Well, neither YSNet or Deep Silver have confirmed Shenmue 3 will be at E3 yet but given how much closer we are to release now and also the decision to show off the game a few months back I'd say 3's appearance at E3 in the form of a new trailer or something is likely. I wouldn't be surprised to see footage or something dropped in Sony's conference for example given it's a major PS4 exclusive. Here's hoping.
Yea, no. Still looks bad. Yes yes I know it's from 2017. Where is his patrician jawline? Why is his face so round? He's recognizable as Ryo at least, but I'm still not satisfied.
Shenmue 1&2 will have Denuvo, and because 17 years isn't long enough to configure the game to run at 60 fps, it will run at 30. More money I won't be spending, I guess. https://store.steampowered.com/app/758330/Shenmue_I__II/ https://shenmue.sega.com/faq
I have the games on Dreamcast, so I'm good. Might look into locating the X-Box version of Shenmue II, though.
Nice to see the negativity is still here. Anyway, here are the key points: You can now save anywhere in both games (in the original Shenmue I you could only save in Ryo's room). Saves from Shenmue I can be loaded in Shenmue II as the original Dreamcast games allowed, but you will not be able to continue this save into Shenmue III (and honestly this is the biggest problem I have with the collection - I thought this was the whole point?). The Xbox version of Shenmue II is essentially the basis for both games, so you'll be able to use the control system from that in Shenmue I. The photo mode and filters from Shenmue II are confirmed for Shenmue II, but so far no information on whether these appear in Shenmue I as well. All arcade games return and are fully playable. Engine is locked to 30fps due to the original game using a framerate-dependent engine (and the engine hasn't changed). Fun fact: on Dreamcast the games were "optimised" for 50Hz by making changes to the physics values, but this was done poorly and the game still runs ~1.6% slower. Gameplay is in 16:9; cutscenes are letterboxed and appear in 4:3 where they did originally. Some textures have been improved and/or replaced, although it appears many are still using the original textures. UI has been completely replaced (although I'd argue for the worse), and platform-specific button prompts appear on-screen during QTEs. There are no audio improvements. The PC version uses Denuvo; the Xbox One and PS4 versions use their proprietary DRM as standard. Releases on August 21st, and I can't wait.
We were talking about I&II in the thread for Sega Fes 2018, but I guess this is a good a place as any to talk about that too. Here are my thoughts. The new Shenmue I&II trailer looks really nice. I've got no complaints there. Won't be buying the PC version at launch, because fuck Denuvo. Sonic Mania on PC literally takes 30 seconds just to open because of that shit and they didn't bother to remove it after the game got cracked so now you're forced to have a game inferior to what pirates get to play. (The game runs fine once loaded of course, but it eats up far more CPU than it should which makes playing on a laptop kind of suck) I may pick it up the PC version later on for modding purposes, but PS4 is my primary system so I've got it pre-ordered for that. The 30fps cap makes sense and I honestly wasn't expecting 60. On my list of things I wish they would have done, this would be the most difficult one to change. The cutscene animations are all hard-coded motions, they don't have in-between values to account for extra frames. They could interpolate the movement values and fix edge cases manually like Square-Enix did for one of their Kingdom Hearts HD Remasters, but it's too time consuming / expensive to have someone work on that based on their budget for this. That brings me to the point of the fact that they're leaving the original audio (both voices and music) intact as-is. That's what makes me think they didn't want to allocate a lot of time resources or money to the project. They still have at least some of the original high quality audio for the voice acting since they used it for Ryo in All Stars Racing, but it's possible that the archives are organized such that they have to re-splice clips to do it. There are really only two things on my wish-list that I'm disappointed they didn't do - the 'original' audio tracks and 16x9 cutscenes for the first game. All of the music for the games (with a few exceptions, like Joy's theme) was played via wavetable synthesis via compressed samples to fit their file size budget. But they still have the original high-quality streaming renders of all of the music - they used them for the cancelled Shenmue Online (which if you search YouTube you can find many tracks that were saved from there which are just reused from Shenmue 1 and 2, mostly 2) and Yu Suzuki is using some of it for Shenmue 3. He showed off a bit when he gave a talk back in 2016 about the game. Don't remember exactly which one it was, but he played a few sample tracks which happened to have the exact same numbering system that they used on the game disc for music in Shenmue 2. The lack of 16x9 for Shenmue 1 cutscenes though is the only one where I actually feel like they were just lazy. We've had proper widescreen patches for the Dreamcast version for over a year now (not to be confused with the initial attempts which had some pop-in issues that were eventually fixed) and the changes to the game required are very minimal to adjust a few parameters. Their official word on this is that the scenes