THE GOOD:The grapics are amazing and the story is magnificent it is the second in the long 16 chaptered Shenmue story
THE BAD:
It is over all too quickly
SUMMARY:
Very few sequels can out-do the original. What fate does Shenmue II hold? The year is 1987, the place is Hong Kong, China. Ryo Hazuki steps foot off a boat that took 2 years to arrive. Was the two year wait worth it? Read on to find out my opinion of this much anticipated epic of a game.
Not all that much has really changed since the original, but why change a good thing? Shenmue II combines many familiar sounds and screens that will make you feel right at home. The one change is the X button is used for any action instead of the A button we used in Shenmue I. You still control with the D-pad but you can use the analogue stick also. Ryo is equipped with his notebook, watch, Hazuki family rest, Phoenix Mirror, maps, and all his gatcha-gatcha collectables. Also all your money is magically converted to Hong Kong Dollars. Another minor change is the new I.S., or icon selection. All four of the Dreamcasts buttons appear in the bottom right-hand screen. They light up and an icon will appear. For example: lips will appear on the A button when you can speak to someone. This makes controlling Ryo a little easier.
Now let me talk a little about the new environments. There is nothing little about them. The game consists of 4 massive cities. Each one is separated in many smaller Quarters. It's a good thing you can purchase maps or you would be lost. Dobuita in Shenmue I had one main street with one side street. It resembled a figure 8. Wan Chai in Shenmue II can be best described as a Spider Web. Streets turn every way, stairs go up to more buildings, most building contain many stories, and around every corner is a dark alley. A little feature that I really enjoyed was the music. Unlike Shenmue I, when you enter a new Quarter a new background music plays. This can help you separate to quarters, and it gives the game a more RPG feel. Sadly, Sega has paid more attention to the huge environments than to the detail we expected. Only in a few rooms you can explore the drawers, and zoom in/pick up items.
Along with a new massive environment comes a new huge cast. People still fade in and out, but there is hundreds more. At any given time you can see about 30 people. You have the freedom to talk to each and everyone of them. And because of the huge cast on one screen the frame rate drops very noticeable. It seems Sega has pushed the game to it's limits. Granted some reply with a, "I'm busy, catch me again later", but most have something of importance to say. Every person goes on their own schedule again, but they are hard to track down because you're in a larger city. Most schedules make them stay at their job all day, instead of getting off work and getting a bite to eat.
Improvements in the Real Weather and Time effects have been added. The rain and snow looks more realistic, the day passes at about a minute per second. Day turns to night with amazing detail. You will not need to follow such a detailed schedule like you had to in the original. Most stores are open from 8:00 am to 11:00 when Ryo heads in to bed. If you need to meet someone at 7:00pm you can skip time to get there in a second. This becomes a very handy little improvement.
What about money. Even though you can use your saved data from Shenmue I, Ryo will always be in need of more money. Around almost every corner is a gambling booth. You can play pachinko, a dice game, arm wrestle, and many games with cards. If lady luck is on your side, virtual gambling can be very addicting, but be careful not to gamble all your money away. I guarantee you will never be bored in Shenmue II, because you can free battle almost whenever you want. There is many street fights going on. Gamble $50 on a fight, with any luck you will win $100. There is always something to do. Along with the street gambling there is a Slot House and a new arcade where you can gamble someone in a game of darts.
Become a martial arts expert. Along your quest you will learn many more new moves, and fight many more battles. They start off very simple, but the difficulty rises very quickly. Instead of sparring you will have to train by the street fights. QTE's are back, and they have made a big improvement! The traditional QTE we are used to have returned, and have brought back something new! New freeze QTE's very added. This improves the cinematic and makes the game a little more difficult. Say someone is right behind you. The screen quickly freezes and flashed A + Left + Y you have a split second to respond. If you fail you usually don't get another retry, and will have to find them again at a later date. Also some un-necessary QTE's are added. If you get too close to a edge of a cliff, a QTE will take effect. Some careful gamers will completely skip this.
The plot starts off very similar to Shenmue I. Ryo is still himself, he isn't interested in anything but finding his father's murderer. The plot unfolds to revile many smaller plots. At some points it seems like Ryo completely forgets about Lan Di and is more worried about something else. Needless to say the plot comes back together, and is much deeper than I thought it would be. The game ends in such a way it leads room for the following chapters of the series.
The final word. It all sounds so great, what's the catch? There is only a few down sides that I have pointed out. Frame rate does drop, graphics sometimes get fuzzy, and there is less attention paid to details. But these are all very minor and you can ignore them and still have a great gaming experience. The Dreamcast is 3 years old, and Shenmue can still push out better graphics than most PS2 games. The sound makes the game. It has the right music for the right place. Action is not a problem, you're always busy. I would say this is more for the hardcore Shenmue fan. If you enjoyed the original you will enjoy this one 100% more! If you didn't think too highly of the original, you will only rate this game lower.
Stu - Shenmue Dojo
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