Random Shenmue Thoughts

[Alpha Trading]

Such an unnecessary flourish in Shenmue II but one I love so much. It’s a little thing that adds so much flavour and atmosphere.

How do you get the one with the fighter jets?

 

[Seaman]

How do you get the one with the fighter jets?

Phantom River Stone entry on it

 

[BruceWayne911]

"Did you happen to see a black car." Lan Di-Sama will be pleased.

 

[Alpha Trading]

"Did you happen to see a black car." Lan Di-Sama will be pleased.

View attachment 17603

That yours?

 

[BruceWayne911]

That yours?

Yeah just bought her

 

[Alpha Trading]

Yeah just bought her

Thats nice mate

 

[bcdcdude]

So every couple of days I search google for Shenmue news and filter by date and it's interesting that a few in recent months had been from GameRant who have been pretty postive about the series. Today there was another article from CBR (Comic Book Resource) called "Shenmue: Only A Manga Adaptation Can Save Sega's Ambitious Failure". This is the same website that recently called Shenmue the "Avatar of video games". I then looked at all CBR's articles about Shenmue and almost all of them are negative in the same manner that many of Game Rant's are positive.

But as I was reading them and thinking "Oh come on..." I noticed the layout of the site was similar to Game Rant; turns out both websites are owned by the same company. I kinda feel played like a fiddle here; it reminded me of two newspapers in the UK; one left wing, one right wing giving opposite articles based on your political stance and they were owned by the same company!

Ugh. I just feel a bit cheated here; but yeah CBR can kinda do one.

 

[Alpha Trading]

I avoid these websites as they are sh**e. These people have probably never played the games either. I used to like reading WhatCulture as im a wrestling fan but all the articles are written by moody snowflakes. It's a shame that even the anime was not continued and probably the only way we will see the story tied up is through a graphic novel now which is a shame.

 

[bcdcdude]

Vote For Empire’s 100 Greatest Video Games Of All Time

Across a few short decades, the medium of video games has exploded –...

www.empireonline.com

Get voting everybody!

For those who don't know, Empire is a movie magazine in the UK. It's a pretty popular one, but one that focuses waaaaaay too much on the mainstream (I believe there is a lot of pro-superhero bias). Still, it's a good platform to highlight Shenmue.

Last time they did this, Shenmue II made #51



and Shenmue I made #7



The top 5 last time were Metal Gear Solid, Final Fantasy VII, World of Warcraft, The Legend of Zelda: OOC and The Last of Us

 

[red]

apart from ryo/akira, are there any other similarities between the characters in virtual fighter and the shenmue world?

 

[~ ヒキ ~]

apart from ryo/akira, are there any other similarities between the characters in virtual fighter and the shenmue world?

Yes, there are other similarities between VF and Shenmue and you can find more informations about this subject in this thread.

https://www.shenmuedojo.com/forum/index.php?threads/shenmue-and-virtua-fighter-connections.3491/

In the interview 64 Rapid-Fire Questions the interviewer did this question for Yu Suzuki.

Interviewer: Does Shenmue takes place in the same universe as Virtua Fighter?

Yu Suzuki: That's tough.

It is really interesting the way Yu-san answered this question.

I even love to think Shenmue as a kind of VF prequel or multiverse type of thing and it makes sense to think this way.

I know a lot of things changed since VF RPG days but to me the connections between Shenmue and VF are beautiful.

To me the main journey of Ryo is the same story since VF RPG days, the journey that leads Ryo/Akira to become
knowledgeable and skilled in the Bajiquan fighting style.

 

[You Arcade Clerk]

Vote For Empire’s 100 Greatest Video Games Of All Time

Across a few short decades, the medium of video games has exploded –...

www.empireonline.com

Get voting everybody!

For those who don't know, Empire is a movie magazine in the UK. It's a pretty popular one, but one that focuses waaaaaay too much on the mainstream (I believe there is a lot of pro-superhero bias). Still, it's a good platform to highlight Shenmue.

