The Kanagawa Prefecture in Japan and the Guilin area in China share something in common, a bond that unites these places, not only with each other, but with over a million players from around the world. A bond defined not by its commercial success but by its artistic triumph, an undertaking of such epic scale that the dream was matched only by its extravagant budget and yet, despite being technically seen as a colossal failure, not really. there may be another. way of considering it except in contradictory terms. He has touched the lives of many, defined them as people as much as he would his hobbies, and in doing so has created the most passionate and fervent community on the planet. Of course, I’m talking about Yu Suzuki’s amazing Shenmue.
In the late 1990s, Yu Suzuki set out to move video games forward once again. Shenmue was originally in development for Sega’s brilliant but much-maligned Saturn console, but the focus turned to next-gen hardware and the many possibilities it would offer them. Coining the term FREE (Full Reactive Eyes Entertainment), Suzuki set out to deliver a level of freedom unprecedented in gaming, a fully realized world of day/night cycles, realistic weather, complex AI, and full voice acting even for non-playable players. . characters. A world that would also simulate other aspects of reality, from playing games to working one day. Shenmue was never going to be something you played, but rather lived, and in that sense, it was a glorious success.
While at its core, the story is a fairly simple tale of revenge straight out of a kung-fu movie, but this is also part of its inherent charm and beauty, ably assisted by the incredible Virtua Fighter-style combat mechanics and the amazing speed. events, Shenmue set the unquestionable standard by which all other open-world games must be judged. RPGs have always offered character progression, it’s key to the genre, but none have felt as personal as this one, it wasn’t just Ryo Hazuki’s character that grew stronger as the game progressed, it was also the player. They almost literally stepped into the protagonist’s shoes to make his quest for revenge his journey, and that’s why the second game’s endlessly suspenseful ending has been so colossally devastating to anyone touched by this masterpiece.
The case for an HD remaster of the Shenmue series is an open and shut case for me, not only is it a vital piece of gaming history, but it’s a work of undeniable beauty and power, and it’s only through the markets. from PlayStation Network and Xbox Live Arcade that there may be some hope for a revival of these classic games, but also for a future for the series. For far too long, they have survived on the fringes of the gaming industry, residing under the “cult”, but now it’s time for them to earn their place in the spotlight for all the right reasons.
The Dreamcast install base amounted to around only 10 million users, but between Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3, there are over 170 million consoles shipped worldwide, there is a huge volume of gamers eagerly awaiting the arrival of something that It will demand your attention, and it will. While the fanbase clamors for a third entry in the series to complete Ryo Hazuki’s story (or at least extend it), a more likely option for Sega is to go with the more profitable HD versions of Shenmue and Shenmue 2. These are not They will not only delight fans old and new alike, but also give us hope. Hope for a future for a series that once seemed dead in the water, hope that one day we may find ourselves with the opportunity to complete our epic journey, and hope for an industry that has found itself bereft of creativity. Shenmue came as a breath of fresh air once, and it may be again.
In the many years since, I have yet to experience anything close to Shenmue, it is something so unique and rare that I have chosen to conclude this with a quote that might be why it should be remade better than I could, as well as Virginia Woolf he wrote in The Waves: “These fugue moments are not to be scorned. They happen very rarely.” And indeed they do.