Shenmue Developer Unhappy with Re-Release

Shenmue I & II were re-released last August, presenting themselves to a whole new generation of potential fans. These high-definition ports were highly anticipated by fans of the Dreamcast originals to boot. So, it was a shame when it turned out the ports were riddled with bugs.

The fansite, Shenmue Dojo, has recorded a lengthy list of bugs for the re-releases. These bugs are evident in the Windows, Xbox One and PS4 versions.

Eigo Kasahara, the planning director for the original Shenmue on Dreamcast, shares fans’ frustrations. He spoke with IGN Japan at the Tokyo Game Show 2018, expressing his disappointments with the ports.

“As a developer on the original games, the last thing I wanted for the re-release [of Shenmue I & II] is for them to be worse than the originals,” he said in the interview.

Sega Europe encouraged fans to notify them of bugs via Twitter. The currently-known bugs include certain cutscenes not playing correctly, some events not triggering, graphics flaws and parts of the game not saving properly.

Shockingly, none of these bugs were featured in the original games. They are only in the ports which were released for PS4, Xbox One, and Windows August 21st.

Kasahara admitted, “There were just way too many issues”. He’s “been putting up a fight with the overseas studio that developed it, insisting that they fix everything”.

Kasahara insists that he will continue to fight the port’s developer D3T until all the bugs have been eliminated. Well, at the very least, until only the bugs present in the Dreamcast version remain.

While the patches are being developed, so is Shenmue III. The game, scheduled for an August 2019 release, reached $2 million in under eight hours in its initial Kickstarter campaign. This is the fastest Kickstarter campaign to reach that amount. By its end, the Kickstarter raised over $6 million.

The success of the campaign showed the dedication and passion of the series’ fans. The original Shenmue was released for the Sega Dreamcast way back in 1999. Its sequel was released on the same platform (as well as the original Xbox) in 2001. The games were thought to revolutionize open-world game mechanics with their level of detail as well as introducing gamers to QTE sections.

Have you noticed any annoying bugs from the Shenmue ports? Do you plan on trying the series? Let us know in the comments below!