Last time they did this, Shenmue II made #51

View attachment 17658

and Shenmue I made #7

View attachment 17659

The top 5 last time were Metal Gear Solid, Final Fantasy VII, World of Warcraft, The Legend of Zelda: OOC and The Last of Us

Voted, but completely cheated as I put franchises in every spot: Shenmue, Yakuza, Judgment, Fallout and so on.
10 spots just isn't nearly enough lol.

 

[Sailor-San]

I work in an buddhist cultural center as a media manager. And always before events I have to prepare the red hall (sounds very shenmueish). So for quiet a while I put on FREE 15 extended on speaker and let the magic happen.

Many people come to me afterwards and say something like: "This music makes the place so peaceful, what is it?" When I tell them, they are e absolutely delighted and a bit shocked 🙃 Its one of my favorite parts of the day.

 

[bcdcdude]

I posted this on the discord this morning, but a mate of mine sent me this link - https://forums.sonicretro.org/index.php?threads/re-discovering-shenmue.41579/

Some really interesting tidbits here :)

 

[JP_]

I posted this on the discord this morning, but a mate of mine sent me this link - https://forums.sonicretro.org/index.php?threads/re-discovering-shenmue.41579/

Some really interesting tidbits here :)

Great thread, thanks for sharing

 

[Dietsoap]

Glad to see the dojo finally tackling the difficult questions.

 

[Seaman]

.

 

[ShenmueTree]

More of a DYK than a random thought.

Tomato Convience Store's slogan is based off of the Family Mart Convience Store slogan, founded in Japan in the year 1973.

You can hear some of their themes but the introduction to the one in question is at 0:19.

 

[Switch]

Tomato Convience Store's slogan is based off of the Family Mart Convience Store slogan, founded in Japan in the year 1973.

You can hear some of their themes but the introduction to the one in question is at 0:19.

Wow great find! I had no idea it was so similar to a real jingle.

For non-Japanese speakers: although the lyrics sound identical apart from the name, they are slightly different:
Family Mart version: "Anata to conbi ni, Family Mart" (In tandem with you, Family Mart)
vs
Tomato Convenience Store: "Anata no conbini, Tomato Mart" (Your convenience store, Tomato Mart).

 

[ShenmueTree]

Wow great find! I had no idea it was so similar to a real jingle.

For non-Japanese speakers: although the lyrics sound identical apart from the name, they are slightly different:
Family Mart version: "Anata to conbi ni, Family Mart" (In tandem with you, Family Mart)
vs
Tomato Convenience Store: "Anata no conbini, Tomato Mart" (Your convenience store, Tomato Mart).

Thank you :)


Yeah, it's pretty clever changing the words to make it sound so similar yet also making it have new meaning. But do we have official lyrics to the Tomato Mart jingle? Listening to the vocals in isolation, (will upload in time) it does kinda sound like it's saying あなたとコンビに、トマトマート rather than あなたのコンビニ、トマトマート unless I'm hearing things.


Also, another cool thing; The actual tomato logo is similar to one of Family Mart's original logos in use from 1981 to 1992.





It's a smiling red circle with a smiling star next to it. It kinda looks like a very stylized tomato, or even an anthropomorphized tomato.


Furthermore under the logo on the lower Ad, it says 「(アレフ)という名で、セゾングループは 国際花と緑の博覧会に出展しています。」

"Under the name (Aleph), Saison Group takes part in the International Garden and Greenery Exposition." which, according to Wikipedia "was the first large-scale international gardening exposition in Asia and focused on the theme of the "Harmonious Coexistence of Nature and Mankind." https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Expo_'90

Further suggesting the logo may be a sort of stylized/anthropomorphized tomato. (tho as stated the logo was created in 1980s, the expo started in 1990s)

Edit: BONUS

Alternative but non watermarked version of the Family Mart logo history video.