La Odisea De Shenmue - English Translation

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Re: La Odisea De Shenmue - English Translation

Postby Scribe86 » Thu Feb 22, 2018 5:25 pm

The Shenmue Odyssey - Page 29-30

THE SITUATION AT SEGA AND THE CHANGE TO DREAMCAST

Due to changing market conditions and Sega's current position in the console race, the project was canceled and rehoused on the Saturn's successor. Up until 1993 Sega position in the console market quite was strong, however things began to change for the Japanese company as the mid-90’s aproached. Beyond their investment made in several versions of Mega Drive, the real problem started with the Mega CD accessory. At the beginning of the 90’s Sega knew that they could not give Nintendo any respite, after their success against the NES, Nintendo was now starting to recover some of the ground lost to Sega with their new console, the Super Nintendo.
Sega’s commitment to pioneering new technology was always one of their best and most admirable traits, but ultimately was also their Achilles heel. In this instance they knew that the next big thing was going to be the CD-ROM, which was already established in the world of personal computers. So the concept of a video game console integrating such technology was not that far-fetched and, in fact NEC the company behind the PC Engine was developing such a device, which ended up coming to market before the eventual release of the planned Sega Mega CD. Nintendo would also go to work on a similar accessory for Super Nintendo; collaborating with Sony, however the lack of demand for Sega’s accessory and the breakdown in Nintendo’s and Sony’s relationship resulted in the accessory not seeing release. However Sony continued development without Nintendo and in December of 1994 the PlayStation was born.

The failure of Mega CD can be attributed to numerous factors: to begin with, the awkward working relationship between Sega of Japan and Sega of America. The Japanese division refused to consult with Sega of America throughout the development of the CD-ROM project, regardless how much of a runaway success the Mega Drive was for the company in that region. The flow of games for the Mega CD was also quite limited and, because Full Motion Video was being pushed (particularly in the West) this resulted in titles that were expensive to develop and had a very linear and short play time. And before the Mega CD could even begin to make a serious mark in the worldwide gaming market, Sega of America began working on another accessory in 1993 that would be known as 32X. The idea was to offer a device that, connected to Mega Drive and turned the machine into a 32-bit platform. The project was full of problems from the start. For example, the North American branch of Sega lacked the necessary means to mass-produce the accessory, while Sega Japan never accepted the 32x as a real addition to their platform. Ultimately if the company that gave birth to an accessory did not fully believe in it, it would hardly stand any chance of succeeding. The announced games promised great things, but many of them did not deliver, there was once again a scarce catalog of games and this was was not enough to convince their audience to purchase another rather expensive add on. The arrogance of Sega at that time did not go down well with consumers, who turned their backs on the first 32-bit platform on the market and preferred to wait for the already announced, upcoming 32-bit machines. Among them being the Sega Saturn, which made Sega technically be in competition with itself, in somewhat of a strange fashion.

From a consumers point of view Sega’s marketing was very confusing and many did not understand the logic of the Japanese company. On the one hand, there was the Mega Drive, Mega CD and 32x combo; on the other, there was Saturn. The company promoted both equally, but they had already lost the trust of the people, especially those who had bought the two accessories of Mega Drive and saw their platforms running out of games to the detriment of the other Sega console. However, the Saturn had several problems of its own that dramatically slowed its life cycle. Possibly one of the most prevalent was its architecture, extremely powerful but very difficult to programme for. This made many developers search out other platforms resulting in fewer releases on the Saturn in favour of the Playstation, which was selling more and was much easier to programme for. This also caused the first Saturn games to leave much to be desired, in technical terms; even Virtua Fighter had to be fixed in Virtua Fighter Remix, a version that polished all the errors of this launch title. Factor this with a bad publicity campaign, a price too high during its first year and an excessive dependence on Sega's own creations, it was not the recipe for success. In addition, it was also hindered in the West by the fact that there were many great Japanese games that never saw a release outside of Japan (Grandia, Magic Knight Rayearth, Sakura Wars ...) and many other announced that were canceled for various reasons, whether they had development problems or just a lack of confidence in the system, this was something that was becoming more and more common as time passed (Blood Omen, Resident Evil 2, Virtua Fighter 3, Shenmue, Sonic X-Treme ...) The Saturn had great potential and this is demonstrated in the great games it has left us, but it was burdened by his own mother company. The mistakes of the past, along with new ones, caused Saturn to be labeled as a "failed system" just two or three years after its official Japanese launch. Its last years were merely testimonials in the marketplace with only a few releases but ones of great quality, like Deep Fear or Panzer Dragoon Saga. However Sega was not done yet, obsessed with removing the Saturn console as soon as it’s position was lost in the market. And to try and recover some consumer confidence the company looked forward to its new platform, the platform that the masterpiece we have been talking about, Shenmue would find its home.

And that’s Chapter 2, I know I’m working at a snails pace but more is coming :)
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Re: La Odisea De Shenmue - English Translation

Postby Switch » Fri Feb 23, 2018 9:33 am

Scribe86 wrote: I’m back with chapter 2 & using my new account, as more people will know me in the community by this handle. Enjoy!


Great work! =D> Ah, so this was all your translation!

Thanks so much, and it's really smoothly translated. I'm looking forward to the next part!
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Re: La Odisea De Shenmue - English Translation

Postby ShenmueTree » Fri Feb 23, 2018 10:16 am

Thanks for the translation, it's greatly appreciated! :)

Though, if there isn't any new information I most likely won't read it, unfortunately.
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Re: La Odisea De Shenmue - English Translation

Postby Yokosuka » Fri Feb 23, 2018 12:11 pm

The first third of the book is only interesting for readers who aren't much into Yu's history, I agree. The last thirds are a bit more interesting. Although the vision on Shenmue as a whole is not revolutionary, they is always a welcome hindsight to enlighten the different aspects of the game from a local culture point of view. But regarding what Switch has done for his Phantom River Stone blog so far, I don't think it's enough to consider this book a no brainer.

Paradoxically -or not, it may not be a book for Shenmue fans but more for Western players who have steamy memories of the games. I would like to read a truly personal and free minded essay on Shenmue someday.
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