weren't framed for 16x9, and they're right. But there's only a single cutscene in the entire game where anyone has pointed out NPC's out of frame that you shouldn't be seeing. That's it. Since the game has a unique ID for each cutscene that plays (you can playback individual scenes by ID via the Debug build of the Dreamcast version that was released many years ago) they can easily review every scene and just force 4x3 for the places where it doesn't work instead of everywhere. They did that for SA2's port and it was fine. It's ridiculous to me since I was responsible for the initial work on DC widescreen codes and I could literally do what I've described just now myself for the DC version via a cheat device code. They have access to the actual source code and aren't willing to do it. My other problem is that the main Shenmue community has gotten very hostile to people pointing out things they felt could have made the remasters better. With yesterday's batch of screenshots, I noticed that the lighting in dark scenes is too bright compared to the originals: http://www.sappharad.com/junk/S12_lighting1.jpg http://www.sappharad.com/junk/S12_lighting2.jpg The Ren scene stuck out to me because the whole point was that Ryo couldn't see anything in the warehouse until they turned on the truck lights, and after that the surrounding areas were still dark. It doesn't reflect the original intent of the scene if the dark warehouse is not dark anymore. When I posted about it, the result of my concern was that Peter Campell, admin of that site went on a rant about how fans are too negative and entitled and they should be grateful that Sega is re-releasing the games. I was going to tell him to fuck off, I'm pointing out a legitimate mistake that they made with the ports, but then he'd probably just ban me so I left it alone. I still have my original copies of both games and I just want to see them give the games the care they deserve, I don't think it's unreasonable to point out things they can fix. I think the real problem is that he's gotten all worked up about the people who complain about Shenmue 3 that he can't tell the difference between someone's opinion and actual legitimate concerns. Anyway, I'm looking forward to the ports either way. ======== Since we're in the Shnemue 3 thread and it hasn't been mentioned yet, surveys went out to Kickstarter backers last week. They do offer add-ons, so if someone wants both platforms they have that option. I've already submitted mine, and used the extra money that I included on my original pledge to add PC so that I'll be getting both versions. The "Slacker Backer" PayPal campaign ends on August 13th, so if for some reason someone still wants a copy and hasn't backed time is running out. I suspect that the finished game will probably be a full priced game now that Deep Silver is putting a bunch of money behind it, so this is probably the last chance to get it for less than a potential "default" price until it goes on sale after release. There was a nice video to go with the announcement of the survey, which features the little girl from the batch of screenshots earlier this year. That video has voice acting and proper motion capture, and honestly looks great to me. But I was one of those people who was satisfied with the quality of the character models from late last year, even though many people still hated them. It's highly likely at this point that we'll get a proper Shenmue 3 trailer at Gamescom in August, about 10 days after the "slacker backer" campaign closes. The fact that they're ending that and sending surveys tells me they're probably going to release in the first half of next year, but I guess wait and see.
Yeah, I saw that. There's no middle ground anywhere, it's either "everything about this is shit, how dare you mention a good thing about it" or "everything about this is great, how dare you mention a bad thing about it". I think you're right about the reasons behind it too. The original games were actually a little brighter than the shots you showed (but a lot darker than the HD shots), so that probably didn't help. I'm too lazy to set up the capture to get an exact match, but here's a shot I captured:
How about this, too? Other people have also noticed missing fog, different (missing) lighting, a crappier HUD font, issues with transparent parts in the motorcycle scene etc... Some of this stuff can't be helped just because Shenmue was on the Dreamcast, but a lot of it screams lack of effort put into the ports. I bet there's gonna be lots of people defending these downgrades and/or saying it's not a big deal - they can fuck right off. I don't think this is going to be as terrible as SADX PC was, but there seems to be quite a few things missing or broken. I hope the more sensible members of the Shenmue community fix those issues if the developers can't/aren't willing to. As long as these ports are on PC, there's always a possibility to fix them via modding. On the other hand, if they have Denuvo it may get in the way. There were rumors about Shenmue 1/2 HD being complete for years and SEGA just waiting for the right moment to release them. If those are true, it's kind of sad to see those ports being messed up. Denuvo is just icing on the cake.
What the shit. Why are they skipping this feature? Unless they can somehow patch that ability in later... I'll probably pick this up down the line once I get a PS4. I don't feel like going back to my DC copy of the first or bothering with the shenanigans of burning the sequel to a CD-R.
