Shenmue: Through the Ages
Take a journey through Yu Suzuki's epic series as we look at the past, present and possible future of Shenmue.
by Patrick Kolan, IGN AU




Australia, August 7, 2007 - Yu Suzuki, Sega's equivalent to Nintendo's Shigeru Miyamoto (though, arguably not nearly as influential outside of Japan) had big dreams. After kicking off the Hang On racing series and reinventing fighting games with Virtua Fighter, he imagined a fully interactive world with persistent people going about their lives while the whole world turned and your character led his life and progressed through a gripping story.

Initially, the idea hinged around the Virtua Fighter universe, and the character of Akira. This project slowly evolved from a Sega Saturn-era Virtua Fighter RPG into a preliminary high-concept experiment, dubbed 'Project Berkley', led by Sega-AM2.

With Saturn dying and Dreamcast on the horizon, the project was shifted to Sega's new platform and the idea of 'Full Reactive Eyes Entertainment' - which forms a crazy acronym, 'FREE', was introduced. Yu Suzuki promised a fully-realised cityscape populated by people going about their business and life in a realistic manner. Seasons would pass, weather effects would affect gameplay and you had to earn a living in order to survive. It sounded almost too far-reaching and fundamentally amazing to be true - and in some ways, it was.



Ryo Hazuki, Shenmue hero and Nelly impersonator.



The budget on this adventurous project blew out; development ended up costing US$70 Million dollars to create the original game - an unprecedented amount for that time (and still one of the most expensive games ever made), with some of that presumably going into Shenmue II and perhaps the groundwork for III. Parts one and two were finally released on Dreamcast (Shenmue II was released on Xbox) to critical praise but only lukewarm sales. Hilariously, every Dreamcast owner would've needed to buy two copies of the first game for Sega to break even, thanks to the console's limited install base. Needless to say, that didn't happen.



The Story: Shenmue

Ryo Hazuki- originally based on Akira from Virtua Fighter - is the sole playable character in both Shenmue titles. The first Shenmue tells chapter one of the saga, while Shenmue two covers chapters two to six. 16 chapters were originally envisioned.

The game is set in September of 1986, which would've made Ryo 18 - since Akira's stated birth date is 1968 according to the original Virtua Fighter, (which came out in 1993, when Akira was apparently 25). Ryo's father, a martial artist, is murdered by the mysterious Lan Di in the Hazuki family dojo. Ryo tries to stop him and discovers that the reason behind his father's demise centres on a sacred artefact - the Dragon Mirror, which is now in Lan Di's posession.



A lot of Shenmue involved lateral thinking and investigating leads.
It was thoroughly entertaining adventure fare.



As Ryo gives chase to Lan Di, he must investigate the lead-up to the incident by talking to the people of his hometown of Yokosuka and keep his eyes open for the Phoenix Mirror - essentially the sister mirror of the Dragon Mirror. The game's biggest innovation was the extent of interactivity and detail crammed into the towns in the game - pushed to a heretofore unheard of level. People's lives did, to a point, operate to a schedule and the streets, shipyards and towns were crammed with locations. However, the game ultimately did not achieve the massive scale originally promised, with many areas feeling rather claustrophobic, thanks to invisible walls and a lot of fake doorways and dead-ends.

Ryo crosses paths with his first love interest, childhood friend Nozomi Harasaki. Of course, with Ryo so focussed on finding Lan Di, it is clear that nothing is going to happen between them and she eventually leaves for Canada. Master Chen, a friendly harbour worker and martial artist, also becomes a central figure to the story, eventually prompting you to find a key character in Hong Kong.

The first game ends with a brief confrontation with Lan Di as he's boarding a boat to Hong Kong, and an impressive 70-man battle with the Mad Angels gang, where you team up with Guizhang, an ally of yours.

Shenmue introduced a few cool concepts - Free Quest, the central free-roaming adventure; Free Battle, the game's multi-character confrontations allowed for a VF-like combo system of upgradeable moves. The game was also responsible for the resurgence in the popularity of quick-time events (QTE), essentially interactive cutscenes requiring timed button presses and stick-directions - later adopted by many an action game, including God of War and Resident Evil 4.

The Story: Shenmue II

Set in 1987 and kicking off in Hong Kong (and wholly glossing over the second chapter of the story - originally intended to take place on the ship that carries Ryo across the seas), chapters three through six continue Ryo's search for Lan Di. You start off in the port, where you soon run into another key character - Master Chen's contact in Hong Kong, the gorgeous Master Lishao Tao, a.k.a. Xiuying Hong - the copper-haired 26-year-old beauty.

Of course, things are never simple and she refuses to aid him in his quest for revenge. Instead, she takes a passive role and keeps an eye out for him along the way. Wuying Ren, the leader of The Heavens gang, steps up and helps Ryo out instead, essentially propelled by greed over the presumed value of another sacred mirror - the Phoenix Mirror, which is linked to the Dragon Mirror from the first game.



Ryo and Shenhua during Shenmue II's end sequence.



Eventually, Ryo tracks down a friend of his father, who warned Hazuki-senior about his impending death, in Kowloon. There are confrontations that result in his kidnapping by a hired gang under the influence of Lan Di.

Ryo manages to save him before he falls into Di's hands and he provides him with information about the two mirrors, which, when combined, will resurrect an ancient order, known as the Qing Dynasty. That's a bad thing, apparently.

Towards the end of the game, Ryo finally meets Ling Shenhua, a young girl in a white jumper, seen in Ryo's dreams for the first time in the first Shenmue. Her background involves her upbringing surrounded by nature and is seen exerting influence over forces of nature - something that's been hinted at in conceptual art and at the end of Shenmue II. In Shenmue II, Ryo finally meets her in Bailu Village, where she is imprisoned. Apparently, their meeting was predestined and will ultimately change the course of their lives.

She is linked inextricably to the mirrors and, as they travel into the mountains together, they come across a sacred sword which Ryo combines with the Phoenix Mirror. This triggers a strange cliffhanger cutscene of the sword floating in midair - and thus, the game ends.

http://xbox360.ign.com/articles/811/811423p1.html

[ 本帖最后由 cangying 于 2007-8-9 17:56 编辑 ]

传到IGN了

SEGA是否还是以前那个SEGA。。。唉，我看是回不去了，大川功死了以后，SEGA魂已经丢了。

哇靠的咧！！又湿了一回。。

太希望是真的了！！！望眼欲穿啊！！！

dubbed 'Project Berkley', led by Sega-AM2

很好！

莎木3先放边上
要是莎木1-2增强版，我觉得没有什么不可能
第一张图也是莎木2里的场景。好像画面确实有些增强

看完原文得出一个结论：老外跟我们一样喜欢YY

这莎木可是属于的烂尾game了，多好的一个游戏啊，大门赶快行动啊

莎木系列还有多少商业价值呢？我觉得不多了啊

我等莎3从初中等到现在......6年了...唉.....

IGN 也愛yy。前幾天才有一篇sega 相關訪談，說莎木系列大家可以忘了它了。

以現在的狀況SEGA還有力製作沙木3嘛?

希望消息是真的

引用:

原帖由 莎木 于 2007-8-9 18:22 发表
希望消息是真的

苦主都来了，何来复活一说，肯定是真的了。。。。

[ 本帖最后由 jimmao 于 2007-8-9 18:26 编辑 ]

Shiningforce正统续作
Daytona USA续作
莎木续作怨念啊

有XO必有PS3