CJ 2007: Is Shenmue Online finally dead? Should Suzuki remain at SEGA?

There is no doubt that Yu Suzuki is one of the best game creators in the world.
He has a big life time achievement like Hall Of Fame because of his great impact on this industry.but now Yu Suzuki is in a real bad situation (because of bastards like Hajime Satomi in the head office? who knows?)

--->Let' s review the major news during last years until now!
and then I' ll say what we want!

2003-Suzuki left legendary " SEGA-AM2" to work in his own studio " Digital Rex" .

2003-Sammy chairman Hajime Satomi became CEO of Sega
(The Nightmare Is Coming!)

2004-SEGA Sega Sammy Holdings!
(KIKIZO said " The Nightmare Begins!" )

2004-Shenmue Online announced for China/Korea!
(instead of Shenmue 3 for world!)

2005-Shenmue Online facing trouble?
(JCE not working with SEGA anymore)

2005-Suzuki is the head of AM Plus(+)?
(a completely new division to develop arcade games plus(+) anything else!)

2006-Suzuki' s new arcade game " PSY-PHI" canceled.
(Hell! NO! after working for years on a game! finally canceled by SEGA!)

2006-China Joy 2006: Shenmue Online resurfaces!
Suzuki showed Shenmue Online at China Joy 2006.
(well, a 15-min trailer released and Suzuki had many interviews
with Chinese media)

2006-China Joy 2006: Yu Suzuki said
" Regarding Shenmue 3, we' re not carrying on relative development yet,
and I can' t give you any further information for the time being."
(this means Shenmue Online is not Shenmue 3)
http://game.163.com/06/0717/19/2M8NONCU00311T2V.aspx

2007-China Joy 2007:
The T2CN both was planned for Shenmue Online to be shown!
(After years not even a release date and finally is dead?)
http://news.17173.com/content/2007-06-03/20070603111046758.shtml

2007-In the new structure of SEGA Corp. Hajime Satomi takes over
current President Hisao Oguchi' s position, too.
(The Nightmare Continues!)
http://www.segasammy.co.jp/english/pdf/release/20070613_sega.pdf


2007-Hajime Satomi(SEGA' s CEO):
" SEGA may withdraw from Chinese online game projects"
(The Nightmare Talks!, wasn' t working on Chinese market your plan? )
http://www.nikkei.co.jp/news/sangyo/20070515AT1D1407714052007.aspx

2007-China Joy 2007: Shenmue Online didn' t exist at China Joy 2007!
(Surprise!!!!)
http://www.watch.impress.co.jp/game/docs/20070713/ch12.htm

2007-SEGA-SAMMY:" We' re not withdrawing from China,
but going back to the starting line."
(WHAT THE HELL YOU ARE DOING?)
http://www.watch.impress.co.jp/game/docs/20070713/china_01.htm

---END OF HISTORY

As you see first PSY-PHi and now Shenmue Online!
what the hell is happening to one of the greatest game developers & his games!

Now we really need an update on Suzuki' s current situation!
can KIKZIO do this favor to us?

Can Suzuki explain the whole ignorance thing from SEGA-SAMMY for his Projects?
will he remain at main SEGA or he should do what Yuji Naka did?
how many years we can live to see another real game with " YS" seal?
(especially another Shenmue)

(Thanks to Kiyuu from Shenmue Dojo for most of the links)

Regards-Alimn

NW' s Shenmue, Yakuza and VF5 site!
http://www.novinworks.com/shenmue.htm

Yeah, I' m not sure what is going on with Yu Suzuki. He always seems very guarded in interviews. On the one hand, it seems like he' s sort of being stifled and punished by Sega for losing so much money on Shenmue. On the other hand, his games were the ones that made Sega so prominent to begin with. I' d love to hear the man speak candidly about whatever has been going on, but will that ever happen?

He should leave Sega and make other games untill they can sort themselves out.

Change is inevitable. Except from a vending machine.

Viva La Revolution! erm, I mean Viva La Wii!

I agree with you guys. It' s been too long since he released something and appeared at Western shows.

I think that we should see something from him soon really. If not, they' re probably just giving him some projects to keep him busy without ever releasing any of it. Kind of like Nintendo did with one of their employees before, if I remember correctly.
I did gather from interviews that he seems like a loyal person and stayed at Sega because he was grateful for the chances he got there. But maybe he should leave now, the company has changed a lot since then after all.
As you said Zoy, it seems like the man is being punished for Shenmue selling less than expected. While Sega should blame themselves partly for it. Besides that he did indeed create a lot of stellar games so they should be thankful.

