke and where the real challenge lies (and do well, in which it DAMN is so far if I may say so! xD)

http://oi64.tinypic.com/2jcfz13.jpg

Seeing the finished project is key here, what's shown (like the model of the man) is cool from a development perspective but it isn't the actual representation of the game we're seeing yet, so I put it in the same value as a 3D model render of a product that i would show to clients or a concept image from a game kickstarter pitch, it looks cool but it isn't quite tangible/grounded yet. No doubt will a lot of work and changes will go into embedding that into a game environment and seeing scales/looks. (e.g. the scenery and architecture also look great on their beastly machines, but if I plan on playing this on a base PS4, will it still look cool when you consider many unreal engine 4 games are sometimes lower in resolution and use a lot of AA? These things you can only know/judge when the game is closer to reaching the finish line imo.)

These days I feel like you can have one of the coolest games in the world but if technical performance isn't pitch/pixel perfect people will rip it to shreds, whether they're too accustomed to what they've experienced from different titles with different budgets, if they can't get immersed without it (which is a huge shame) or if these people simply want to dismiss it because they don't want to feel like they're missing out (I'm surprised how much of a factor this especially is today, with people committing less time to games.)

Saying that, polish does matter and these days I often feel it pays to wait for a game to actually have most of it's kinks ironed out. Some games can get away with it depending on what it is or how you see it, but it's crucial with Shenmue as an immersive experience so i hope they don't experience much difficulty with the engine there (thank the father's of heaven that this game isn't on unity engine!) I'm sure (just like the original games development) we're going to notice so many changes to many different aspects of the game, Yu-san is very meticulous with this sorta thing as you all know so it'll be interesting to look back if anything else. Just recently, games like mass effect andromeda and yooka laylee sound like they're getting such significant changes it's basically an overhaul to the experience (which is a kind of a shame considering how things turned out regarding their respective launch.)

The Fig CEO comments still has me excited, just makes the game seem that much more real and instils/reinforces a lot of confidence in that serious work is indeed happening and that it's taken seriously. (Not that I doubted it, I'm glad much is kept a surprise it's nice to see another perspective especially after the broken age kickstarter, as someone said I'm sure they'd welcome a potential Shenmue 4 campaign on their platform in the future if the opportunity were to arise!)

...

Just my thoughts on all this, thought it might've be worth reiterating here. Really excited to see more down the road, very patient for 3, kinda impatient for 1 and 2 HD :-p Hoping for the Rice Digital rumour to come to fruition and that Shenmue HD is on track for this year (failing that please just announce the game, YOU ARE TEARING ME APART SEGA!)

We're almost there everyone! :-D

http://oi66.tinypic.com/2ir6pas.jpg

p.s. I'm almost towards the end of thimbleweed park right now, shaping up towards being my second favourite crowd-funded game. It nails pretty much everything for a modern point n' click (except I think they went a bit too far with the in-jokes/breaking the fourth wall, too much of it gets stale+annoying and yeah I'm not a fan of the deadpool movie, monkey island definitely did this more tastefully imo) but was reading on just how much it exhausted the dev's to work under crowd-funding... :-( Hope they're not burning out at YS.net and wish them all good health...

p.p.s I just heard right now that there's a patch that comes out for thimbleweed park where you can disable the annoying in-jokes AHAHAHAHA what?!?! Guess there were others that were more vocal about it! xD I've never heard anything like this happening, closest being much of the awful/redundant dialogue being cut out in the DmC definitive edition

Awesome work!

