Shenmue: The Movie Remastered

[BlueMue]

It's here!

phpBB [video]

Media coverage

http://metro.co.uk/2016/06/03/fan-remasters-shenmue-the-movie-into-5-hour-long-epic-5921456/
http://www.hardcoregamer.com/2016/06/03/shenmue-the-movie-gets-fan-made-remaster/209928/
http://agetimes.net/tech/gaming/fan-remasters-shenmue-the-movie-into-5-hour-long-epic/
http://www.gametoppc.com/2016/06/gaming-fan-remasters-shenmue-movie-into.html
http://hu.ign.com/shenmue/13059/news/eld-at-ujra-a-shenmue-filmet
http://www.polygon.com/2016/6/4/11858558/shenmue-the-movie-high-definition-full-version
http://www.gameplane.de/shenmue-remaster-von-shenmue-the-movie-veroeffentlicht/
http://n4g.com/news/1914461/shenmue-remaster-of-shenmue-the-movie-published
http://www.gamecrate.com/shenmue-movie-gets-proper-fan-remake/13744?hootPostID=738c94624bee5a411c809e8cb0751b4b
http://www.rebelgamer.de/2016/06/seht-euch-hier-shenmue-the-movie-in-high-definition-an/53376
http://n4g.com/news/1914461/shenmue-remaster-of-shenmue-the-movie-published?info=true

Old OP contents

I am pleased to present to you the trailer for my recently begun project-

Shenmue: The Movie Remastered

phpBB [video]

I've always been disappointed by the original, and although I understand that they had run time and disc space limitations to work with, I felt that Shenmue: The Movie wasn't an adequate experience. I decided just a few days ago that with the power of modern emulation, I could remake Shenmue: The Movie the way I felt it should have been done, and in 1080p this time.


I'm happy with how the trailer turned out, but keep in mind that not all of the footage you see here is final. Certain parts of the game have given me some trouble, for example the "microstutter" you probably noticed in the Yokosuka harbor scene. I'm hoping to get every second of the 3-5 hour long finished product as perfect as possible.
Edit: Fixed the stutter in the harbor cutscene and uploaded a new version of the trailer (embedded above).

"Can I help?"

Absolutely! However, I will be doing all of the recording and editing myself to keeps things easier and more consistent. What I will need that I'm not sure I can do myself (not very well, at least), is assets like title and ending cards, a custom thumbnail, and probably a new font too. The one by David Brown that I used is nice, but it doesn't support numbers, so I couldn't use it for the intro text or credits. Besides these sorts of things, I'm completely open to any advice, compliments, or criticisms anyone has. This is about creating the best remake possible, not my ego.


As said in the trailer, I'd like to give a big thanks to BlueMue for his advice while I was recording this; David Brown for the Shenmue font he created which I used at the end of the video; Esppiral, Masterchan777, and Sappharad for creating the awesome Shenmue I&II Auto Fixer; and the entire Demul team for making such a fantastic emulator.


Thanks for watching and reading! I'd love to hear your thoughts!

[Jibby]

Here is a better version of the subtitle font file that was posted to 500k a while ago (it supports numbers and punctuation).
Can't remember who made it, but all credit goes to them:
https://mega.nz/#!XF01jJiQ

[Mr357]

Here is a better version subtitle font file that was posted to 500k a while ago (it supports numbers and punctuation).
Can't remember who made it, but all credit goes to them:
https://mega.nz/#!XF01jJiQ

It requires a password. Do you know it or who to get it from?

[Jibby]

Here is a better version subtitle font file that was posted to 500k a while ago (it supports numbers and punctuation).
Can't remember who made it, but all credit goes to them:
https://mega.nz/#!XF01jJiQ

It requires a password. Do you know it or who to get it from?

Oh, sorry, I've never uploaded to mega before. This should work:
https://mega.nz/#!XF01jJiQ!jLikh3-cm4Da ... ueLeBaqJF0

[BlueMue]

I applaud you for taking on this task. It's a massive effort to get all the scenes together.
For a long time I've been thinking of doing something like this myself, but I never got a large enough urge to start it.

If you need some advice or help with modifications that could be needed just let me know.

[FlagshipFighter]

Cool, funny thing is I always found the shenmue movie to be lacklustre with the cuts in story/detail, yet my sister and nephew loved it at the time, so it still must've retained something good (at the time I remember thinking the gameplay/pace was very important part of the experience because I like that aspect of living every waking moment of his life. And it was that that I wished the movie did better.