I hope we get an update on the Shenmue situation soon. Shenmue Online is a no show this year at the China Games show. This has left me to wonder what Yu Suzuki is doing now at Sega. It' s been 3 years since Shenmue Online was announced. Maybe it' s time to do a follow up on that Shenmue next gen article. This series deserves better then the state its at now....

Shenmue is dead, Yu Suzuki is dead, Sega is dead. Accept it. Move on with your lifes.

I hope Shenmue Online never sees the light of day. Judging by Phantasy Star Online, it' d be a very bad idea and inferior to the original in every single possible way (even the worst Phantasy Star game is about a trillion times better than the best Phantasy Star Online game). Shenmue Online can go to hell.

Shenmue 3, however, really needs to be made. Sega of Japan' s CEOs have never been very bright. Sega of America only employs those whose IQ is below 56. Nobody gives a rat' s ass about Sega of Europe. It' s no surprise Sega is where they are now.

I' m still waiting for Sword of Vermilion 2, Suzuki!!

I really like to know Adam Doree' s comment?
does he think that Suzuki san is still at SEGA?!!!

We really need an update about Yu Suzuki & his current position.
seriously! I' m not talking only about Shenmue! I want to know
what the hell is happening to one of the best game developers!

We can' t sit and watch what SEGA-SAMMY are doing with him!
didn' t he made SEGA famous???

Suzuki san to SEGA is like Miyamoto san to Nintendo.

Regards-Alimn

NW' s Shenmue, Yakuza and VF5 site!
http://www.novinworks.com/shenmue.htm

hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm



BAH!!

Me want shenmue!!!

Even if you break 2 legs from a crab it still runs!
What you gotta do is find its weak spot and do massive damage at it.

Shenmue is dead, Yu Suzuki is dead, Sega is dead.

Not quite, but they certainly haven' t been doing well the last couple of years. Just take VF5 as an example. It should have been a return to VF3' s uneven surfaces with more advanced collision detection, and the fast-paced nature of VF4. Sadly what we got was VF4 with mix of VF3 gameplay combined.

Not a bad combination, and better than VF4, but it feels slightly stalled and other than the visuals and new musical style, not the great leap many fans were expecting. (I love VF5 though, really the best since VF3) That doesn' t excuse the lack of innovation which this gen was crying out to see from such a franchise.

VF5 however was awesome so I can' t complain too much, though when I see Let' s Go Jungle it all falls apart. Whilst it looks alright, it plays like a poor mans Lost Word arcade, and isn' t likely to succeed in any territory.

Other than OutRun2 (both versions), HOTD4, After Burner Climax, and VF5, SEGA haven' t done all that many great games at all in the last few years. The above would be considered one year' s worth of arcade entertainment back in 1997.

I was hoping that the new Euro-based Driving Studio could recapture some of the earlier SEGA magic, but after hearing that the team working on Sega Rally is now aiming at 30fps for the final game, rather than 60fps, I' m not so sure.

The standards have dropped, and SEGA need some creative freedom with their teams and a driving force to make some of the most fun, immersive and innovative technologically advanced games out there. Just like in 1993-2002.

Hell you can use the Sega Bass fishing rod on DC for Virtua Tennis, making it play like the Wii Sports tennis, but with control over character movement as well. That' s forward thinking.

VF5 however was awesome

It is awesome!

Not sure if your a die hard fan or just a fan. (heh, theres a difference) But I do find it odd that you liked Vf3 better than 4? (did you ever play VF4 FT? BTW).

SEGA went back to the flat arena style for 2 main reasons:

To concentrate on having extremely tight collision without the complexity of layers (probably causing too much problems)

The Fans / Playtesters Demanded Flat arenas back (A bunch of the ' Famous' Professional Japanese VF players had alot of input on both VF4 and 5.

I do love Vf3 myself but i think 4 is a more realised polished fighter.

The standards have dropped, and SEGA need some creative freedom with their teams and a driving force to make some of the most fun, immersive and innovative technologically advanced games out there. Just like in 1993-2002.

Yeah, it' ahsame, It seems Dreamcast was SEGA' s last Attempt (too many creative games on that plattform).. and it just got slapped back in thier faces.. SEGA was like ' Ok, F^%K you' , you want Playstation Fasion and EA, w' ere gonna give you that shit from from now on' - Creative side gone..




As for Yu Suzuki..

The only company Good enough for him or the thing that would make me more happy, is to see him set up his own division within Nintendo.