And sorry but this thread feels incomplete without the following:

[MUSICAL NOTE] You hit the man in the front You fight the leather attack You hit the man on the left B'cause I'm down with drinkin' You hit the man in the front You fight the leather attack You hit the man on the left B'cause I'm down with drink- Hey you! I don't know you! But I'm a slave to you I hate you! Don't walk around here (yo!) I'm gonna take away from everythingTake a ride don't gimme a ride! You hit the man in the front You fight the leather attack You hit the man on the left B'cause I'm down with drinkin' [MUSICAL NOTE]

XD

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I believe it was mentioned by a few how Shenmue 3 should resemble an art style closer to the Yakuza games/Shenmue online. While I can understand and appreciate that, it's not anything I expected for this project to fulfil, I think that it's an unfair limitation to place on it due to the difference in the games budget as well as really restrictive from a development perspective if Yu-san and the team indeed wanted to challenge/change from that.




Yep. It was me who said that. I still believe that Yakuza should be the graphical benchmark for Shenmue III. Especially in terms of character models. The reason why I say that is because while I have no proof of it, it looks like Yakuza used Shenmue as their base for aesthetic designs and specifically character models. I get the sense that whatever graphics and shading tools they used on Shenmue was directly carried over into Yakuza's development cycle. Kazuma Kiryu's PS2 model looks like he would be a companion that would accompany Ryo in Shenmue V or something.

I don't look at it as "restrictive" so to speak, as I think it's a matter of Yu simply picking up where he left off. While I'm not too fond of the new character models, the words described from the guy who said he saw the game was that "Shenmue III is beautiful", so I'm not too worried about it. I'm confident that Ryo's character model will be fine, along with the others. If Kid Nocon can give us an accurate looking Ryo working as a one man development team, I'm sure development team will get it right.

My biggest concern is the fighting mechanics. I really REALLY hope they continue to use the Virtua Fighter style of fighting. Anything else would feel unnatural


Wasn't quoting anyone specifically, just noticed a few people brought it up during the streams :-). I've given Yakuza a second chance from playing 3 till 5 and I absolutely love the franchise now but I still actively dislike Yak1 with a passion that I will take with me to the grave dammit!
xD (only went 1/3 through it) and the presentation (graphics, openworld, English VO) was just awful, and not in an endearing way either imo. I know it's unfair to compare shenmue 1&2 to yak1 but shenmue was just leaps and bounds better than it and that was shocking considering there's a 7ish gap between them.

Agreed kid nocon has works wonders, and thankfully I hear that UE4 is considerably more widespread in Japan right now so hopefully their's no shortage of devs with that background like there once was.

As a once huge fighting game enthusiast I agree with you on the fighting mechanics, (ive mentioned this before but) it's really hard for any game of any budget to nail how a fighting feels. There's response, animations & blending them from one move to another, weight, maybe even physics to consider. It sounds really ambitious what Yu-san wants to achieve with animations that change depending on the distance of the foe. I wonder if they'll keep the same 90 degree camera angle from shenmue 1 and 2 (which I quite like because it's like a traditional fighting game) though if Yu-san wants to create scenarios where you can direct the battle to another environment like an alleyway maybe it won't be (or would allow you to lock-on/off from that perspective) though I'm sure the team is well equipped and experienced to take on the challenge.

(Have you ever tried Yakuza: Black Panther on PSP? I felt like the fighting in that game shares some similarities to shenmue's. Heck I think it's better than the mainline yakuza games fighting... :-p)

...

Side note: seems to be some murmurs for a splinter cell 7 this e3, please be true that'd be once e3 dream fulfilled if so! :-D (although I'm a little frightened in the direction ubisoft would take it.) Also I've heard a few things about an Microsoft/Sega collaboration? Hmmmm I wonder what if true (my brain is jumping to conclusions with dreamcast emulation lmao I wish)

UK Twitter Trends:

https://youtu.be/9P9eecvkhcs

#EssentialViewing

Kenny wrote:After about, like what? 2 Years? I finally submitted my comic pitch (14 sequential art pages) to Image Comics, Dark Horse, and a guy I ran into who is an editor at Vertigo.

Hoping for the best but we'll see.

Best of luck dood, hoping for the best!

