I posted a thread here months ago discussing things I hoped to see in Shenmue III. With the announcement of the Kickstarter surveys I believe we will be seeing the game in 8-10 months’ time. I wanted to take the time to sort of "predict" how the gameplay mechanics will work out. Note, that these are only guesses and I can't necessarily predict any innovations that may be introduced.
The core mechanics of Shenmue will remain mostly the same. The defining feel of Shenmue will remain mostly intact due to Suzuki-San and Sub Director Okayasu-san's incredible efforts to make sure the "Shenmue Color" will remain a reality, and the smell of the world originally envisioned by Suzuki will as well.
The game will benefit greatly from the new camera mechanics possible in the Unreal engine. This will make investigation much more fun with a more dynamic range of motion (especially on the PC with the mouse). Background scenery will be more beautiful than ever as we have already seen. Not only will the camera be significantly improved, but also will be movement overall. Instead of tank-like movement in the originals, the new movement will feel more fluid and will finally benefit from dual analog mapping.
Due to budgetary restraints, only a few characters will be as fully fleshed out as the original, the core cast. These are the characters that will have daily schedules and backgrounds. Most of the other characters will be like those represented in Shenmue II. Characters will own shops in the game and we will get to explore them like in old entries and we will finally be able to eat food.
The Rapport system will allow Ryo to build relationships with major characters depending on how he reacts to them. We will see multiple playable characters (Shenhua and Ren) each with their own unique abilities and methods for handling conflict.
The time and date functionality will remain the same and many secrets will be discovered by triggering them at specific dates and times. Also, the traditional bad ending for not finishing the game in time.
Mini Games will make a return, we will see many old ones and some new. Part time jobs will also be back and I suspect a return of forklifts. Also, Arcade games hidden around with the already revealed Excite QTE.
QTE’s will be the same as always, with the QTE’s from Shenmue II returning and new innovations to be added to this mechanic with cooler cinematic action and set pieces than before.
Free Battles will change a lot, I suspect there will be more of them to appease a more mainstream crowd however, a balance between action and exploration will still be present. The core battle system will change fundamentally, scrapping the old Virtua Fighter engine and using something new.
The new battles will take place on a large radius and the improvements for movement from the new engine will make combat rely more on dodging and blocking. Typical punches and kicks will remain along with moves with will be trained in real time battle.
There will be a new "reaction system" that will trigger when Ryo makes a perfect block in combat. An action command will appear on the screen and if pressed with proper timing Ryo will make a cinematic counter attack.
There will be new masters in the game that will teach Ryo more moves. There will also be more access to sparring partners that will be used for move training.
Let's see if I get anything right, some of them are safe guesses