Currently playing:
Korg DS 10 (ds) /  Metal Slug 7 (ds)
Rhythm Heaven (ds) /  Fire Emblem (ds)
Super Stardust HD (psn) /  Virtua Fighter 5 (360)
FSX (P

After seeing how Sonic & Mario at the Olympics is shaping up (and considering that Miyamoto is directly involved with that game) I seriously don' t want to see any Sega folks working with Nintendo together anymore.

On topic:

Well I think we should finally stop crying after Sega. I even go as far as saying that even if Yu Suzuki would make another Shenmue I seriously doubt it would be as good as it' s predecessors, simply because the fans would expect a game in the vein of Shenmue 1 & 2 while Sega would be interested in making sure the game appeals to many people. Therefore it would end up being some weird " good" game, and not the master piece it' s supposed to be. (Like with Deus Ex 2 which is quite a good game - but only if you don' t compare it to DX1)

After seeing how Sonic & Mario at the Olympics is shaping up (and considering that Miyamoto is directly involved with that game) I seriously don' t want to see any Sega folks working with Nintendo together anymore.

Eh?? I wouldnt use that as an example. What SEGA Developers are involved with that? Miyamoto is only looking over the project. Also How good does one expect a Sonic & Mario Sports game to be???

The Only Game that SEGA and Nintendo Properly Worked together on, is F-ZERO GX and that is one of the finest racer' s ever created.

Currently playing:
Korg DS 10 (ds) /  Metal Slug 7 (ds)
Rhythm Heaven (ds) /  Fire Emblem (ds)
Super Stardust HD (psn) /  Virtua Fighter 5 (360)
FSX (P

I expect the game to be damn more fun than any other party game out there. Including established series like Mario Party.

And well, as far as I know, F-Zero GX was also solely Sega' s project. Miyamoto was supervising it and the only other Nintendo guy that worked on the game has been the guy that also designed the other F-Zero games.

Sega did F-Zero better than Nintendo possibly ever could... and Nintendo did an awesome job on their F-Zeros. Sega took a great Nintendo idea and made it better. So the two can make good things happen.

The real Sega died along with the Dreamcast.

Change is inevitable. Except from a vending machine.

Viva La Revolution! erm, I mean Viva La Wii!

Does it matter? Sega died years ago on the day the last Dreamcast was manufactured.

The real Sega died along with the Dreamcast.

Yep, it died along the dreamcast, gone are sega' s good days, Fortunatly there are many excellent developers today and many of the old ones kept up their quality standards, such as capcom and konami.

Shenmue is not considered a masterpiece in the industry except to some few people. Gamerankings shows a score of 89%, masterpieces get at least 93%, you can check that yourself. While this score means that it' s a good game, this is no Masterpiece, You should also know that part of this high score is due to the Gigantic leap forward in graphics... so Leave this word " masterpiece" to games like zelda, resident evil, metal gear, soul calibur and much more...

Dreamcast has many great innovative titles (most of them were by sega itself) , few terrible games but most of them fit the arcad style, it lacked cruely of true AAA console games, i might name them all:

Shenmue (for you fans)
Code Veronica
Ecco' s dolphine
Grandia II
Skies of the Arcadia

and basta i think or you can even add double that if you wish, it' s still terribly few...

In the glorious days of the Playstation, sony had a huge library of AAA titles and Playstation 2 followed suit after its first " terrible" year... Obviously Dreamcast would fail.

Sega today is a shitty developer, and i respect EA much more than Sega as the former keeps a good quality in their games neverthless. I might add that Sony might be considered as the best First party developer, God of war, ICO , shadow of the colossus, Wipeout , loco roco, Gran turismo (POlyphonie: 2nd party ? ), Sly, Socom... Sony deserves all the success it had up to PS3 launch. Nintendo is also excellent and if some think it' s the best 1st party i would NOT object. Mario, zelda Metroid are Masterpieces... the bas thing about nintendo is that it' s whoring mario like never before and i hate that, and compared to sony it doesn' t have many great IP' s.

will Shenmue 3 ever be released ? May be , but then Sega or whichever would be buying the franchise should make the Core gameplay different than shenmue 1 and 2 to succeed.

Leave this word " masterpiece" to games like zelda, resident evil, metal gear, soul calibur and much more...

With the exception of Soul Calibur and maybe Resident Evil 4, I use the phrase " diarrhea inducing" to describe those games. Also, it' s funny that you describe Soul Calibur as a masterpiece with this list, but somehow it didn' t find its way into your list of AAA Dreamcast games?

Shenmue might not be a masterpiece as a game because it had its flaws.
But as a human accomplishment it sure is a masterpiece.