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@Spaghetti's update just made the whole thing sink in with how much of a big deal this is with journo's interviewing/seeing the game. While the project is very much in development, what ys.net will be presenting seems to be closest thing yet to what's indicative of the end-product... no biggie... :O *collapses*

May already have mentioned it, but seeing Ryo roam around for a few seconds would be amazing and that's kinda where I'm keeping my expectations, and be delightfully surprised by the rest.

Would be cool to see more of Ryo (mugshots ftw!) and perhaps some more UI elements and inventory, but that might be asking a lot. But since many outlets are going to see the game, perhaps there really is going to be a a little bit more to satiate them (like the others mentioned, if not straight away then shortly after).

Hoping for the best in that they get to present their craft as they intended. Hasn't quite clicked with me on just how much of a big milestone this will be for them (to start showing and talking) and for us to see something more tangible.

Also for everyone that's going I hope the most recent update doesn't dampen your visit too much. Hoping you'll all be 'promoted' as 'professionals' to visit the 'business' area. Just don't have too many drinks when Randy Pitchford is around xD #BackdoorShadyDealz.

Seriously though that #ShenmueSaved interview with Yu Suzuki was amazing and to me (and I'm sure the rest of us) another interview with Yu-san or the team at gamescom would be waaaay more poignant and profound than anything the other outlets will report about regarding the project. I know that's a little jaded / disrespectful to the media but when certain sites try to make 'much ado about nothing' as @Spags just mentioned with the most recent update it makes me a little concerned what those vultures would do when the gamescom material is out there. :/

*breathes* Remembering the 4 wude and to keep friends close! The haters gon' hate but as with any other project/kickstarter they will just subside eventually and we will left with ourselves and Shenmue mother-cheddin' 3!

...
I'd laugh if it was just an image of a new vending machine. I'd actually be laughing so hard, shake Suzuki's hand, keep laughing and walk away.
Some would be angry, but I for one cannot wait to try the delicious and improved taste of New Jet Cola. https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170714/7d75864a16159a3989605cd24a66734f.jpg

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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outcast_(video_game)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OwEkRN_fG48

Kiba this has got to be one of the best reply posts I've ever received and was an absolute pleasure to read, thank you!

The first time I heard of this game was when the kickstarter for the HD remake came about. It looked mesmerising and just reading about the tech behind it was super fascinating. I was thinking of backing it, but sadly I think the whole thing fell through.

Completely forgotten about it since, if it had stealthily came out I still think I would have given it one glance and a miss since these days it's hard to judge a game without a demo/trial + the overwhelming amount of stuff that comes out. But after reading your post I am totally sold and curious to find out more about it when it hits consoles. The game looks stunning in that trailer and looks to be a very faithful remake too. It's fascinating to hear how much of a community there has been for this game over the years as well as their accomplishments in terms of patching/improving the game experience and making entirely newer version. Looking forward to it!

Also, love the music in your signature dude, what a great game that is! Still need to play the 3rd entry that came on console a few months ago though.

Great question OP, even though it's been a debated topic elsewhere and in conversation, I do think it's become more relevant to explore now that we live in a world where Shenmue 3 is actively in development and Yakuza has yielded a lot of success and potential growth as a franchise for SEGA.

When I first heard about Yakuza (fyi: I was young, like in secondary school) it seemed like SEGA were selling out, with all the magazines I used to read mentioning "GTA of the East" and seeing the images/vibe/cover image everything seemed as if it was the antithesis of what Shenmue was about. It looked like a reactionary game (even though it wasn't and was infact the first mature-rated game SEGA ever made) but the focus on japanese gang culture was a huge put-off.

I remember playing Yak3 at a friend's house (using their save file xD) seeing the openworld and trying for the very first time to approach the game like shenmue and it wasn't working out at all: I'd try to talk to NPC's and nothing happened, no in-game time and dynamic weather etc (which is one of the most pivotal/crucial shenmue elements to me, those elements make you approach the game very differently full-stop) and the lack of VO and limited selection of minigames made the game feel very much inferior to shenmue.

