What resonated with me the most? Well, that's easy: back when I played Shenmue 1, I would often just wander around at the start of the day and soak in the ambience. Aside from that, I was at most concerned with trivial pastimes. In the late in-game afternoon, it often occurred to me that I should at least do a little something to progress the main story. It soon became evening and a certain restlessness arose due to the approaching bedtime and some 'duties' that still had to be done (feeding the cat, training,…). Rushing through the dusk/night, quickly buying something at Tomato on the way home, then wandering back through the sleepy suburbs, past illuminated windows and the few acquaintances who were still out and about so late, triggered a feeling of homeliness - matched with that special, not unpleasant restlessness that only FREE music could express. At home, in Ryo's save room, I would read some notes or listen to music before going to sleep, of course never without turning off the desk lamp first, knowing next door Fuku-San would stay up a little longer. Everything seemed truly alive. And you know what? Today, decades later, it still feels exactly the same. No other game has ever felt like that to me.
The fact that Ryo knows so many people in the first game, plus the fact that any random NPC will stop to show you where you’re going in the second game, appeals to a very human desire for community which is often difficult to find in the modern world. This is probably one of the reasons I’ve seen people describe the experience of playing Shenmue as “therapeutic.”
The mystery is maybe the biggest aspect for me. I always say at "Do you remember Zhao Sun Ming?" the game completely had me. But all the things you mention piled on top of that, so Shenmue became my favorite game. Just going into the neighbourhood with its vibe is something unmatched to this day!
I had a similar experience, the atmosphere of the first game is something I've never experienced before or since, and about 3 months after I first played it I got to visit Japan and it was crazy how captured the atmosphere so perfectly
@@SurvivalSpheres sadly not, was only 12 so not in control of the trip, but got to pass through Yokohama, and there were parts of Tokyo that gave me a real Shenmue vibe
Vivi-G: The attention to detail is still unrivaled. I remember seeing some of the kids in sakuragaoka return from school with back packs, then return back outside to play without the bags! Or how when it rains NPCs pull out umbrellas... I don't think I've ever seen NPCs reaction to rain in any other open world game. There are countless intricate details which form a wonderful experience, which is why Shenmue 1 in particular will always be my favourite.
This is bang on. The charm of Shenmue was the immersion. I never really went overseas before Shenmue, even though my family had some relationship with Japan, I never remembered it. And it just makes you fall in love with the world. Then I got super into Japanese and chinese culture, lived there, learned a bit of the language, the culture, everything. Now Japan and east asia to a lesser extent is massive part of who I am. Never had another piece of media presentation with me since. Yakuza is a distant second the persona series. You nailed it matt
Glad yuo enjoyed the video. Shenmue had a profund impact on people in many different ways and literally inspired peoples future paths. Not many video games can say that. Which is why we push so hard for the series to be finished :)
Agreed this is one of my favorite games of all time. The graphics and world immersion were amazing for the time it was released on Dreamcast. I will always be a Dreamcast fan boy, that was the first system my parents got me for Christmas and my favorite game system to this day.
I felt every word of this, completely agree with everything you said. The slow pace of the first Shenmue, the often peaceful music, and the rich atmosphere of 1980s Japan all provide such a calming escape when life gets turbulent.
Fantastic video. The first Shenmue feels like home to me--it always has. It was so familiar despite being so drastically different than where we all grew up.
When I walked around the real place in Yokosuka I was AMAZED at how similar it still looks. I've never felt so emersed and it was hilarious how a lot of locals seemed so confused about the way I was totally buzzing over the location of a random building or ally; its THAT accurate.🙂 Even walking up the hill to Yamanose there's a huge building (its actually a shrine) that looks so much like Ryo's house.
Shenmue's worldbuilding and storytelling are deeply connected. The story wouldn't be as impactful if players couldn't fully immerse themselves in that world and live Ryo's life. The idea that this sort of worldbuilding is unnecessary is missing that point and provides a lazy excuse for publishers to do everything on the cheap. This is what should be the standard but isn't. If I'm going to convince myself that I'm part of a game world, then I want to be able to pick up some cat food at the convenience store in the morning, feed my kitten, treat myself to some toy capsules, speak to my neighbours, hear the snow crunching under my feet, use a public telephone, catch the bus, decide when and where I'm going to train and for how long, watch the sky get dark, watch my neighbour close his shop at the end of the day, etc. Shenmue's Yokosuka is my 2nd home.
i visited dobuita probably like 6 months ago for the third or fourth time. That probably might be the last visited ill ever do. I think it felt different for me this time since i live in Japan now for 16 years. When i play the game, i was still in high school and lived abroad (im half japanese and visit japan every summer, but not Yokosuka). But i went once in high school or maybe twice in college when i was home visiting Japan. In those few trips, it felt great, probably because i was not living in the country permanently. When you played the game and especially if you did not live in the country it felt like an escape or jump in home, especially for me. The details of Dobuita felt really real. That was the charm for me in the first few visited. Few years back before covid, i visited Hong Kong as well. Shenmue also was one of the few reasons i visited Hong Kong.
