Do you think Shenmue 3 should keep its original graphics?

[asdfguy]

Do you think Yu Suzki should make Shenmue 3 look like Shenmue 1 and 2. I saw the new screenshot of Shenmue 3 and, in my honest opinion, it looks rather poor. I know it's early screen shot, but it still looks quite bad. I really loved how the original Shenmue looked and I don't like the direction Shenmue 3 is headed.



Here's what I mean.


Shenmue 1

[Spaghetti]

We're about 14 years removed from the Dreamcast technologically. Even if they wanted to do a retro look, it would be impossible to get it exactly the same.

Give it time. The Shenmue feel is still there, but clearly the graphics are nowhere near final. It's a prototype. Very early versions of Shenmue didn't look like the game we got in the end either. Yu has already said they haven't captured the look of Guilin in the trees, rocks, vegetation, etc.

[Yokosuka]

At the moment, I'm only a bit afraid about the lack of singularity in the aesthetic.
The screenshot with the rain reminded me Vanishing of Ethan Carter (or the background from a modern old-school Resident Evil). Looks like the threes are placeholders by the way, too European for me.

[Shenhua-Nani?]

Calm down, it's way too early to judge the game's feel and graphics.

And to answer the topic i would be ok with old Shenmue graphics in HD, but it's impossible.

[FlagshipFighter]

The screenshot looks great to me, only thing that seems weird to me is that Ryo kinda looks like he's levitating... but this is absolutely astonishing progress made so far! No complaints whatsoever!

I was a little worried about this game after all the awesomejapan pallava tbh but this has restored my faith, so I best get around to making my second donation soon... :-)

[AnimeGamer183]

Absolutely not. If its actually going to be relevant and have a chance to make some kind of splash this day and age, there is no way it can keep its original graphical style, visual style and art direction? Sure, but we cant just throw Dreamcast graphics on it because we are anxious about what the final version will look like.

This is like saying I would rather have the Project Berkley/Saturn footage graphics instead of the Dreamcast graphics just for nostalgia's sake/playing it safe. Just one being renownding NOOOPPPEEEE.

[killthesagabeforeitkillsu]

Compare Shenmue's 2 Guilin to Shenmue's 3 Guilin. There is no point in using city environments as examples.




I don't see the point in going for squared grass if you can do it better... they just need a warmer color pallet.
To me the main issue continues to be Ryo's and Shenhua's faces/body models.

[Snakiest]

Either is fine with me. Who cares. As long as it is Ryo and his goddamn story.

In Yu we trust.

[BlueMue]

I think by this point it's kinda pointless to think about if Yu Suzuki is interested in keeping the original graphics.

The screenshots we got so far have already established that he is going for new graphics and a new look with more emphasis on real time lighting. I do hope that look will become more in line with the tone that Shenmue II set.
The interior shot of that Bailu village hut we got a while back definately had a lot of this charme already.

[murdiaries]

I love the saturated colors dreamcast had, altough we may enquire if that was a choice or a compromise Yu had to settle with DC textures.

[KidMarine]

I wonder if some fans will do a Dreamcast mod for it...

[murdiaries]

Just the fact it will be on PC and UE4 will make thigs nice for modders. Sure, we can also suggest Yu about making the palette more saturated but isn't abit too early?

[mjq jazz bar]

No.

[nevski]

I agree, the three pictures that were delivered yesterday lack in There is far more authenticity and atmosphere in the first two screenshot you posted. I mean I, personnaly, wouldn't guess this is a 15-year-old creation.

More than any other game I've played, what Shenmue was able to capture through its artistic direction was this "authenticity feel". In my opinion, this was achieved through developping a world that is huge by its intimacy. The accuracy of the world of Shenmue is encapsulated on how it managed to be grandiose both in the macro and micro-scale. I think the success of this gesture is to be found in how the multitude of detail helps in making the whole picture the most coherent, and not the other way around.
To be honest, I already find there is a gap between Shenmue I and Shenmue II, as far as this particular thing is at stake.

Now, there are many factors that can explain such a gap between Shenmue (I-II) and these pics of what Shenmue III could be.

- 1st, like others have been saying, the change in the scenery.
Artistically, we've gone from a quite interior/private kind of dialectics to a very open/rural/wide one: Shenmue's narrative was all huddled up in a very urban and intimate small town atmosphere. Patchwork-y (look at the architecture, the variety of people you could meet) but in the same time very consistent. There was this feeling of "texture" in all meanings of the term. (look at the dirty brick texture of the walls of Sakuragaoka)

But the direction the story has taken forced this to change. Already in Hong-Kong/Kowloon, the richness of the districts and the will to keep it as detailed as possible was a little too ambitious in a sense and contributed to make it less and less "authentic" i guess.
But this is particularly stiking in Guilin at the end of SII. Very rural, very open, but at the same time, very generic, apersonal, and, in a sense, empty. Maybe the direction artistic was not really fitted for this part of the game.

- Now, maybe this is intentional, and maybe there is no way to portray such a rural wrold any better in a video game (I can't recall any "good" example). Maybe, this is the feel you get when you're in a pre-alpha phase of development. But as I said, Guilin was particular even in SII, so I don't really know...

Also, it's important to bear in mind that this "original" Shenmue graphic feel was strongly supported both by the cinematic direction (camera angles, narration) and the exceptional music and sound direction. This is something that was critically well done in the original series. And I'm afraid this is something that will lack in SIII, given the information we got until now. But again, it is very soon to be partial.

Sorry for the long post! :/ this is just what I have in mind, and I hope this will evolve in a good way.

P.S. Please excuse my English i'm a non-native speaker

[Let's Get Sweaty]

For those who seem to think Suzuki's forgotten what the "feel" of Shenmue is, just cast your minds back to his interview with DualShockers in September:

What dictated the choice of Unreal Engine 4 for the game?

YS: It was the portrayal of colors, the shaders and the rendering engine. They’re close to the image I have for the world of Shenmue III. Unreal Engine 4 allows me to portray what I think the humidity and the smell of the world should be. If you see a scene in the desert, you will feel the dry air of the desert. I feel that I can bring those abstract qualities of climate and atmosphere to life using Unreal Engine 4.

Remember that what we're seeing in these preview screenshots is still the product of only a few months' actual development.