- Joined
- Aug 22, 2018
The story padding I can tolerate. It’s the way that players are forced to wait until certain in-game times to further advance the story that really grinds my gears.My guess is that the whole black car->Chinese people-> 3 blades-> sailors-> Charlie bit was sorta padding to help fill out S1 as a stand alone game.
The whole sequence is just a time waster from Ryos POV and the real story doesn’t start until you get Zhus letter.
When I first played the game all those years ago this wasn’t really an issue, as there was plenty of exciting stuff to see and do around Yokosuka. Now, though, I find myself putting the controller down and doing something else to pass the time whenever I reach that section, which strikes me as god-awful game design.
I understand wanting players to spend time exploring your creation, but think that the best way to do this is to create a compelling world that players want to explore because they’re curious or excited rather than forcing them to engage with it due to bullshit design choices. Shenmue was able to get away with this in the nineties because it was groundbreaking and new, but that’s not really the case anymore. Certainly, this was an area where Shenmue 3 fell a little flat.