Ouch. Yeah, my problem was that I grabbed the frames from "Shenmue 2 The movie", a fan made video from YouTube. I used footage from it in the past to do an HD remake of the "Special Trailer" and the guy who put together that movie warned me that the YouTube upload I used initially was too dark. I made the same mistake again when using his footage to find those stills. :-( I could go and capture my own footage from hardware too, but my I'd have to do it over composite and that looks like crap. (I've got the Akura HDMI adapter for DC, but my capture hardware is 10 years old and only component & composite. I've been meaning to replace it, but was kind of holding on in hopes of something external that supports 4k60fps. They've got 4k30 devices now, so it's getting closer.) I'll dig around YouTube for someone else's hardware footage and replace the images later. Thanks for noticing. With how long those rumors have been around, there is no way they could be true. Sega contracted d3t to do the port, and the rumors have been around longer than Sega has been working with them. There's also the fact that it would be a waste of money for them to do that, especially considering how much money they lost on the game the first time around. Based on comments elsewhere about Sega being very surprised by the amount of interest this has gotten, it seems like an easier story to believe would be that the surge of new requests for ports after Shenmue 3 was announced is what probably pushed them to look into it. Sega PR said in late 2016 that they were "looking into" it, if we take that at face value, it's likely they didn't start on the ports until 2017. I don't remember where, but I had a similar reaction. I was hoping there would be some kind of payoff for collecting those few missable items from the first game that transfer into the second but have no use in the storyline yet. (I believe they were the untranslatable move scroll, one of the photos of Iwao, and the white leaf) Will they just give those items to everyone in 3, despite some players not grabbing them in the first one? Or will they be forgotten and no longer have a purpose? Aside from that, I guess there's not really a point. They probably can't transfer capsule toys again, I'm guessing most or all of the Sega branded won't be present anymore. And they're probably going to come up with another reason for you to have to earn money again, since we know there's a part time job in Bailu. Adam Koralik, Sega's new non-employee PR person for Shenmue who knows nothing about software development claimed something like it would be too difficult because they were built on completely different game engines. As an actual software engineer with an actual degree in software engineering, I'm pleased to inform you that he has no idea what he's talking about. (To his credit, he admits that he doesn't know anything. Also, I don't mean to sound like a jackass, I just thought that phrasing sounded funny when I wrote it.) Ultimately the game engine usually has nothing to do with reading a file, they can do it if they wanted to. But to that end, maybe there's no point for the toy capsule reasons. Or there could be some kind of cross-publisher restrictions on consoles to prevent one publisher's games from touching another's data. We know some PS4 games can detect save files from previous games in the same series and give you something for it, but perhaps that ability is restricted by Publisher and since Shenmue 3 isn't Sega maybe that's related.
Isn't SEGA's actual involvement in Shenmue 3 absolutely minimal, being that they're nothing except the rights-holders and licensor? I would hazard a guess that that's got something to do with it. SEGA and d3t are doing their own thing with Shenmue 1 and 2, so Ys Net won't be able to reliably support the feature. SEGA aren't even publishing Shenmue 3, with that honour instead being picked up by Deep Silver after SEGA expressed no interest in it before or after the successful Kickstarter campaign.
It could be because Shenmue III is being developed by a team separate from SEGA, so they're not talking to each other about save games crossing over? EDIT: Woop, didn't see the new page, hence the disjointed comment from the other posts.
I was initially also concerned about how the ports looked, especially II -- the original trailer they put out showed a conspicuous lack of shadows, and all the screenshots on the Steam store page seem to avoid showing the floor for this reason. But with the recent trailer, the shadows are back and the lighting actually looks pretty decent. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OE_xPfHP0dY Now my only concern is the soundtrack. The Dreamcast version applied some digital sound processing on top of the sequenced music, granting it a meaty, rich quality. The DSP was completely absent from the Xbox port though, and since they're basing the port of Shenmue II off the Xbox version, that has me worried.
Yeah, I'm quite relieved that the shadows are back for II. Also I do love the Xbox Bloom effect seems to be in Shenmue I as well now, although I wonder if it's going to be a toggle option for those who want the original look? Either way, my money's down for Day 1 Dobuita!
Someone got a response out them on social media, and Sega PR claims the bloom can be disabled: https://twitter.com/SEGA_Europe/status/1014616351229370368 Their answer for the cutscenes is weird though. Why did they zoom/crop them for the PC gaming show trailer last month, and in some of the screenshots, if the actual game doesn't let you do that? That's false advertising.
There must really be some issue with modifying any part of the cutscenes if even an option to zoom in or crop to widescreen is out of the question. Still, good news about the blur toggle! I do like the effect, but I might still want Shen 1 in non-bloom for the sake of legacy and all that.
My suspicion is that when they say they weren't framed for 16:9, that's not just a technical answer but an artistic one, and one I respect. In the TV and film industries, it's not unheard of for older shows and movies to get "uncropped" for other aspect ratios, whether it's the "Fullscreen" DVD version of a widescreen movie that was shot open matte and then cropped for theaters, like Titanic, or an HD remaster of an older TV show that aired in fullscreen but was filmed widescreen-safe, such as Scrubs. At worst, you end up with things like visible boom mics at the top of an unmasked 4:3 shot which were previously cropped in the 16:9 version. Or, in Shenmue's case, you get out-of-frame NPCs becoming visible. But even a best-case scenario, you still get action relegated to the center of the screen, making for some stupid-looking framing, and not what was originally intended. I would assume that's what they're referring to here. Not technical limitations at all, but artistic integrity.
There are several scenes where the letterbox fades away seamlessly into a 4:3 fullscreen QTE. How would you handle this if the cutscene was already fullscreen to begin with? I'm not defending their decisions, but it's easy to cry foul without having considered all the ramifications of a seemingly simple change.
I think ultimately Sega didn't allocate sufficient budget/resources to these hence why we're getting basic-level ports as opposed to what the series truly deserves. Contrast this to Yakuza for example and its bleeding edge engine and full-on Kiwami remakes which to be honest is what Shenmue deserved here as opposed to serviceable, decent-ish but disappointing bare-minimum ports. That said these remasters are selling incredibly well (top sellers on Amazon/Steam) and they haven't even been released yet so hopefully that gives Sega a shock to the system.