A couple of years or so later I played 1/3rd of Yakuza 1 pssst via emulation as I didn't have a PS2, don't tell anyone! I was young and reckless! :p and in that third of gameplay there were aspects I could appreciate but the combat was unrewarding and repetitive. I have to play the game acknowledging that it was a step down to shenmue, despite being a game that came out many years later. I enjoyed some of the shenmue-esque aspects of the game, but that English VO was atrocious (and not endearing in a way like shenmue or resi 1, just baaaad) and I couldn't handle it anymore. I thought from then Yakuza just wasn't for me.

Then, Shenmue 3 was announced. I had my hands on a PS3 at the time and decided to give Yakuza ANOTHER GO after a GT/EasyAllies video with Huber and Ben really pushing it any saying "look, don't be intimidated by the amount of games, just jump into Yak3 or 4 and watch the flashback cutscenes from the other games and enjoy" so I did that and jumped into Yak3. I took it slow (beat the game in around 9 months) I thought that the game was okay, I liked that it did some unique/unexpected/mundane stuff that was very shenmue-esque but the gameplay felt very limited (finding out later that sega did a poor/budget job of localising it and stripped out basically a third of the game). The story was compelling and there were definitely some cool moments that occur during normal exploration which I liked a lot but pacing out that game was the best thing I could do to avoid feeling burnt out on the game. The combat was much better and versatile compared to the others and I liked the new camera perspective.

I had Yak4 and continued on, and it was here that I felt hooked to the franchise. It felt like a huge step up from 3 in every regard, and I liked the addition of multiple protagonists with different fighting styles helping the game's pace. the story while a bit convoluted at times was really engaging and the side stories were very cool. Yak 5 was the same level of experience but beefier and more polished.

On thing's for sure: If SEGA was around and still making hardware, Yakuza wouldn't exist, whether Shenmue 3, 4, 5 etc ever came out or not, they would have continued to focus on games made for the team demographic and under (like nintendo) for the most part as their mindset was that gaming was for them and it took extreme humility for them to step away from that...

I definitely felt both extremes about yakuza in my life. I ain't no psychologist, but I do wonder to this day if Shenmue 3's announcement made me a little more accepting of the Yakuza series and seeing it for itself without having to scratch every Shenmue itch. Overall Yakuza definitely fulfil's some of those shenmue desires, and has continued deliver that through iteration of each game. I'm looking forward to seeing it grow bigger and better and striving for that Shenmue 1 and 2 originally represented with a certain level of ambition with immersion, but in a different and practical way (as their focus won't be on having real-time clocks/npc interaction and simulation, but evolving the formula of what exists).

I'm glad shenmue exists and is happening, as over the years we've only seen aspects of it's mechanics/vibe between several games (heavy rain, l.a. noire, sleeping dogs etc). To me the passage of time and character/personality the openworld has with the music and focus/interaction on the mundane and minutiae is unprecedented. That's what i look forward to with shenmue 3.

...sorry for the wall of text :(

Hot dang.
Well first off about the UI I'm surprised someone who is so into UI design can agree with ie. the "My Games" library icon being right next to multiple adverts.

Then take that top row and basically scrap it all and call it the Store, because that's basically all its acting as. Just constant buy that, look at this, sign up for whatever. The whole system UI is just so blatantly geared towards making you buy shit. It's not only annoying but offensive. The PS4 and Switch put all that stuff in clearly designated areas. They don't constantly bombard you and you can get where you want to be in 1-2 QUICK steps tops.

Also the loading from page to page in the Xbox UI is just plain slow and laggy. I always experience this half second delay with a button press. You would almost think its input lag but then you realise everything in the whole UI is slow altogether too. Maybe load less bullshit on the front end so we can just have a nice simple interface like we did with the first gen Xbox 360 blade style UI. Now that was a good UI. Then they went and fucked that one up and it's never been the same since.

