http://www.1up.com/news/shenmue-hd-help-shenmue-iii-chances

I'm not that hopeful about Shenmue III coming out, or even if one is released that it would resemble the old Shenmue games in essential ways, but I think the Shenmue I+II HD releases are very possible, even likely (at least for one of them to be re-released, but I hope both).

If Sega's Shenmue HD rumors are true, I hope they do release PC versions as they have with the other Dreamcast ports and furthermore, it would be killer if SEGA were added to GOG.com's roster with DRM-free Shenmue I+II. That would just be so great - I really think many open-minded adventure gamers that haven't played it would truly appreciate it, because the essence of the games really is in the spirit of the adventure genre (in my opinion).

I read a post somewhere else where someone felt that what drew them to the games was the well-executed sense of being a "stranger in a new world" (referring to Shenmue II) and the uncertainty and excitement which that entails, and I think I agree. Also, the games really drew you into the story -- that is, if you could get past the voice acting. And the fighting was well-executed (don't be turned off, adventure fans, it was not really the focus of the game and is very learnable even for point-and-clickers). But, I digress.

Does anyone hope for these to be released? Or at least, would any of you be curious to pick up Shenmue HD if you haven't played it and are into adventure games.

I think if Sega were to come on board, it would start out with some of the older Sega PC range titles like Virtua Cop, Daytona, Sega Rally Championship and so on, quite possibly even the Mega Drive/Genesis emulations that have been doing the rounds (they're DRM-free on GamersGate and the Steam version is install-agnostic, so why not?).

The HD remakes are unlikely to begin with I think.

Oh wow, great to hear news about this franchise. I got Shenmue II for the Xbox a couple of months ago, and I've been in a quandary about whether I should watch the movie of the first game or hope to find a second hand Dreamcast somehow ever since.
Ofcourse it's also very good to hear that it might make the third game possible.

IF Shenmue comes to PC, then all dreams can go true!

like ONI on gog.Shenmue is a legend. Great game to start with. not some arcade shooters that nobody would play. Shenmue would be a nutt-kicker game on GOG. But I rather doubr it.

You're probably right about that. I've wondered about the Mega Drive/Genesis games coming to GOG.com too, considering the DRM-free GamersGate releases. I guess they'd have to either introduce new prices (i.e. 2.99 for a Genesis game) or they'd release some games with higher prices but most in 3-game bundles or something like that.

Sega does have quite a backlog of PC ports of arcade games and whatnot. I even have a Panzer Dragoon port on disc. I owned the PC version of Virtua Cop 2 back in the day, and I liked it a lot. I'd probably pick it up for a nostalgia kick. I do personally think these kind of light gun (and console) arcade shooters have aged badly, but that doesn't mean they're not good stupid fun to play now and then :-). You're crushin' my dreams, dude! ;-) I prefer to think at least one of them is _somewhat_ likely, if only because Sega would hope for hype sales.

At the very least they might put Shenmue II on XBLA but not PSN (which would suck for me as a current PS3-only owner), since as an Xbox game I'm sure it uses DirectX and might be a simpler port to the 360. (Not to mention the emulation for the original game disc works reasonably well on the 360, from past experience, so they could just release it as an Xbox Classic or whatever if they're still releasing those.)

But heck, you may be right. If so, I may just need to eventually buy a Dreamcast again! I personally watched the movie and played Shenmue II first. I don't feel like it'll ruin your experience to go in that order, since a lot of the little things that make the game fun aren't present in the recap. You'll still enjoy Shenmue I after playing the second first. Of course, it all comes down to whether you tend to regret starting in the middle of other game series after the fact :-).

I would be thrilled if they do actually announce a third game!

Shenmue IS a legend. Definitely in my top 5 games, along with Half-Life 2 and a few others.

Hey, I like arcade shooters! I see what you mean though, they don't have the same level of appeal as something like Shenmue, or as another obvious example Skies of Arcadia.

ONI... I've only ever played a demo, but Wikipedia says it was published by Gathering of Developers. So, even though Bungie developed it, maybe they didn't own the rights so Microsoft hasn't inherited them? At a glance it looks like Take-Two should own any GoD-owned properties since they acquired GoD. If that's true, I guess it's possible for it to get a release here. It does look interesting.

ONI seems to be gone forever, unfortunatelly.

As for virtua cop, I meant, they would rather start with some HUGE game like Shenmue, if they ever got Sega on board, i suppose.

Of course were talking about a case where Shenmue PC actually got released and then GOG signed with SEGA, which are both unlikely :P

Well I think I'll wait a while longer. I'm going to Denmark next month, and it'll undoubtedly become a secondhand game hunt, so who knows, I might be incredibly lucky and find a Dreamcast somewhere :p I only know that the chances of finding one here are next to zero.

But thanks for the advice, most likely I'll just watch the movie and hope for a port someday. At least I'll be keeping my eyes open now, I thought that the franchise was totally dead.

Oh, I see what you mean. That's kind of what I was thinking - if they did sign with GOG.com, it seems like Shenmue would make sense for one of the first few games to release on this site if the timing was right. It is notorious and a cult classic, after all, like many GOG.com releases.

Yeah, maybe I shouldn't get my hopes up about SEGA coming to GOG.com :-). Stranger things have happened though, and it is true that SEGA has a fair amount of DRM-free content on GamersGate. It might be more likely than Shenmue HD being released, anyway ;-).

I personally don't think it's that unlikely that Sega might come to GOG. They have a long-established policy of extensively exploiting their back catalogue (Sega Mega Drive Classics, Sega Dreamcast Collection to name two) and don't seem as hostile to DRM-ness as some publishers are.

You'll be hard-pushed to see the likes of Empire Total War come to GOG, but a lot of Sega's classic era stuff isn't unthinkable and most of the classic-era Sega stuff isn't burdened with third-party licences like EA and Activision's games.

I am surprised that GOG hasn't signed for any of Megadrive, Dreamcast classics etc. yet.... They all are in GOG price setting range...

Is that the game where you go around asking strangers about sailors?

And you feed the kitten

Yep, that's the one :) lol. And let's not forget all the forklift driving and crate-moving.

No problem :). I want to add one last thing about the Xbox version of Shenmue II. I played it on the Xbox 360 through backwards-compatibility, and many of the quick-time events are made much more difficult by the Xbox 360's mushy, inaccurate D-Pad. I can't speak for the original Xbox controller's d-pad, which may or may not be better.

A third-party controller might be an improvement. However, I did manage to finish it with a normal 360 controller. Some QTEs would be challenging with any controller, it's just that it's tricky to point in specific directions on the Xbox 360 d-pad which makes it worse than it should be, since you have to then repeat them a few times.

I hate to say something negative about one of my favorite games, but it's always helpful to be aware of the quirks ahead of time, and anyway it certainly wasn't a deal-breaker for me.