Thank you again for using my footage in this i really appreciate it 😄 I actually have an answer to your question. He wanted to know how people in Japan felt when they played the game for the first time right? I have visited Japan numerous times and whenever I would go to locations that were video game oriented. I would try to chat with somebody to find out if they are fans of the Dreamcast. Then of course I would lead it right into Shenmue 👍 I'm sorry to say most people were not familiar with it or vaguely familiar. It could just be where I was talking or the fact that so much time had passed. However! I did find one person who had played the game upon its initial release. He told me graphically he felt it was very impressive. He thought the girls were cute and thought it was fun that you could play old arcade games. But as far as the rest of the atmosphere goes, it wasn't such a big draw. I suppose this makes sense... I mean if the world being depicted is something that you're very familiar with, you wouldn't be as fascinated or interested. Like yourself Matt, this was probably one of my biggest introductions to Japanese culture. There are so many little elements that you normally wouldn't see if you watched a movie or a TV show that takes place there. I became fascinated and would try to get more information on the early days of the internet while also going to the library to do more research which was still very limited as far as the culture goes. But anyways, I was just happy to find somebody who had played the original game and felt it was pretty amazing but in the grand scheme of things not as memorable as other releases.
That's an interesting, if somewhat sobering description, but it doesn't really surprise me. I think it's often like that. As for the whole topic of ambience in video games, the countless trivial videos with the aim of immersion, this is a purely Western trend. There are hardly any comparable videos on Japanese RU-vid, for some reason it doesn't seem to correspond to the desires of the people there. It would be interesting to explore the background. Conversely, however, it also means something that some of us don't want to hear: SEGA's explicit aim at the time was not at all to get (Western) gamers excited about mundane aspects of their native surroundings. Rather, this was just a side effect of efforts to create a realistic ingame world.
For me having always grown up with Sega consoles in the 90s, I had never played a game with a “world” before. l had never played an rpg, as they weren’t readily available on Sega’s hardware, so I’d just primarily grown up playing fighters, racers and platformers. I remember playing Shenmue for the first time and just being blown away by its world and the level of detail. It was unlike anything I’d ever experienced, and still is. Shenmue’s way for communicating with the player is through its world, and its narrative unfolds the more you interact with it. It’s not just a feature, it is the core of Shenmue which all its other elements revolve around.
There are only a handful of video games, movies and music that FELT like they were hand-crafted for me, and Shenmue is among those rare few. (Mass Effect, TIE Fighter, Babylon 5, Star Trek TNG and DS9 would be in my personal top 10). Suzuki crafted a world that, while functionally alien to me as an American, somehow felt like home with amazing ambient music, fun storyline and compelling characters.
Specifically, I was impressed by the overall quality of performance of Shenmue, even though the dreamcast is considered the weakest console, but not a single game of that generation could impress so much. I was lucky to buy the console right away with Shenmue, so the effect was maximum. This particular opening video, exploring the house and going outside for the first time, it’s just wow. I also think that in terms of immersion into the world of the game, no other game has yet been able to come close. Some individual elements were adopted, in some places they may have been better, but based on the totality of the solutions of the dreamcast duology, no one was able to repeat it.
For me, playing Shenmue 2 when it first launched (my dad bought me it for Christmas and I'd not played Shenmue 1), and the same applies to the first game, is the ability to do whatever you want during the game day. I'd never played a game that gave you that level of freedom. And for games released back then, the sheer number of things to do that were not related to the main quest were staggering, and they were all so much fun.
@ShenmueDojoVOD It sure is. I was just thinking about Shenmue 2 and right at the start, there are toy capsule machines, stalls and multiple arm-wrestling venues. And only a little further into the game, you have lucky hit, multiple types of dice gambling, the harbour job, a full arcade and slot house and 5 different competitive darts games. And the really crazy thing, none of it ever feels boring!
