Deep Silver investment speculation thread

[Vitoner]

Hello everyone! I'm a long time lurker on this forum, member of the Shenmue 500k FB group and one of the admins for the only Italian FB group dedicated to Shenmue.

I have posted the following on Shenmue 500k as well since I'd like to gauge as many opinions as possible.

In the recent interview with Dengeki Online (thanks phantomriverstone.com for the translation), Suzuki has stated that thanks to the Deep Silver investment the second area of the game (Choubu) will be 3 times bigger than previously anticipated, becoming "open world-like".
During the Kickstarter campaign Suzuki stated in the Reddit AMA that for a true open world experience he'd need $10M, so I think it's safe to assume that the total development budget is under this figure, since the area will be open world-LIKE.
In the KS campaign the stretch goals to expand the Choubu area above the bare minumum go from $8M to $9.5M.

So...
1) We don't know if the Deep Silver funds will contribute to the development "in stretch goal order", but it's safe to assume this is a possibility since Suzuki has said he has planned Shenmue 3 to be scalable according to the budget and the KS stretch goal could b considered his road map for the project.
If the DS funds do contribute "in stretch goal order", it means that we may have reached the $7M and $7.5M stretch goals too, expanding the battle system.

2) In the following calculations I have subtracted more or less 30% from the KS stretch goals' amounts, money that was meant to pay backer rewards and KS fees during the campaign and shouldn't be considered in the development cost.
All the following calculations are based on the money that is (was?) still needed to unlock the stretch goals after the already reached $6.7M mark (as of 31st July, 2017).
To expand Choubu 3 times (taking in consideration only the first 3 stretch goals of the 5 that read "Choubu area expanded"), Ys Net needs $1.400.000.
If we consider all 5 stretch goals up to $9.5M, Ys Net needs $2.1M.
Lastly, if we don't consider the $7M and $7.5M "Battle system expanded" stretch goals, we have to subtract $700.000 from the total amount.
So, Deep Silver could have invested from $700.000 up to $2.100.000 in the development of Shenmue 3.

3) In this investment range, the possible additional unlocked features are as follows (of course we can't know if it's all or neither of them, this is all speculation):

CHOUBU EXPANSION
Choubu area expanded 3 times - This is what Suzuki stated in the interview I mentioned before, so this is the only confirmed fact. However, there are 5 stretch goal named "Choubu area expanded" and we don't know how many of them fall under that "3 times". The first 3? All of them? Only Ys Net knows for now.
These stretch goals are as follows...
(1 of 5) Minigames x4
(2 di 5) Betting games x4
(3 of 5) Kung-Fu Mastery
(4 of 5) Part time job
(5 of 5) Game stalls

BATTLE SYSTEM EXPANSION
- Expansion w/ AI Battling
- Expansion w/ High Ground Battle System

What do you guys think? Is my math sound? I hope I haven't embarassed myself with shitty calculations... I'm hungover from a surprise drinking night with an old school buddy and I suck at math in general

[Valascaziel]

Biggest indicator is if, in future interviews they talk about Bailu. If it is mentioned as ALSO being expanded, we'll have a better idea.

[Enigma]

I'm going to assume that all of the stretch goals have been met. There were so many interviews put out this week but I think I recall in one of them that the project has now expanded BEYOND the Kickstarter. (Hope I did in fact read that and didn't dream it.) So I'm well hyped about that!

What I'd really like to know is if the investment has made Shenmue 4 any more secure in any way: either the separate project receiving a bit of preliminary funding (not sure if they're thinking of long-term franchise investment and milking sequels already) or if Shenmue 3 DLC packs are now being planned to deliver us more of the 11 chapters?

[elfshadowreaper]

I think Deep Silver must have been very impressed with what they saw concerning the development of Shenmue 3. They see this as a big investment in their own brand and want to be a part of something as big as Shenmue 3 could be. In order to secure the publishing deal they likely offered to invest more than just publishing the game. This is all speculation of course but everything seems very, very positive for Shenmue 3 and the series as a whole.

[mjq jazz bar]

I don't think there's any use in being dogmatic about that chart. They were already adding features above and beyond the chart before they even opened up the Slacker Backer. There's no question they've raised more than what they got from crowdfunding.