I did the smart thing by pre-ordering Shenmue, so that I received a full 5 discs, two of which are extra, containing a musical soundrack and another disk with special bonus items and access to online information on Shenmue though the Dreamcast. Babbages called me like they usually do, and with much anticipation I drove to the mall and picked up my game. There's a girl I like who works there, she looks like she might be a rather cool person, but I just don't see that she would be interested in me, I'm just an ordinary customer and embarassing myself by trying to pick her up, would make returning to Babbages awkward. She rung up my game, and Shenmue was mine, a game that I had anticipated for a long time. I had downloaded the movies of the Japanese version well over a year ago, and hoped and wondered about this game, and today, the day was here.
When I got home I looked at the game in it's pristine new condition and then removed the plastic from the CD Case. I placed the first disc in the Dreamcast and turned it on. I watched in amazement at the introductory sequence began with an eagle flying over a hilly landscape and a young Asian girl standing atop a cliff. The girl's voice speaks a verse of poetry expressing the ultimate saga of Shenmue and of Ryo's great destiny. This in inself was a work of art. I immediately begin the game and thus Shenmue Chapter 1 Begins.
The opening scene begins where Ryo is running toward his house, it is snowing, and the sky is grey and overcast. You can even see the pattern of each snowflake if you look well enough. He sees a black luxury car and a broken sign in front of his house. The gate is forced open. He finds an elderly woman, Ine-san lying on the ground and she is hurt. He runs to the Dojo to find his friend Fukisan thrown bodily outside of the Dojo to the Ground. He rushes inside to be held back by two men wearing black suits, and discovers a man wearing a robe with a Dragon on it and his father in the Dojo. He yells, "father." Very movielike music plays here, remeniscent of a feature film. The man (Lan Di) asks Ryo Hazuki's father for the Mirror and he says that he will never tell. Then out of something remeniscent of the Matrix they enguage in martial arts combat, and the ominous and mysterious man in the dragon robe deals a crushing blow to Ryo's father and he crumples to the ground. Ryo rushes toward the man in the dragon robe, Lan Di, and he is summarily knocked to the ground with one blow. They both writhe on the ground in agony. Lan Di picks Ryo up by the neck and holds him up in the air and demands, "Tell me where the mirror is... or your son!" His father says, "It's under the cherry tree" and the two men in black suits leave the Dojo and go outside. Lan Di tosses Ryo asunder, and says to Hazuki Sensei, I will let you die with Honor. Ryo's father stands and Lan Di delivers a crushing double handed blow to him and he falls to the ground. The two men in the suits return with the Dragon Mirror, and give it to Lan Di. He looks at it and walks out of the Dojo. Ryo holds his father's dying body in his arms, and his father tells him to keep his friends close to him, and then he dies. Ryo cries out in agony.
4 days later it says. We see a postman ride off on a motor scooter, birds chirp in the morning sunshine, and Old Woman, reaches into the mailbox and pulls out a letter and says, "A Letter...for Hazuki Sensei." Then we see Ryo lying in bed tossing and turning, he's having a bad dream of the man who killed his father, Lan Di. He sees him, and is finally awaken from the nightmare. He then gets out of bed to find himself in his bedroom.
The first scenes of the game were intense to say the least, and just exploring Ryo's room I discovered how awesome this game was and continued to be. I opened up every drawer in his dresser, finding socks and underwear, shirts, and pants, as well as magazines in the bottom drawer. I opened his closet and found trophies and boxes piled up in there. On his desk I found a tape, and I discovered that I could turn on the lamp sitting on the desk. I could also turn off and on the lights in his bedroom with the switch by the door. Inside his desk drawers I found a tape recorder and another tape that said Sha Hua, the other was Shenmue. I discovered that you could put tapes into the tape recorder as well and play music with it. Ryo has a journal that he keeps with him and in it at first there were some phone numbers and the notes he hand made about Lan Di, a man with a Tattoo on his arm. When I left Ryo's room Ine-san was there waiting for me and she handed me a daily allowance of 500 Yen, and said that she would leave it everyday on top of the shoe cabinet by the door. Ryo tells her not to work herself too hard. The house itself looks exactly like the interior of a Japanese house. I went into the kitchen and opened up the refrigerator. I can hear the hum of the compressor. I opened up all the drawers and cabinets in the kitchen, I opened one below the stove and a cockroach crawled out from behind some cans. Ryo says, "It's just a cockroach." I lift up the strainer and look at it. I remove the painting from the wall. I then focus in on the food sitting on the table by pressing the R button, and then Ryo has a flashback.
Ryo invisions himself as a little boy sitting at the table and he is eating carrots. He pushes them aside and then his father says to him that while he is sleeping there are farmers in the fields working hard so that he could have those carrots. He picks up the carrot slice with the chopsticks, grimaces, and eats it. His father smiles and says, "that's my boy..."
I do a little exporing and find a bathroom with a toilet on the floor in it, then I find a room with a TV and I look in the cabinet underneath and Ryo takes out a Sega Saturn from the cabinet and puts in on top of the TV. I discover a room with a Bhuddist altar, and I pick up matches and candles from the drawers under the alter. When I focus on the Altar, Ryo kneels and preys. I then leave and go outside. Ryo only wears socks inside the house, no shoes, a tradition very native to Asian people. He goes outside and it's a sunny day. I look into the pond and see fish swimming in there. I look at the ground and see grass and I find a spigot with a hose attatched and a clothesline. The detail in this is just phenomenal. I go near a Tree and Ryo has another dramatic flashback to his youth and he sees his father training him in the martial arts, showing him the correct center of balance.
From this point the game progresses, and I ended up getting very involved on the first day I played this game. By far this has to be the most beautifully crafted, detailed games I've ever seen. It's so immersive, it just is like being part of a movie. Yeah, you can still tell it's computer generated graphics, but many things are so detailed and textures are so defined and realistic. Ryo himself is smooth and his eyes and face are expressive. The realtime weather and the passage of day into night is flawless, absolutely breathtaking. This is a tour de force of gaming excellence. I can't say I've ever seen anything this good. Time to stop typing, and start playing more Shenmue, it's lucky I got this even written, with all the great games I've gotten recently. This one has to be by far the best though. Damn...unbelieveable!