It's like they realised at one point they could turn a games console into a advertising and sales machine and had a field day in seeing how far they could go. With the constant balancing act of attempting to listen to user feedback with UI updates to "streamline" while then adding 10 more sales icons into the mix like we wouldn't notice.

And the side bar? It would be great if you didn't need to do so many additional presses to still get what you want. And its of course crazy slow too.
tbh just scrap the entire UI besides the side bar because that's basically all we need to operate the system. Then put it front and center with no other distractions. Maybe that would speed things up and make it look like a games console again.

And ya the controller is great though. Favourite thing about the console and its something I use more often to play PC games than with the Xbox.. >_>

Ya they better reboot Mech Assault or Crimson Skies before I permanently replace its space with the Dreamcast.

Thanks for the reply dood, there's a lot of salient points here too. I hope I can do justice to this without imagery.

The whole 'ad' thing doesn't really both me because the majority (except one on the bottom right) is informing of features/shortcuts (like gold), new games and as a whole I quite like the appearance it all elegantly put together as well as the 'live' presence of it all, it doesn't feel like an desolate/arid place to be). And honestly i have never taken issue with the fact that ad's still there when having a gold subscription, it seems like complaining

The PS4 menu welcomes the idea of all these dynamic themes (which I think is cool and I can appreciate) but the inconsistency of it is what drives me nuts: If you're going to allow these theme devs to drastically alter the look of the OS, you have to go the whole way. It's unreasonable to expect that all apps should have an icon of their own, but most of the stock ones should (i'm looking at you 'PS Store' and 'What's New') because they look so jarring when you have a see-through icon and then a big blue ps store icon that you are not allowed to alter in anyway.

Also, there's just too much noise in the current layout and the way they've listed everything. If you press options on a game tile you get a whole list of jargon, most of which is never applicable.

Then there's the amount of steps it takes to order any of your games in folders. If you want to move things around you have to press options, go down to edit folder, go down again to the icon you want to move, press X, and move one one by one... waaaaaay to clumsily implemented. To do the same thing with Xbox pins (after first assigning pins either through your recent played list/games folder or online/app)

The actual Sony aesthetic stands out too, because unlike Apple, Google, MS they didn't really incorporate flat design. Fair enough, I prefer flat design but I don't want to dictate to others what their tastes should be. If people like gradients and all these wavy lines in the background will all this bizarre sombre music that plays in the background: power to them. But things ought to be clearer (which they've just did in the last update to incorporate some flat/vector-y icons, cool!) but they still don't really follow the principles like the golden rule.

Setting up the thing felt liek a pain as well, waaay too many questions for waaay too many thing like they're not confident on setting up a default that the user can then further tweak.

Also, please Sony: Don't be stingy with not allowing auto updates for games when the console is on standby when not on PS+, this is waaay too much of an inconvenience/nuisance, people hardly have enough time as it is for setting up all this. They're the only one's out of all Steam/Nintendo/Xbox that do this.

In terms of things to come, there's going to be refunds and gifting on the xbone which I'm hoping Ninty/Sony adopt. Unlike sony, xbox is still lacking a basket feature for the store atm... :/

I want to be optimistic here as a whole. I'm glad Sony added external HDD's because I've never liked the thought of swapping the internal unless the internal one was going to have a use elsewhere. PS4 is 500gb atm and my xbone is 1tb (w/ 4tb HDD). Also, we're past the days of the PS3 interface (which I'm still a little gutted they never fixed aspects of). I have nostalgia for the blades/XMB interface too, but the limitations of that interface obviously couldn't handle the load as features/lists grew more prominent. The Ps3 especially (with all this vita card applicatioon, sing star etc etc) is a mess man.

We live in a time now where all the corporate empires like Google, Apple and (depending where you go) MS have really advanced UI with using clean/consistent/legible icons and with design principles/guidelines all organised and considered, the expectation have just skyrocketed.

