Shenmue III

Being a Shenmue fan is hard. It is a niche franchise that routinely is the punching bag in the media. If you look at Kotaku you'll have Jason Schreier calling you "crazy." If you look at Vice you will be met with the pronouncement that your favorite franchise "was always bad." Go to YouTube and you will be met with Sterling, Yahtzee, Dunkey, and former-fan-turned-rabid-hater SuperEyepatchWolf bashing it. The media, and gaming community in general, loves to hate Shenmue. So why do I love it? What is it about this niche franchise that has held my heart all these years? 1) It is a love letter to martial arts, especially Chinese martial arts. 2) It makes every experience a memorable one, especially with regards to NPCs. 3) It allows you total freedom to explore every nook and cranny of a map lovingly crafted for exploration. 4) It demands that you slow down and savor it. 5) It ultimately is a game series with heart, earnestly and humbly offering you an experience unlike any other franchise. So, all that said, what about the much-maligned third installment? Honestly, having played through multiple times, it is everything I wanted. Is every part of the game perfect? No, but especially when you consider how this game almost never came to exist, that it took 18 years and so much love to create, it is a crowning achievement. This game is scrappy, it doesn't have the major budget like the first two. That makes it even more impressive. I love that Yu Suzuki, a visionary of the medium, stuck to his guns. This game, storywise, is ultimately about Ryo and Shenhua. It is about what binds them. The story was never supposed to be completed in 3 installments, so I feel heightened expectations caused some of the sour notes among fans. Those that say there is no story missed the story play out each day. There is a story to see, you just need to be open to it's presence. It rewards patience and curiousity. This game? It is a third Shenmue. And that is a wonderful thing.

This is a great game and it was a joy to return to the world of Shenmue after nearly two decades. I strongly recommended the entire Shenmue series to anyone interested. Take your time as you make your way through all the side activities for the most enjoyable experience.

If you liked Shenmue 1 and 2, you'll like this. Now, if you liked the COMBAT in Shenmue 1 and 2, you'll hate this. The overall experience is nice enough to warrant a middle review, but this game should've been better.

I have played Shenmue I and II when they came out originally on Dreamcast and I gladly revisit Shenmue II every couple of years. The games may have aged a lot, but the second part still holds up and carries lots of nostalgia for me. Shenmue III is like playing a parody of the first two games. The whole game is about finding Shenhua's kidnapped father - who, originally, pretty much left of his own volition, even writing a mysterious farewell-letter. Shenmue III ignores one of the most surprising moments of the series (a magically floating sword), never talks about why it's floating and turns it into a key in a series of "find lock then find key then find lock then find key" missions. Nothing in this game progresses the main story, the ending literally puts Ryo back to where he was at the beginning. The final boss fight is a joke and an insult to Ryo's character progression. Art styles clash, with some NPCs looking extremely cartoony, like they came out of a 3D Street Fighter. Overworld stamina management is awful, the combat system is worse than ever and the Arcade mini games are a sad imitation, especially the "Virtua Fighter" clone. The worst thing is the money stopgaps. Every chapter of this game has one moment where Ryo has to gather ridiculous amounts of cash to buy an item to progress the plot. This takes either hours of grinding QTE mini games or save scumming through gambling mini games. It's just no fun at all. The music is good, but much of it is a recycle from previous games, sometimes using character-specific themes completely out of context. The only original saving grace Shenmue III has is the environmental art. I feel sorry for the people who created intricated, lovely environments that got wasted on this sad sequel to a legendary franchise. Played this on Steam.

I've now played all three Shenmue games and this is the worst by a good amount. Lets start with some good stuff. Music, good. Graphics, not great but matches Shenmue overall feel. More ways to get money. I'm also going to give a tip to the new players, gather herbs and toys to make easy money, make sure to do some save scumming on the toys and you'll never have to gamble. If you're going to gamble, frog and turtle races are the easiest to work around. Lets get to the nitty gritty now. Story, its ok at best and a waste of time at worst, it does actually add stuff to the overall lore just no where near as much as you'd want. Combat is by far the worst change and might be one of the worst combat systems ever. You hit the face buttons to do moves and a combo of that to do more complicated moves (you can also hit the right should buttons to quickly do a selection of 5 more complex moves). The problem is that there is a delay to everything you do, timing attacks can be a complete crap shoot and a lot of the time, the AI can just block or walk past those moves. Also no throws, at all, Ryo's main martial art is Jujitsu. You know, a martial that is based around locks and throws. This also leads into another combat system problem, AI can just block forever while you can't, you can't overcome the block in anyway. you just have to back up and hope they'll whiff an attack or won't block. The real question is, is this game worth your time? The anwser is only if you really want more Shenmue, it still feels like Shenmue except for the combat. If this is the first time you're hearing of the series, this game sure as hell isn't going to win you over. If you need the story for closure purposes, watch a lets play or something.