I seriously don' t want to see any Sega folks working with Nintendo together anymore.

I dont know, they might be able to make a decent Sonic and Mario game if they actually tried. The olympics game looks like a gimmick. I bet if they were to keep making games with both sonic and mario in them they will eventually do like they did with crash bandicoot and spyro when they put Crash in a Spyro game and vice versa

....Nah, they need to just stop making sega games and let it atleast die with some dignity

Can' t the make a cross-over RPG like Kingdom hearts or something. That' d be cool.

After the sonic RPG is made, then they could make Mario RPG(With sonic characters) then make paper sonice(with mario characters) I think I would cry if that happened

I don' t want to see Sonic in any game unless it' s 2D and it goes really fast.


EDIT: Even then I wouldn' t play it.

but somehow it didn' t find its way into your list of AAA Dreamcast games?

My list was about AAA games that were not from the arcades... otherwise SOul Calibur on dreamcast was hell of an AAA title.

Can we just stop using the term AAA. It' s driving me insane.

Not sure if your a die hard fan or just a fan. (heh, theres a difference) But I do find it odd that you liked Vf3 better than 4? (did you ever play VF4 FT? BTW).

Well I would consider my self a hardcore VF fan. Used to play for hours on end back when VF2 came out, and did the same and more for 3. Afterwards I played VF for at least a hour a day overall, and do VF5 for about 40 mins these days. It' s kinda a love and obsession, (restricted by time) I guess, though I' m out of practice compared to when I played for hours when still at college.

In term of raw gameplay I would agree that I found Final Tuned more enjoyable and tighter in many respects, same for Evo also. However VF for me isn' t just about how well it plays, but how realistic it can get in the realm of a perfectly playable fighting game environment. So that means arenas that look like locals not seperated from everything else, with uneven surfaces on some areas or flat ground on others.

I was hoping that VF5 would at least bridge the gap more between 4 and 3.

SEGA went back to the flat arena style for 2 main reasons:

To concentrate on having extremely tight collision without the complexity of layers (probably causing too much problems)

The Fans / Playtesters Demanded Flat arenas back (A bunch of the ' Famous' Professional Japanese VF players had alot of input on both VF4 and 5.

I too noticed this going back and playing VF3. Sometimes performing a split-sec timed, counter combo upwards of the undulating surface would cause inconsistancies in collision, and thus sometimes really getting in the way. Especially if the path lead straight into a wall, with a slight glitch making the attacked character suddenly snap down to the floor quicker than usual.

Apparently the physics used in VF3 were more advanced in terms of coliision than for VF4 of 5. And I can see why.

Still with 4 years between VF4 and 5 (not counting Evo and FT) I think they could have really made some headway with these problems regardless on what certain high level players thought about it. Otherwise the series could become stale, and eventually lose much of it' s popularity like the King Of Fighters series (thought that was as much down to poor playmore noobie devs, than repetition of the game engine).

Anyway I' m just glad that VF is still awesome and not been ruined like some SEGA franchises. But bring back the undulation, more advanced physics etc. Prove to the players it can be done. After all Yu Suzuki has stated before that he wasn' t happy with VF3 completely, and would have liked more time to iron out the issues, not too mention boost the Model 3 step 1 power to step 2 at the time, due to the game being slightly downgraded from expectations.

SEGA management however, wanted the game out earlier to continue to show their arcade tech dominance.

Some articles in reply to some posts:

Why video game reviews suck?

http://www.destructoid.com/why-video-game-reviews-suck-part-two-30412.phtml
http://www.destructoid.com/why-video-game-reviews-suck-part-one-30369.phtml
(so, please don' t judge about all video games just based on reviews, scores & etc)

Why SEGA was years ahead of its time? " GAME' s RADAR feature"

http://shenmue.planets.gamespy.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=33772
(Online gaming? Motion Sensitivity? & much more!)

The rise and fall of the Dreamcast

http://www.computerandvideogames.com/article.php?id=161538

One of the most memorable consoles yet,
not only because of masterpieces like Shenmue!,
remember Jet Grind Radio!, Seaman, REZ,
SEGA Bass Fishing, F355 Challenge, Soul Calibur 1,
Dead Or Alive 2(the real base of today DOA games), Virtua Tennis,
Virtua Fighter 3tb, Sonic Adventure 1, Crazy Taxi, Skies Of Arcadia
& much more...
(If we remember Soul Calibur 1
& keep this in mind that AM2 knew DC' s hardware better than Namco
then we can easily believe that VF4DC could be a DC game with better textures
& anti-aliasing in comparing with the PS2 version, but unfortunately DC died!)

