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Preview: Shen Mue
A recent flurry of news surrounding Shen Mue has stirred up the public these last several weeks. The game's original release date in August has quickly slipped to October. When that date was closing in, Sega announced that they ran into unforseen problems in development, and Japan wouldn't see the game until next Spring. Things took another turn when Sega retracted the Spring release and pushed it up to December 29, 1999. The media was quick to label Shen Mue as the 'last great game of the millenium,' so let's keep our fingers crossed that the hyperbole is right.

It's not as if there is too much too worry about, as the game is being developed under the watchful eye of Yu Suzuki (responsible for Daytona USA, the Virtua Fighter series, and many others). Shen Mue is shaping up to be his most ambitious project yet, promising an intriguing story full of memorable characters within a fully interactive game world.

Until this point, not much has been revealed on the story, but Sega recently let the cat out of the bag. Ryo Hazuki, the main character, returns to his family's dojo to find his father, Iwao, confronted by a band of thugs led by Souryu (the obligatory bad mofo). Souryu is searching for some kind of talisman, and in the process of finding it, kills Ryo's father. Thus begins Ryo's quest for revenge. Along the way, Ryo will travel to mainland China, where he will stumble upon Shenhua Rei, with whom he will share an uncomfortable love relationship (much like Tifa and Cloud from Final Fantasy VII).   Another key character is Ren Wein, the head of a Hong Kong street gang. Ryo and Ren will embark on many adventures together as they both often have common goals.

The gameplay in Shen Mue will be broken down into three modes: adventure, quick timer events (QTE), and free battle. Adventure mode is pretty self-explanatory--this is the mode you'll use to navigate through your surroundings. The d-pad will move Ryo, the analog pad will let him look around, the left shoulder button will be for running, while the right will allow Ryo to view objects. QTE are what seems to worry people--in these, you are computer controlled, while the screen instructs you to press different buttons accordingly, to perform certain actions. Imagine that you're running through a crowded street, and the "A" button appears on the screen. If you press the button, you might evade a person you would otherwise bump into if you didn't press the right button. Most people worried that the QTE would turn Shen Mue into a 3D Dragon's Lair. Worry not, however; the QTE will only be a small percentage of the gameplay. Finally, we have Free Battle. This mode adapts a VF3 style battle system and lets you beat up baddies yourself, instead of through the QTE system.

One of the things I mentioned before was that game world in Shen Mue is fully interactive. There is a money system involved, and you will have to gamble or perform errands if you want to earn some bank. The money will be used to buy goods or services in the game world. For example, you can pop in some coins into a soda machine and watch Ryo chug it down. There will also be arcades that you can go into, where you can--yes, you guessed it--play the games! Most of the titles will be Suzuki's previous classics, like Hang-On, Space Harrier, and Outrun. And get this--it is rumored that you'll be able to buy a virtual Sega Saturn that you can use to play games (provided you have the CD). You can also buy little baubles from toy machines that can later be viewed. You can even go online and trade them with other people. I'm guessing these will be of the Sonic keychain and plush toy variety, but you never know. Maybe you'll get to pimp a Rolex from one of these :)

Shen Mue will ship on four GD-ROMs. Three discs comprise the game, while the fourth, titled the Shen Mue Passport, will be used to log onto the Shen Mue network. Don't get too excited, though. You won't actually get to play with other people. It's pretty similar to logging onto the Sonic Adventure site, but there will be more features here. This is the place where you can trade the aforementioned collectible items. Also, the Shen Mue Passport will allow you to download a VMU game, view cutscenes, a character bios database, the Shen Mue music tracks, as well as the game manual. Yep, that's right, Sega has gone digital. Hell, Sega even threw in the F355 Challenge VM Operator Mode. Here you can view your racing stats from the Suzuki's arcade title, F355 Challenge (that is, if you saved them onto your VMU in the arcade). The only thing Sega did leave out was the kitchen sink.

On course for a December 29th release in Japan, Shen Mue looks like it's gonna make quite a splash. The only issue is, has it gotten a little too ambitious for Suzuki to handle? A game of this magnitude has to be either a masterpiece, or a flop. To Suzuki's credit, he's made some of the biggest and best games in the industry, so let's hope Shen Mue follows suite.

--- ElDuderino