Sure, the Xbox One UI had big issues when it started, and the majority of that came with the fact that the OS was designed to be navigated primarily with Kinect voices > controller. Whether people liked that or not (i quite liked it for 360, never owned a kinect for XB1), they've shifted away from all that to improve the UI/experience for controller only users as they started selling xbones without kinect. And xbox dashboard atm isn't perfect either (going from game window to home doesn't feel seamless at all + the reduction of some features like snap for favouring performance did upset a few owners).

I totally understand your point of view though and it's totally valid of course, I bought an xbox about a year and a half later after launch? I actually thought the xbone had decent title releases for every year since it launched with the big exception on this year (halo wars 2 and crackdown 3?) scalebound did hit hard for us too but there was a bunch of cool stuff this year I got to try (phantom dust hd) overall though the japanese releases on PS4 earlier in the year did pretty much decimate everything else. I'm just saying overall there's a lot to like about the xbone UI and it's the one I prefer as a whole. Hopefully I explained my perspective of the OS adequately enough.

...

That's enough UI discussion from me today xD. Remember the days DVD's use to have slick/super awesome UI? And now they're all just a jpeg (and often not a good one) with arial font options? What happened? Disc space? The decline of DVD sales? Emphasis placed on blu-rays?

Discussing hardware design is fun too. Personally I like the one I have (OG Xbox, entire matt finish so non of that gloss scuffing) because it's just super robust, silent and ventilates very well. I kinda wanted that after, you know, the early 360 years xD. I understood the advantages of having external power supplies but they are kind of a nuisance I suppose. The very PS4 OG with the totally illegible icons for eject/power and ventilation was a bit of a disappointment and one of the bigger reasons I waited (along with the 2.4ghz only wifi chip because i'm nowhere near my ethernet) but the slim made up for it. The tactile buttons, the removable of that huge-ass LED tunnel on top of the console are things I favour. I can see how people like changing their faceplates prior though...

For controllers, imo both xbox/ps4 had issues with out of the gate. Xbox had super-stubborn shoulder buttons and a lack of 3.5mm headphone jack port. PS4 had the dodgy thumbsticks coating, weirder triggers and low battery life of the controller. Both seem fine now after their revisions though. Overall I prefer the xbone controller as a whole on the ergonomics side/grip, but I think it's subjective for the most part.

Which leads to the switch... oh my words. Interested to hear you hardware experience here @Axm. First of, the engineering of the handheld and joycons is incredible. And let's praise nintendo for adopting a modular design for the handheld innards/components and use of screws (non of this glue guff you see everywhere else, pushing away from planned obsolescence and no chances of proper user repair that you see for every other bit of tech).

I don't own a switch but I borrowed my brother in law's for a while and hardware wise it's currently has the most fundamental flaws out there. Skipping all the wifi/bluetooth/battery reading/plastic stand/ventilation/gyroscope/docking on samsung/LG tv's/plastic build warping issues all aside, the design ethos for this console just wasn't properly considered. They tried going for an omni design approach with the analogue and buttons being totally vertical on the joycon for the sake of 'sharing the joy' (of which I did with street fighter 2... and damn did it not feel right in that setup at all :/). Sad thing though is that the ergonomics side was apparent during the early prototypes for the WiiU controller, which they corrected later for the retail units. They clearly know and are aware of all this.

The lack of a proper dpad in normal mode wasn't as much of a huge letdown, that probably would just take some adjustment for that game. And the sharing the joy-mode clips are just clumsy, impractical and unconsidered additions.
But the analog/buttons need to be diagonal for me to even use it for a standard amount of time. All the 'fixes' for this seem to resort to either buying more accessories like a joypad (which kinda defeats the purpose, also 'dat price dough') and resorting to 3D printing components (as Ben Heck on youtube demonstrated).

