You know what, much like anything of it's hey day, it was probably (no, it was) so much better to play it than today! What Shenmue 1 gave/gives you is a world to be totally immersed in. The situation from the outset is an emotional one. The protaganist watches his Dad get killed at the very start then it's up to you, and only you, to seek revenge but you are in over your head. You need to journey onward to your town, and other places eventually, to get experience in life and much needed experience in martial arts. The fighting is generally QTE, so if you absolutely hate QTE in games don't bother playing it - although when you get the QTE right the video sequence of the fight looks good (well it did back in 2001-2).arry_g wrote:As someone who never played this games (they passed me by) and the fact that a load of people are sad every E3 that a new game is not announced, please can someone explain to me what Shenmue is, why people love it so much and why it is so unfortunate that I never played them?
Your local town is where you spend a lot of time "forming relationships" and enquiring about who saw what on this fateful day. At first the town & everything in it is alien to you, however you quickly get used to your surroundings and it feels very homely. The days are marked in in-game time and you view the daytime and night time. Certain places are open at night and others in the day etc. It looks very lovely, even today. Oh and its during Christmas too, so it has a great atmosphere to it!!
The game just goes on from there really, where you need to travel to places to get info from certain individuals and you get to the point where you need money to travel.... (you don't need to eat but you need money) Needless to say, you will put in an honest days work in, well a few days I think is; as a forklift driver.
Like any game though, it has its good parts and bad. Nowadays it is a bit slow in what it does but, if you have teh desire to play it and stick with it it's definitely worth seeing what all the fuss is about. Personally I enjoyed Shenmue 1 (completed it) and I've only played a quarter of Shenmue 2 - I will finish it eventually, but I just havent played it as much as Shen#1. I couldn't give a shit if Shenmue 3 comes out, if I am honest. If it did arrive I would like (for some odd weird reason) to see it released on the Dreamcast...yeah, thats never gona happen!!!