Shenmue Dojo

Of all the things Shenmue performed, evolved, and pioneered fifteen years ago, which of these things do you think it did better than most games of today?

I'll start with perhaps the most obvious: QTEs. Shenmue wasn't the first game to use QTEs as a gameplay mechanic, but it absolutely popularised them and gave us perhaps the best examples of them we've ever seen (or are ever likely to see). Whereas nowadays many QTEs feel as if they've just been plopped in there for no reason other than to justify their existence and gimmick-ify them, Shenmue's use of QTEs was done in such a way that directly involved players in cutscenes and made sure their involvement was given the utmost importance; if you failed the QTE, you were either sent back to the beginning of the sequence so you could learn from your mistake(s) or you were put in a position where you would have to head somewhere else in order to progress. In this sense, players were valued highly, whereas something as laughable as the tap-A-to-crawl-to-the-detonator part in Halo 4 has absolutely no value whatsoever, and could easily have been a cutscene. (The microwave sequence in Metal Gear Solid 4, however, does an excellent job of evoking an emotional response from, and giving a sense of importance to, players, despite being similar in nature to the Halo 4 example. Not only is Snake struggling like never before to complete his objective, but so too is the player via their input. The latter is basically soulless.)

Imagine Shenmue without QTEs - many of the cutscenes in which QTEs feature simply wouldn't be able to exist without seeming immersion-breaking and pointless (the Jimmy chase and Charlie pursuit through the harbour, especially). Certain sequences were built around QTEs as opposed to QTEs being built around certain sequences. In my opinion, both Shenmue and Shenmue II had the perfect amount of QTEs (with the possible exception of the jog through the forest in the latter) and made excellent use of them, too.

So, what do you think Shenmue did better than most modern games? GO!

The way Ryo can grab things seems quite trivial when you get games like TES that you can grab almost anything (and even steal from other people), but it's mostly restrained to "investigation areas", the hand and the limited turning motion you can do gives you the sense that you are actually a person in a game, not just a random avatar (LA noire did this too).

The details everywhere (self explanatory), but that actually make the place lived in, something like it could actually exist. Power chords, air conditioners, etc. just expand that sense of something "real".

The routines and npc behavior, while some other games have routines, and more advanced AI, I think Shenmue is one of the few games that you can talk to pretty much anyone and ask about your current quest/status, and even with no "line repetition". They did a splice word that could permutate to give different phrasings to the questions, I don't think I've seen that in any game. Most adventure games have that "talking about what is happening", but most are closed scenes, so it's not impressive as Shenmue did it.

About QTEs and why Shenmue did them better from a design perspective:
- Did them sparingly: Today there are lots of games (david cage) that use them as a main gameplay element. Some games do the contrary, they use it too little and you are not even paying attention, so it results on a sudden death. Shenmue anticipated quite a bit the QTE with the music, the context and in SII they did remove the black bars to transition between QTE and cutscene to tell you "prepare".
- It's arcade-like: the get in your nerves tick, the big button, contributes at catching your attention immediately. Today most games focus about "not breaking immersion" so they try to get rid of GUIs, tutorials, and make things "seamless". The thing is we KNOW we are playing a game, making it like Shenmue just contributes to make it more immersive by giving you that sensation of importance.
- It correlates to Shenmue actions: You punch with X, kick/jump with A (legs), and grab (or do something special) with B. You already know what to expect. Some games just throw around buttons.
- Instant feedback: You do an action, you get a cool move, and it maintains your attention by throwing from time to time a couple of button sequences. A lot of games (again hack Cage), just give you infinite bullshit commands and the outcome is made by how many times you failed.

Excellent comment on QTE, couldn't of said it better!

For me, I love the day-to-day immersion. The fact that there is an in-game clock and how everything abides by that makes the game feel phenominal unlike anything else. I wish other games would use something similar. The real-time weather and the civilans daily habits truly make the world feel real and it's something I believe no game has ever managed to quite capture the sensation of.
that is unfortunately
Sure, Fahrenheit and Heavy Rain contain an excellent level of detail. L.A. Noire is increibly captivating and contains a very authentic and detailed world (that is unfortunately somewhat ruined by he fact that you can't really do anything inside of it) and Yakuza is somewhat on a similar wavelength to Shenmue but without the same level of scope/ambition, which is fine but it often feels more 'game-like'.

Shenmue emcompasses all of the above and more. Shenmue also has many moments that shock/surprise (when stalking Yuan, breaking daily routine to rescue Nozomi) and combined with how much you can achieve, make you really want to care about the game, hence why I am NOT surprised just how many fans and love there is out there for this that is quite unlike anything else...

Shenmue combines several genres. It contains elements of action, adventure, mystery, martial arts, "walking simulator", and even racing to a degree. It's a completely unique experience. Very few games make the player feel like they are in a living, breathing world with real people, not just repeating NPCs.

(Contrary to the hate a few posts up) I think Heavy Rain is one of the few games to captures the spirit of Shenmue, albeit in a much smaller and linear scope. Heavy Rain surpasses Shenmue in the sense that the players choices drastically effect the narrative and ending. In Shenmue the player is dragged along a strict story arch. Players can decide how they get from Goal A to Goal B, but ultimately no matter what happens Ryo's going to fight Chai in the Arcade, work at the harbor, and eventually board the boat to Hong Kong. There are minor changes based on player choice (if they beat Chai, for example), but most of them are insignificant to the overall story (Telltale Games Syndrome).

With that being said, Shenmue is still one of my favorite games of all time. There are very few flaws (most can be attributed to it's age). It may not be as refined as Heavy Rain but it is a much more ambitious title. Heavy Rain is an interactive movie, where as Shenmue is an interactive world. Both are good in their own respects, but Shenmue will always be one of gaming's most impressive feats to me.

I was talking about QTE design.

And pretty much every game design choice cage makes is the wrong one. HR is a cool game, but the QTEs suck. Some are insta fail, some are long as fuck, some are just little letters roaming around, it's just bad design.

MiTT3NZ wrote: Atmosphere.

This. Yu Suzuki did something unbelievable, he embodied the spiritual atmosphere of Japan into a fucking video game.

To make you feel human in a virtual-reality cyberspace. To feel the world and the people as life-like (living, breathing, feeling). The attention to detail and the quality to make it feel real (realism).

Getting the most haters.