Will Open World Harm Shenmue 3?

5

513att

Joined
Oct 30, 2018
At an expected 100GB, Shenmue 3 is going to present one of the largest open worlds in gaming history. Skyrim is 12GB. Witcher 3 is 50 GB. Intriguing? Yes. But, how will it affect the carefully constructed narrative path that defines the first two games?

While an expansive open world is an exciting prospect, the Ryo Hazuki in me has his doubts. The first two games are characterized by Ryo's dogged and singular pursuit to avenge his father's death. He rarely takes time to have a conversation...let alone embark on a lengthy side-quest.

A vast and detailed world could be a thing to behold...but, it could fall apart quickly if Ryo is still determined to follow a very set path. And if the game does present us with side-quests, will that negatively impact the heart of the series? But, hey, at least we get to discuss new Shenmue.
 
That 100GB thing aswe know of is just placeholder. It also doesn't necessarily reflect world size, if it is accurate it could be 4k assets.

I don't think having a large world or side quests will negatively effect the game. An unpopular opinion, I don't think Shenmue should stick in the past it NEEDS to evolve. There is no reason it can't use a modern design and still be Shenmue.
 
The size of 100GB is provisional right now.
As I said in a recent thread, I don't think S3 will have a large scale world. I think it's said to be more like in between Shenmue 1 and 2. A world full of details, people, animals...instead of those vast open world but without much more to do apart from take a stroll.
 
513att said:
While an expansive open world is an exciting prospect, the Ryo Hazuki in me has his doubts. The first two games are characterized by Ryo's dogged and singular pursuit to avenge his father's death. He rarely takes time to have a conversation...let alone embark on a lengthy side-quest.

A vast and detailed world could be a thing to behold...but, it could fall apart quickly if Ryo is still determined to follow a very set path. And if the game does present us with side-quests, will that negatively impact the heart of the series? But, hey, at least we get to discuss new Shenmue.
Click to expand...

Both of the original games had sidequests. Looking after the kitten, collecting capsule toys, finding the Yamamoto residence for Kame, learning moves from various characters, playing pool in MJQ, buying Shozo a drink (a literal fetch quest), finding/saving Mai, translating the Stab Armor scroll, taking photos of various NPCs, Duck Racing, the whole Man Mo Park wild goose chase, making Fangmei fall in love with you... that's not even a complete list, and every one of them is optional.

If anything, the game not presenting us with sidequests would negatively impact the heart of the series.
 
There's a 0% chance Shenmue 3 will be the largest open world game in gaming history. It's probably not even going to be half the size of GTAV/RDR/RDR2/Sleeping Dogs or any current open world game. And datasize has nothing to do with actual game location size btw, not to mention that 100GB is just a placeholder.

Regardless, what will set Shenmue apart from huge open world games is its atmosphere and attention to detail.
 
If I remember correctly, Yu said (in 2015 after the kickstarter) they were testing thing with a map of 4km*4km
So I really don't think it is going to be a big open world
 
Tortu-genial said:
If I remember correctly, Yu said (in 2015 after the kickstarter) they were testing thing with a map of 4km*4km
So I really don't think it is going to be a big open world
Click to expand...
That was just for the forest about Bailu IIRC.
 
When it comes to open world games, it’s always a question of quantity vs. quality. Based on our experiences with Shenmue and Suzuki’s dedication to it, we know what it will fall into.
 
Jigen said:
I don't think having a large world or side quests will negatively effect the game. An unpopular opinion, I don't think Shenmue should stick in the past it NEEDS to evolve. There is no reason it can't use a modern design and still be Shenmue.
Click to expand...
I agree 100% that they need to modernise certain aspects of the game (controls for example) but there are a lot of modern open-world design tropes that would ruin the Shenmue experience in my opinion:
  • map markers/waypoints
  • any HUD element that explicitly tells you where to go next or highlights "important" NPCs
  • side quest menu that gives you a list of things to check off
To me Shenmue is about real exploration and performing tasks naturally, not mindlessly following waypoints or doing something because you haven't ticked it off in a menu yet.
 
orient said:
I agree 100% that they need to modernise certain aspects of the game (controls for example) but there are a lot of modern open-world design tropes that would ruin the Shenmue experience in my opinion:
  • map markers/waypoints
  • any HUD element that explicitly tells you where to go next or highlights "important" NPCs
  • side quest menu that gives you a list of things to check off
To me Shenmue is about real exploration and performing tasks naturally, not mindlessly following waypoints or doing something because you haven't ticked it off in a menu yet.
Click to expand...

This!
 
Also for God's sake, no random battles and stats grinding elements to inflate gameplay time like an extensive RPG level up system. Hopefully no healing items allowed during battles as well, as this stuff is just an unnecessary clutch for the adventure genre which Shenmue falls in.
Along with the points already brought up in posts above mine, and if the calendar mechanic stays intact, I doubt the core Shenmue experience will be affected by the increase in size of its world in any negative way.
 
Guppy said:
Also for God's sake, no random battles and stats grinding elements to inflate gameplay time like an extensive RPG level up system.
Click to expand...

So no training? No fights like the Enoki battles?

Shenmue has always had these systems; they're just done more immersively than a typical RPG.
 
DigitalDuck said:
So no training? No fights like the Enoki battles?

Shenmue has always had these systems; they're just done more immersively than a typical RPG.
Click to expand...

Those sorts of battles were good. I think he means the more Yakuza style battles that generally serve no purpose to story. The Shenmue ones are done within the story context which is good & I'd expect the same in 3.
 
Shenmue has battle events, not random battles. If Shenmue had random battles you wouldn't be able to walk for 5 minutes in Dobuita without a thug instigating a fight.
 
DigitalDuck said:
So no training? No fights like the Enoki battles?

Shenmue has always had these systems; they're just done more immersively than a typical RPG.
Click to expand...

The training in Shenmue is just there to add flavour and bares no real weight to the general gameplay. Proof to that is plenty of players can go about finishing these games just fine without even noticing that moves could evolve, besides the in-game system automatically lowers the difficulty for the player after a certain number of retries. There is nothing RPG grinding about the series. I hope they keep the training actually, but just don't want to see the core gameplay to be focused around it.

And like orient already said it, Shenmue has no random battles. They are always tied to a specific time and place, and limited in numbers. This is not Yakuza.
 
I actually highly doubt Shenmue III will have one big interconnected map to explore. The first two games, especially 2, are mostly medium-sized "open world" areas connected to each other in the story by cutscenes. For instance, you can freely walk around a fairly big interconnected chunk of Yokosuka, but if you want to get to the harbor you have to get on the bus and "warp" there.

I imagine III being like that, but with larger areas and without all the loading zones. And based on the Kickstarter incentives for different locations, that seems to be what they're going for. Baisha, Choubu and Bailu Village are probably all going to be separate maps that you reach by progressing the story. They'll still be decently-sized "open world" areas, but they won't all be in one big open world.
 
Exactly, I'm anticipating something very similar to the previous games in terms of world size and structure. I'll be interested to see if interiors load separately like in the old games (and still happens in some modern games like Fallout) or if they'll be completely seamless.
 
Guppy said:
And like orient already said it, Shenmue has no random battles. They are always tied to a specific time and place, and limited in numbers. This is not Yakuza.
Click to expand...

And yet, they seem random to the average player.
 
They only seem random in the same way cutscenes seem random in any game. Not sure what you're trying to get at here :unsure: Shenmue may share some ideas with JRPGs, but it doesn't feel like a JRPG in the slightest, unlike Yakuza.
 
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