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SEGA currently "investigating" making Shenmue 1/2 HD happen

PostPosted: Wed May 11, 2016 3:57 pm
by Henry Spencer
phpBB [video]


If they're making it they want it to "live up to the quality of the original titles" and want to include the licensed products from the original game.


http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showthread.php?t=1217581

Re: SEGA currently "investigating" making Shenmue 1/2 HD hap

PostPosted: Wed May 11, 2016 4:33 pm
by Jesse
I would love if it had the project Berkley demonstration plus other videos, numerous concept/official drawings of the characters etc, interviews with the voice actors/developers during the process of making the series, selectable music tracks + much more included as extras. A awesome easter egg would after you beat shenmue you get to use the bicycle in new game plus.

Do I expect any of this? absolutely not I expect it to be bare bones as possible but with a photo mode maybe. but it deserves everything considering the excruciating wait in between sequels. Sega should pack it with as much bonus content as humanly possible.

Re: SEGA currently "investigating" making Shenmue 1/2 HD hap

PostPosted: Wed May 11, 2016 4:43 pm
by alexh86
I hope that is genuine! Even for Shenmue to get mentioned by Sega is great news though. Personally, I don't care all that much about the licensed products, replace them with other made up brands and characters.

Re: SEGA currently "investigating" making Shenmue 1/2 HD hap

PostPosted: Wed May 11, 2016 7:28 pm
by -=SPZ=-47
Investigating what?

Sega, do you want to know a secret? In order to do something, you have to DO IT! You have to start the project, fund it, work, release. You know... like any other friggin' game in the world!!! Dammit!

On the other hand, I'm not surprized Sega forgot how to make games. Let them investigate. Maybe they will learn something alongside with inventing a wheel and researching electricity...

Or maybe, just maybe, they just show us the middle finger like in the last 15 years.

Re: SEGA currently "investigating" making Shenmue 1/2 HD hap

PostPosted: Wed May 11, 2016 7:48 pm
by FlagshipFighter
Just imagine guys, Shenmue. 60fps. 1080p. Widescreen. Achievements. Uncompressed sound. JP/EN language. Unreleased Features/Directors cut content. A playable Saturn port. Special features...

And yes. Yes I am a masochist,.

Re: SEGA currently "investigating" making Shenmue 1/2 HD hap

PostPosted: Wed May 11, 2016 8:04 pm
by Giorgio
The good things is that finally they don't show a sign of doubt about Shenmue 1 & 2 HD's selling potential.

The interesting thing is about licensing in the first two games. If it's for products like TIMEX, Coca-Cola (JP vers. only), Sapporo, Hitachi etc, then it's a simple matter of re-texturing (even a fan modder can do this). Therefore, I infer it is something more complicated. There is high possibility it is related to the rumours about the game engine being licensed.

Assuming SEGA's efforts is in full force, it's a matter of time and two factors are responsible for the delay: i) resolving the licensing issues, ii) porting the game (as well as QA).

Related links:

Re: SEGA currently "investigating" making Shenmue 1/2 HD hap

PostPosted: Wed May 11, 2016 8:06 pm
by shredingskin
I hope they're just stupid and by licenced products they mean the timex and trademarked stuff that can be swapped very easily and not actually third party software (which is most likely the case).

Re: SEGA currently "investigating" making Shenmue 1/2 HD hap

PostPosted: Wed May 11, 2016 8:55 pm
by Sappharad

I don't think BlitWorks would be an ideal choice to do a port, even though everyone seems to want them to do it.

The article specifically mentions Sonic CD and Jet Set Radio as 2 of the 3 they pitched to Sega. To start, Blitworks own Sonic CD port was bad. It leaked onto PartnerNet at some point and is discussed online in a few places. It had framerate issues, and they did nothing to enhance the game. Sega ultimately had them port the version that Christian Whitehead created for mobile, because they couldn't make a version well themselves.

Their port of Jet Set Radio had framerate issues on PS3, especially noticeable in the Bantam Street area. A port of Dreamcast game to much more powerful hardware should not have framerate issues. They had to delay the Vita version, which as a result when it was released it actually performed BETTER than the PS3 version, the framearate issues did not exist there. (The PS3 version may have gotten a patch after it came out on Vita, I'm not sure)

While I wouldn't opposed to Blit doing a port, I hope they would have improved their process by this point. And I'm not sure whether they'd have the resources to make any of the enhancements that people want to see.

Sega's in-house team seemed to do a decent job porting Sonic Adventure 2, at least it holds up from a performance standpoint.

