Shenmue Dojo

Now that we know the general traits of the remasters, the platforms it will be on, the price and even some vague estimation of its release window, I think we have most elements to have a little fun speculating about how many copies the game will sell. Which is a serious and crucial aspect for the future of the series, by the way.

I made a poll, but feel free to add some discussion here.

Since one of the versions is a PC game that will be available forever, let's limit the poll to first year sales.

First week sales? First month sales? First year sales? What are we estimating?

Total sales i imagine.

I put 200k-500K, i think Shenmue 3 could reach the million sale, but here it's "only" a Remastered, i cannot imagine we will have 1 million of copies sold.

I'd say it's more of a port than a remaster.

Average first-year Steam sales for low advertised indie games are around 200,000.

Yeah, I was intending lifetime sales. But knowing it's a Steam game that will hang on forever, we could limit it to first year sales.

I predict a little more than 200K sales for the PC version, more or less the same as the Bayonetta port. But adding the PS4 and Xbox versions I would bet it will be closer to 1 million.

Of course it would be poetic beauty for it to sell exactly 2.33 million copies, making exactly $70M in revenue. And making Sega recoup that infamous figure 19 years later... :-)

I think this will do quite well if the haters e.g (Gaming Bomb, Fauhnhouse whatever their name is ect) get their grubby hands on it first and sell the game short in their crappy reviews.

jasonorme666 wrote: I'd say it's more of a port than a remaster.

I'm not sure why I keep seeing people say this?

1080p resolution, new modernised control scheme, new modern interface, native 16:9 widescreen, new language options.

It's a remaster by definition, regardless of how little or how much energy they put into enhancing the game.

I believe altering things like resolution and control scheme to coincide with today's standards doesn't make something a remaster.

Yakuza Kiwami is a remaster, built from scratch on a new engine with additional story and gameplay content, enhanced audio (re-recorded I believe) and graphics.

From what I can see in the trailer for Shenmue HD, it pretty much resembles running Shenmue maxed out on an emulator, with some filters enabled. You can even change the controls on an emulator to use dual analogue sticks to move and look around for a more modern control scheme.
Granted, the interface is new.
This also wouldn't be the first time SEGA has used emulation/roms in their released products.

Maybe the footage is just too early, maybe the engine has been built again from scratch, maybe we will get HD textures and additional content, we just don't know.
I'm not knocking it, I couldn't be more excited, but I personally feel it checks more boxes for a port, than a remaster.

jasonorme666 wrote: I believe altering things like resolution and control scheme to coincide with today's standards doesn't make something a remaster.

Yakuza Kiwami is a remaster, built from scratch on a new engine with additional story and gameplay content, enhanced audio (re-recorded I believe) and graphics.

I think you have personal definitions of the terms remaster and remake which aren't standard. Yakuza Kiwami is a remake. As you said, it's "built from scratch." Remade. If it's not a remake, then what qualifies as a remake to you?

Edit to add: Having said that, the terms "remaster" and "remake" are not really very rigidly defined so it's understandable that there is some disagreement in how they are applied. But at this point I think there are some generally accepted definitions.

jasonorme666 wrote: I believe altering things like resolution and control scheme to coincide with today's standards doesn't make something a remaster.

Yakuza Kiwami is a remaster, built from scratch on a new engine with additional story and gameplay content, enhanced audio (re-recorded I believe) and graphics.

No, that's called a remake.

Enhancing existing assets = remaster
Creating all new assets = remake

And this, ladies and gentlemen, is why it is a good thing that "Shenmue I & II" is called that and just that.

Going back on topic... I think with the large userbase, low price point, general interest in the series ever since the Kickstarter and many here buying multiple copies it can reach close to a million in its first year.

Centrale wrote:

jasonorme666 wrote: I believe altering things like resolution and control scheme to coincide with today's standards doesn't make something a remaster.

Yakuza Kiwami is a remaster, built from scratch on a new engine with additional story and gameplay content, enhanced audio (re-recorded I believe) and graphics.

I think you have personal definitions of the terms remaster and remake which aren't standard. Yakuza Kiwami is a remake. As you said, it's "built from scratch." Remade. If it's not a remake, then what qualifies as a remake to you?

Edit to add: Having said that, the terms "remaster" and "remake" are not really very rigidly defined so it's understandable that there is some disagreement in how they are applied. But at this point I think there are some generally accepted definitions.

I never said it wasn't a remake, I very much consider Kiwami a remake/remaster as I tend to find these terms are interchangeable. What Kiwami isn't, is a port.
I said that Shenmue HD seemed more like a "port" than a remaster/remake given what we have seen and the info we have.

Edit: I just noticed it's being developed by D3T in Cheshire, 45mins away from me.
"Our expertise includes networking, optimisation, rendering, and porting to platforms including iOS, Mac, Android, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 3, Xbox One, Xbox 360, PlayStation Vita and PC/Steam."
I believe they dealt with some of the Witcher ports, I could be wrong.

No, I don't mean to be petty, but the terms have literal and very clear definitions. They're not interchangeable. A lot of people seem to get confused by the terms and use them interchangeably (including some pretty big youtubers), so I do understand the confusion, but it is quite simple really in my opinion.

A remaster is technically a type of port. You are still porting a game from one system to another. So in some respects, we're arguing over semantics here. Decades ago, remasters didn't exist. They were just called ports. So, it could be argued that the term 'remaster' was created by publishers as marketing spin. Either way though, the term is here now, it's here to stay and it's got a pretty clear definition. If you take original assets, up the native resolution to HD, enhance other effects and textures, change menu interfaces, make other adjustments and alter controls etc., then it's a remaster. If you take existing assets and do nothing or very little with them other than optimise for different hardware, then that is a port.

Yeah. They're not interchangeable. Kiwami is a straight up remake.