So yeah, all I'll say is in true nintendo fashion: I'm sure all their future iterative console designs (XL/mini/*new*) are going to much much more considered on the whole. I think they're working on this quicker than we think, with all the WSJ reports added with the versatility/scaleability of manufacturing these components. I'd have though Nintendo learned the hardway about hardware gimmicks after star fox. Nintendo IP's aren't really a big on their own for me, but I'm super intrigued on the games that could come as well as the game Nagoshi is working on for it atm. Is it a monkey ball game, or a handheld yakuza spinoff? Exciting stuff!

(P.S. Never played crimson skies or mech assault :( I do own the former somewhere though). Also, apologies for anyone reading if I sounded too harsh on anything, again just my critiquing, hopefully it's balanced. But if I did any of the mistakes when i was at uni my tutors would have publicly shot me down for it (as they do) this shyte is taken seriously as is always up for scrutiny! xD

Have you decided on what you're planning to get? :)

(P.P.S. has anyone tried the steam controller? I've never tried one)
(P.P.P.S. Gamescom hype!)
(P.P.P.P.S. yes I wrote all this during my break-time. No regrets xD)

Turned my Xbox One on today just to make sure its still working..pfft.. stupid $500 pos.

You know it's really quite sad that I've had an Xbox One since midnight launch and I have a total of 3 exclusive games I've cared to play on it. Forza 5, Sunset Overdrive and Halo 5.
It's almost laughable that I've had a Switch for only 3 weeks and already have more games for it than my XBO and it's a Switch! Haha It has hardly any games and already its stolen more of my time away from the PS4 than the Xbox did in over 3 years!

The state of Xbox is sad. Who the hell even cares about the Xbox One Xxx420BlazexxX here? Do you even 1st party bro?

And what the HELL is still up with this UI? You know after 3 years it seems to have gotten just WORSE over time. I mean am I on twitter or the freaking Microsoft Surface tablet? This is still a game system right? Why am I still struggling to find where my games are hidden... oh! right there a tiny box next to the Pre-order Call of Duty WWII advert. Oh am I supposed to like "pin" it to the bottom of the rows of other bullshit? Fuuuuck this system.
Give me one more year without any worth while exclusive and its sold to another baka gaijin for a PSVR and some paper towels.

Ahh man that sucks to hear dude... but nice to see the other consoles doing you proud!

I'd actually politely disagree with you on the OS/Interface front. I actually think the Xbox OS currently is more robust, feature-full and on the whole front, stable. They've been consistent with adding a lot of cool QOL improvements too. I think the Metro/Modern design language gets a lot of flack because of all the stigma it got during the Windows 8 era. It's super versatile and a lot of things flow really nicely and are laid out in a well ordered/organised way. The PS4 OS is considerably more inferior in my opinion, the design language is so outdated, inconsistent and places it's focus in the wrong areas liek dynamic themes instead of improve the operation/features/performance/stability, espeically for rest mode/instances it takes to do things liek move icons/going to storage etc. I don't want to keep going on about it as a whole (I know it isn't Sony's forte) but I really think they need to step it up in that regard (saying that, I appreciate the remote play on android phones feature a lot). Hopefully v5.0 by the end of the year introduces a lot of improvements on all fronts. The switch UI design language and performance is very nice imo, it's just at a very early state with a lot of obvious features lacking so it doesn't really tell the whole tale. Being in a designer and very much in the UI scene etc I could go on with tech jargon and instances but I'll save you having to hear that xD).

I agree that one doesn't necessarily need to own both an xbone and a ps4, i think much of that comes down to personal taste/preference and what they currently own. I don't have a desktop pc, as i prefer laptops but use it mainly for work and surfing) so for me to play the MS titles it made more sense for me to own on. The service front has been really great, not just with the OS but with games with gold, backwards compatibility, xbox/pc play anywhere and mp features (it also helps that buying Xbox games are really cheap here in the UK, you can often buy £25 xbox credit for £17.99). I agree in that if you have a PS4 and prefer those titles compared to xbox + have a decent pc then there's not much reason to own an xbox because so much of it is accessible there now.