Re: SEGA currently "investigating" making Shenmue 1/2 HD hap

PostPosted: Wed May 11, 2016 9:25 pm
by Anonymous81
Fantastic news. I know it's a double edged sword because it means the re-releases don't already exist as works in progress. But as they said, there are complicating factors. I think it's only a matter of time until this happens. Whether it happens before Shenmue 3 is another story, of course.

Re: SEGA currently "investigating" making Shenmue 1/2 HD hap

PostPosted: Wed May 11, 2016 11:07 pm
by AnimeGamer183
A couple things to cover here. What version of the Shenmue and Shenmue 2 do they release? a modified Shenmue I with japanese and english voice options built in? Will japan finally get their hands on the Xbox content of Shenmue 2 along with japanese and english voice options for everyone? [-o<

Should Shenmue 3 wait to be released so the HD remasters of 1 and 2 have plenty of time to sink in for a new audience? Also giving the paypal more time to generate funds? Of course that would start a Shenmue 3 Kickstater gate, but would it ultimately be worth while? How crazy would back lash become? How much of a factor would Shenmue 3 being developed independently and Shenmue 1/2 HD coming out from Sega affect the release of either? Suppose Shenmue 3 came out before Shenmue 1/2 HD, that would be a problem right? See what I am getting at? Timing could be crucial.

So many exciting questions and prospects, but at the same time it could get ugly depending on the way everything goes down. Luckily for most here we are down for the ride no matter what, but Shenmue could a HUGE success again if the franchise could be solidified to a new audience and we could get Shenmue 4, 5, and 6 beyond or however many it ends up being.

I am excited as much as I am anxious about the situation, I think when/if Sega announces Shenmue 1/2 HD the question of seriously trying to make Shenmue into a profitable series again takes top priority fot Yu Suzuki and YSNet and the development of the rest of the series should be treated as such, we dont want Shenmue 3 to be another dead end and them not be able to make the rest. Cant wait to see the way the rest of this plays out.

Re: SEGA currently "investigating" making Shenmue 1/2 HD hap

PostPosted: Thu May 12, 2016 12:43 am
by VukBZ2005
Honestly, if Sega is working on both games somehow, they should work with both the developers of the third game in the series and Sony to (a) release all three games in the same package or (b) within a the same period of time as Shenmue III. I believe that such a thing will ensure the series' future success.

Re: SEGA currently "investigating" making Shenmue 1/2 HD hap

PostPosted: Thu May 12, 2016 1:09 am
by Monkei
With regards to Shenmue 1 & 2 HD, of course we would love to release these tomorrow. Of course it’s not as simple as just porting the games to the current platforms, as we would need to ensure that any HD remaster lives up to the quality of the original titles. And with games as immersive as Shenmue 1 & 2, there are further complications from licensed products that were included in the original games. That said, we’d love to do it, and are currently investigating how to make it a reality.


=D>

Re: SEGA currently "investigating" making Shenmue 1/2 HD hap

PostPosted: Thu May 12, 2016 1:56 am
by Sonoshee
At this point I'm just over the moon that they've finally acknowledged the demand for HD remasters =D>

Re: SEGA currently "investigating" making Shenmue 1/2 HD hap

PostPosted: Thu May 12, 2016 2:59 am
by Batosai
Now were getting somewhere! =D>

I think we should celebrate getting some evidence that its not entirely a pipe dream and may even be a possibility before the release of (in all honesty it really has to come before) Shenmue 3 near the end of 2017 or early 2018.

Secondly it can possibly be seen as some form of sincerity in doing it right. At a long shot maybe they have been secretly working on the project on and off removing barriers to it being a reality. If we got it visually enhanced closer to a remaster with less compressed audio it would more than make up for the wait for me personally :)

Roll on E3 and pray for news on the old content and let Yu Suzuki polish the new content [-o<

Re: SEGA currently "investigating" making Shenmue 1/2 HD hap

PostPosted: Thu May 12, 2016 5:49 am
by Kiske
Anonymous81 wrote: Fantastic news. I know it's a double edged sword because it means the re-releases don't already exist as works in progress. But as they said, there are complicating factors. I think it's only a matter of time until this happens. Whether it happens before Shenmue 3 is another story, of course.


I don't think we can be so affirmative about the fact that remasters don't already exist as work in progress.
As far as we can tell, there's officially no remaster with currently "work in progress" status.

Whenever they decide to announce it officially, we will know then and only then, how far they are in the remastering process.

Note that Sega pretty much said the same thing about investigating ways to do Shenmue HD at the end of last year.
viewtopic.php?f=5&t=49249&start=60#p1121746

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That can mean two things: They do PR work and tease the fans or hopefully... they are on it since a longer time that we can imagine and wait the right moment to make it official.
Either way, I'm positive we will see a remaster sooner or later. We really need to keep the pressure on them though.