There are certainly times I did NOT like it. And each day you play in-game (yes, there is an in-game clock, and you can only save at your bedside) progresses the story – generally to a satisfactory degree. The mini-games, while silly, are welcome distractions. The town you start in, and the little city you progress to, both have their own personal charm.
It is onerous to a degree that very few (if any) modern games would dare approach. You’ll also need to do the Kung Fu mini-games to improve your Stamina and Strength, and you’ll need to fight a bunch of enemies to increase your Kung Fu level in order to progress through increasingly difficult enemies. But why do you want to do all of this? Because the game forces you to need to buy a very expensive item, that’s why. Or use the capsule machines in the hope you can collect a set of toys. You absolutely WILL have to work for your cash. Not to mention the fact that cash is hard to come by. These kinds of strange design decisions, coupled with a story that is designed to frustrate, and you have a tedious RPG. Want to use that medicine you’ve just collected herbs for? Well… you can’t… you can only sell it. Want to pick up a plant to use it as medicine? Switch the UI to first person, point the reticule that appears on the screen at the herb, wait for an animation to bring your view up close and personal to the plant in question, then wait for the GUI to tell you that you can press the button to pick it up.
Shenmue 3, while graphically beautiful, is faithful to its predecessors, still including such archaic gems as lengthy discussions that can not be skipped, a lack of fast travel, a difficult to navigate (some may say virtually non-existent) map system, an unintuitive control system, and some very questionable design decisions. Perhaps a game that takes these advances into consideration, and perhaps even tries to push the boundaries once again? Now, 18 years later, players have Shenmue 3 in their hands, and what should they perhaps expect, given the multiple advances in technology and game mechanics that have occurred since? In some ways, it was just as tedious as real life. In terms of game mechanics, players could talk to virtually any NPC, shop at almost any of the shops, work, and train. Those of you that may have travelled to Japan would likely lament that Japanese towns were captured so faithfully therein. Going about your business in these towns really felt like living within these towns. Twenty years ago, the artistic design of the towns in which Shenmue was set was what first piqued the interest of the fans. Or… to be clear – I’m not sure I care enough to go through this again. However, Shenmue 3 does NOT tie up all loose ends, instead choosing to simply continue the story, leaving it still unfinished, and the door open for more titles. At the time, they were some of the most advanced games of their kind that were available in the market.Īn epic RPG that told a real-world story in real-world terms, albeit restricted by the technology of the time.įurther, the story that was started in Shenmue and Shenmue 2 was never completed and so fans were clamouring for the story to be completed for around 15 years before finally they were told they would get their wish.
#SHENMUE 3 MODE SERIES#
Not only that, but the last title in the series was itself released 18 years ago. Part of the problem – and it is a problem – is that this is the continuation of a story started twenty years ago.
It’s long and it’s tedious, but that doesn’t make it bad… Although perhaps it should. This really sums my experience with Shenmue 3 up. And I probably shouldn’t have enjoyed my time, but somehow… I did. It probably shouldn’t have felt quite so tedious, but it did. It probably shouldn’t have taken a long time, but it did. It took me a long time to get to this point – the point where I could actually put my thoughts to words in regards to Shenmue 3.
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