The xbone controller is a huge appeal to me over the ds4 too, the later which I find really uncomfortable for some genres of games (like fighting games) but this angle is for the most part subjective (other than triggers/battery?/build quality) but i do like sixaxis/speaker for some games that utilise it because it's endearing/unqiue/cheerful (how would anyone feel about them in shenmue 3? :p)

The only area for me in which the xbox is massively lacking this gen are the Japanese titles sadly, this to me is what has made the PS4 an essential console to own and I'm sure if a put-off for many. PS4 as a result has the edge on a diverse range of games, but for me all the Sony western titles are really unappealing, which too much of a focus on narrative story with the same-ish tone with really safe and stale gameplay mechanics without leveraging the technology available, placing genre or multiplayer aside for visuals. Thankfully Sony Japan (and to a smaller extent, Europe) have been providing some more fresh experiences this gen. And of course, props to Sony on Shenmue 3's e3 reveal.

I'd say sell the xbone for them too (or for further investing into switch/ps4 games) before the value dips too. The PSVR made me really ill when I tried it at an event (it didn't help that the game I played was RIGS) as cool as the novelty of it all was it still felt like preliminary tech that hasn't matured, and I think that'll only become more apparent day by day with the amount of technical limitations it has on every dimension. Also, I kinda don't trust Sony with supporting anything adequately outside of the console, camera and phone-space. Saying that, Rez Infinite looks really cool (but I'm content with the DC/360 versions and Child of Eden tbf) and there's that crazy awesome japan-only game (well, experience*) where you can look at all sorts of scenery around the world with ambience and just chill (+allows you to use your phone without taking the headset off).

Sorry if I rambled for too long, you found your comment interesting and wanted to share my experience with this gen. I definitely prefer playing third party and the experience with playing on xbox the most atm and the service they provide, but I do think by the end of the generation PS4 will have the most pivotal games for me (for Shenmue 3/Yakuza games alone). On the VR side, if you really want to invest in a headset I'd choose the PC variants (oculus/vive) over PS4VR so that you're not in a walled garden/dealing with the burdens of restrictive tech/spec limitations/limited software library. I think this all brings a discussion for what's important these days, first parties definitely are, but they're also just one aspect of things, service matters too. Wow, consoles have really grown up since the DC days...)

(P.S. What's 'Xxx420BlazexxX'? The scorpio? I'm skipping on the iterative hardware this gen (except for switch because i'm pretty sure the revisions for that will be drastically superior to the OG version and more beneficial to the end user because it's a handheld) hoping when next gen arrives all the manufacturers are backwards compatible out of the gate (please sony, it sucks having the ps1, ps2 classics purchased on ps3 and ps3 titles no longer supported, don't do this again! Ninty too!)

[color=#FFFFFF]XBone is still a solid console aside from Asia, but Axm's comments reminds me of this GameStop's employee story...

haha, that reminds me of the days when there was genuine/endearing/innocent humour on the internet, a time before hashtags and aggressive clickbait, let us journey... ["we're walking in the air"]

https://youtu.be/R98qC0fd_1w

https://youtu.be/ZOkF0McZKIw

https://youtu.be/xq-nAOJYeuE

https://youtu.be/-4IXbDwuKT0

Happy Birthday Sonniku! Hope you have a nice, chillaxing day! Just sit back, have some green tea with a cheeky side of sparkling water and some nice quinoa dark chocolate cake and sliced cucumbers with cottage cheese on top (with an order of pineapples on pizza order from Mario on the way) complimenting a laid back playthrough of knuckles levels in sonic adventure 2 (okay that last bit was in jest). But seriously keep friends and those you love close to you! [emoji106] https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20170726/e9dac3d9eb5a3f226f0a59d5a52afb28.jpg

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