Why was the ridable Bike cut from Shenmue 1?

[Zoltor]

When the info was released that a Bike was originally in the game, we where more or less told/led to believe it wasn't fully functional, and was hard to keep it steady(infact I recall seeing footage of such a while back, showing it was pretty hard to ride/it wasn't fully functional, when this came to light).

Well I decided to do a Youtube search, to see if a Beta version of the game, with the Bike actually surfaced(opposed instead of just the footage I have seen already), and found such pretty easily.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f9XQsX5QAKs

As you can see, the bike seems to be fully functional here, It's not the clumsy mess we may have seen in the past, so if it was a already fully implemented system, why was it cut, I wonder?

Someone so needs to ask Yu about this(while they're at it, ask him how he fit Shenmue 2 on just 4 GD rom discs as well).

[Gen]

Both of those questions are partially answered in the GDC postmortem video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Amu0_EunHmM

There's a segment about data compression at 25:55

Someone asks about the bike at 40:45, but Yu's answer isn't very satisfactory, he basically says "Unfortunately we couldn't include everything we wanted".
My guess is that even though it looks good and fully functional in the video, there may have been other problems with it, such as poor controls, problems with going uphill or downhill etc.

[Zoltor]

Both of those questions are partially answered in the GDC postmortem video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Amu0_EunHmM

There's a segment about data compression at 25:55

Someone asks about the bike at 40:45, but Yu's answer isn't very satisfactory, he basically says "Unfortunately we couldn't include everything we wanted".
My guess is that even though it looks good and fully functional in the video, there may have been other problems with it, such as poor controls, problems with going uphill or downhill etc.

I watched that awhile ago, and yea the response about the bike, definitely wasn't a real answer.

I don't recall him going into detail about the compression technique he used(just that some undisclosed compression techniques were used/just a couple things are mentioned), but I'll rewatch it again

Update Edit: Oh ok, yea evidently it does explain a compression technique in great detail, you just need to read the text on screen lol(there being a translator present, I must've not notice the text on screen, during that segment, plus I believe I was making dinner when I was in the middle of watching this, so yea).

Thanks for bringing that to my attention.

[shengoro86]

Yeah it was cut due to budget.

I have been working on bringing it back via mods for about 3 years now. It's a very technical process.

[Zoltor]

Yeah it was cut due to budget.

I have been working on bringing it back via mods for about 3 years now. It's a very technical process.

What budget lmao, Yu didn't have anything of the sort.

Yea, I imagine It's very tricky to create a bike, to work in a way that would be fitting for a Shenmue game.

[shengoro86]

Yeah it was cut due to budget.

I have been working on bringing it back via mods for about 3 years now. It's a very technical process.

What budget lmao, Yu didn't have anything of the sort.

Yea, I imagine It's very tricky to create a bike, to work in a way that would be fitting for a Shenmue game.

But they had a time constraint, and probably had to cut alot of stuff that weren't good enough for release.

To Shengoro: I look forward to riding downhill through Yamanose

[Zoltor]

Yeah it was cut due to budget.

I have been working on bringing it back via mods for about 3 years now. It's a very technical process.

What budget lmao, Yu didn't have anything of the sort.

Yea, I imagine It's very tricky to create a bike, to work in a way that would be fitting for a Shenmue game.

But they had a time constraint, and probably had to cut alot of stuff that weren't good enough for release.

To Shengoro: I look forward to riding downhill through Yamanose

This is definitely true by the time the 2nd game was nearing completion, I'm posite Yu knew if he didn't release it when he did, Sega may have decided not to release such at all, because they were folding in general at the time. This is what most likely why the first person BS happens at all. I'm pretty sure Yu forced the First Person thing in that area of the map, to cove up a camera bug(these types of camera bugs caused by being in super narrow spaces were super common in that era of game development).

I don't know if that would've effected the first game much though, however it would be very interesting from a historic standpoint if that was the case, because if it is, that would imply Yu predicted Sega looking for a easy way out, back in 99, and thus he couldn't afford(figuratively speaking) lingering on a system/feature that Isn't a must have.

[Gen]

I don't know. I think it's true that there was basically no limit on the amount of money Am2 could spend on Shenmue but there certainly must have been some kind of time constraint on S1 from Sega. Shenmue was going to be the Dreamcast 'killer app' and they couldn't wait forever to release it. At least, Sega would have wanted it released before PS2 launched in japan.

[Zoltor]

I don't know. I think it's true that there was basically no limit on the amount of money Am2 could spend on Shenmue but there certainly must have been some kind of time constraint on S1 from Sega. Shenmue was going to be the Dreamcast 'killer app' and they couldn't wait forever to release it. At least, Sega would have wanted it released before PS2 launched in japan.

Originally Shenmue 1 was suppose to come out at launch, which Yu overshot a bit. I guess it is possible that even though it wasn't ready at launch, Sega could've have still been pressuring Yu to get it out as soon as possible, so that could very well be the reason.

[Chaikilla]

I don't know the exact reasons but I can't help but think that a bike would have been more useful in Shenmue 2. Maybe I'm just lazy ;/

[Yokosuka]

Wasn't the official reason that the bike would have massively perverted the main gameplay and the Ryo trademark representation ?

[Amir]

I can imagine parking it would have been a problem, too. What would happen if you left your bike in the middle of Dobuita overnight? Would it be in the same place the next day? Would someone nick it? Would people give you shit for leaving your bike in the middle of the street? It's not like GTA: San Andreas where you can just nick another bike... The vehicle-like control scheme for Ryo makes a bit more sense, though (unless they had a different control scheme for the bike, like tapping A to go faster or something).

[Zoltor]

Isn't the official reason was because the bike would have massively perverted the main gameplay and the Ryo trademark representation ?

I could so see that as a point, except if that was a factor at all, why was it being planned to be added to the game, to beginwith. Surely Yu knew such would speed things up a tad+ have the side effect of causing players not to talk to NPCs as much as they would otherwise, because they are on a bike.

[Yokosuka]

Yu said for Shenmue 3 that the most difficult part in developing process is trying new things and don't know the exact result. So I suppose they became aware of the issue at the last moment. Because they even not tried to include it in Shenmue 2. I imagine also the loading as a point, it could have got on the player nerves to be stopped each 10 seconds.

[Switch]

I see they had even built a bike shed in Dobuita where Ryo could leave his bike.


By the way, listening to Yu's words in the GDC video, he says "I wanted to put it (the bicycle) into Shenmue, but we ran into various problems and gave up on it". So he was just a touch more specific than the interpreter's version.