Which has me thinking. Instead of doing a 3-5hr epic, how about adopting an episodic format? Perhaps that would be really interest for shenmue, and gives you a more succinct experience with plenty of minutiae as well.

Plus you and/or others can work on this in bitesize chunks, and maybe releasing each episode as you develop the next. I think this has great potential to attract new fans as well imo.


Sent from my C6603 using Tapatalk

[FlagshipFighter]

Which has me thinking. Instead of doing a 3-5hr epic, how about adopting an episodic format? Perhaps that would be really interest for shenmue, and gives you a more succinct experience with plenty of minutiae as well.

That's a good idea, but I'd like to keep it as Shenmue: The Movie. If I did end up splitting it, I'd probably do three episodes (one per disc).

Edit: I found out what was causing that annoying stutter. It wasn't the emulator as I had suspected, but rather my recording settings. There were a couple of options that I thought didn't make a difference, but turning them off seems to have fixed it.

Double edit: Updated the OP with a fixed version of the trailer.

phpBB [video]

[Jibby]

Looking good so far! I can potentially do titles and end cards when the time for them comes if you like?

[ShenGCH]

Awesome! Really looking forward to seeing the finished work, man

If you're looking for someone to rework the subtitles from the original, I'd be happy to chip in. The grammar and such isn't exactly the best job out there.

[Mr357]

Looking good so far! I can potentially do titles and end cards when the time for them comes if you like?

That would great! At this point I don't what I'd want it to look like though. I was thinking of opening with the Shenhua prologue, then having a custom "title screen" per se that's similar to the original (the one I used as the thumbnail for the trailer), but obviously it would say Shenmue: The Movie. If it were animated that would be amazing, but a static background would be enough, and I could chroma key a flashing "press start" prompt over it. Immediately after that would be the iconic opening cutscene at the dojo.

Awesome! Really looking forward to seeing the finished work, man

If you're looking for someone to rework the subtitles from the original, I'd be happy to chip in. The grammar and such isn't exactly the best job out there.

Do you mean in-game? I haven't been using them so far, and I don't plan to. International subs for YouTube would be sweet though.

[Jibby]

That would great! At this point I don't what I'd want it to look like though. I was thinking of opening with the Shenhua prologue, then having a custom "title screen" per se that's similar to the original (the one I used as the thumbnail for the trailer), but obviously it would say Shenmue: The Movie. If it were animated that would be amazing, but a static background would be enough, and I could chroma key a flashing "press start" prompt over it. Immediately after that would be the iconic opening cutscene at the dojo.

I could easily do an animated version of the title screen, including a "Press Start" prompt. Just let me know when you want me to start on it and if there is anything else you want added to it! There's obviously no rush, so feel free to think of some more ideas. Feel free to PM me and hopefully I'll be able to get it exactly how you want it.

[Sappharad]

You mention the auto-fixer that Masterchan777 wrote, but it doesn't look like you're actually using it so everything is stretched out in the trailer. Is that intentional? Will the final be 16x9, or will you be letterboxing it at 4x3?

I've actually wanted to recreate some of the Shenmue 2 trailers in 1080p widescreen using a similar approach, but my primary machine is pretty old at this point so I can't capture video smoothly with it. If you get a good flow going that works well for capturing the first game, I'd love to know more about your setup.

[Mr357]

You mention the auto-fixer that Masterchan777 wrote, but it doesn't look like you're actually using it so everything is stretched out in the trailer. Is that intentional? Will the final be 16x9, or will you be letterboxing it at 4x3?

I've actually wanted to recreate some of the Shenmue 2 trailers in 1080p widescreen using a similar approach, but my primary machine is pretty old at this point so I can't capture video smoothly with it. If you get a good flow going that works well for capturing the first game, I'd love to know more about your setup.

I never would have noticed if you hadn't pointed it out. The stretching is pretty subtle, in my opinion. The problem is, even with the tool there's still flickering near the edges. Unless I can fix that, I'll probably just stick with the stretched 16:9.

Edit: As a result of this epiphany, I've added a poll for the aspect ratio to the OP.

[Mr357]

Here's what the opening cutscene looks like with the Auto Fixer on. Ignore the frame dips and audio distortions; I always throw out recordings that have those.

phpBB [video]

[Esppiral]

Since characters no longer clip aoutside the 4x3 area I would recomend using the autofixer for Shenmue I, for Shenmue 2 there is no such a problem, the game won't clip (the hack behaves differently/better on real hardware though)