The Evolution Of " Virtua Fighter"


(As you know VF was the first 3D Fighting game based on martial arts!
not Tekken, DOA, Soul Calibur & etc)

Anyway, I believe if Yu Suzuki is about to leave SEGA,
he should go to some where like Capcom or " Seeds!"
As you know Seeds is an independent video game development company.
It was founded on August 1, 2006 by Shinji Mikami(Resident Evil), Atsushi Inaba(Okami) and Hideki Kamiya(Okami),
the former key members of Capcom' s Clover Studio
and still retains many other former members of the studio.
Yu Suzuki can be the biggest name in their company
because he always like to create new things!

As for SEGA' s future, well, with upcoming SEGA games like
NiGHTS:JOD Wii, VF5 360, Ghost Squad Wii, SEGA RALLY Next Gen & PSP,
Golden Axe Next Gen, Crazy Texi:Fare Wars PSP, Ryu Ga Gotoku 3,
Seaman 2 &... it seems they are still alive!

but they really need to do more, Jet Set Radio 2, Street Of Rage 4,
Panzer Dragoon Next Gen, Skies Of Arcadia Next Gen and
of course, Shenmue III...

Regards-Alimn

NW' s Shenmue, Yakuza and VF5 site!
http://www.novinworks.com/shenmue.htm

Dude you know the image showing VF3 is really flawed.[:' (]

The game has no gouraud shading in the pic, when it does in the actual game, and some other effects are missing too. Yes I know it' s from MAME, but it still can' t emulate Model 3 yet.

How about this:



From the DC version so isn' t perfect unfortunitely, but you get the idea.

^ I remember that VF 3 was a revolutionary game from a technical standpoint, with its detailed graphics in it' s time.

now even VF5' s graphics is much better than Tekken 6 and Soul Calibur IV' s graphics.

Edit:I just changed that " The Evolution Of VF" image.
now the image is showing VF3 TB(DC).


Regards-Alimn

NW' s Shenmue, Yakuza and VF5 site!
http://www.novinworks.com/shenmue.htm

Can we just stop using the term AAA. It' s driving me insane.

Hehe, funny that you mention this. Recently, I had been thinking about the fact that AAA gets used more often these days.

And about Shenmue' s score. It did get very good reviews in general. It' s just not a game for everyone so the score on metacritic.com got dragged down by " Hot Games" and " Gamespot" who found it tedious. It is an adventure game after all so of course it will involve asking questions etc. It would be like giving an FPS a bad score because it' s tedious to just have some weapons and shoot all the time. Each genre should be judged after what it tries to achieve I think.
Besides that, Gamespot changed their 6.8 score (used on metacritic) to 7.8 actually.

ORIGINAL: Abasoufiane

Shenmue is not considered a masterpiece in the industry except to some few people. Gamerankings shows a score of 89%, masterpieces get at least 93%, you can check that yourself. While this score means that it' s a good game, this is no Masterpiece, You should also know that part of this high score is due to the Gigantic leap forward in graphics... so Leave this word " masterpiece" to games like zelda, resident evil, metal gear, soul calibur and much more...

You surely mean Resident Evil 4, then? Cause all the other Resident Evil games are no masterpieces by your definition. Who the hell actually said that a game has to be rated 93% to be considered a master piece anyway?

Dreamcast has many great innovative titles (most of them were by sega itself) , few terrible games but most of them fit the arcad style, it lacked cruely of true AAA console games, i might name them all:

Shenmue (for you fans)
Code Veronica
Ecco' s dolphine
Grandia II
Skies of the Arcadia

Hmm how come you decide THOSE games are " AAA" titles anyway? I mean if we look at your definition of a good game (=good ratings) we get a lot more exclusive " AAA" games. Like Virtua Tennis, Jet Grind Radio or Sonic Adventure.

In the glorious days of the Playstation, sony had a huge library of AAA titles and Playstation 2 followed suit after its first " terrible" year... Obviously Dreamcast would fail.

If we look once again at your definition of a good game (=good ratings) the PS2, evan after it' s terrible first year, didn' t actually overtook Dreamcast when it comes to the amount of " AAA" -titles (I seriously hate AAA!). It took PS2 until it' s third year to accomplish this, which, considering that the Dreamcast only lasted for little more over 2 years, puts them actually at least on par.

First of all, i Noticed lately that there is a trend in this forum, " AAA" is not cool anymore to say ! just waw, i don' t give a flying *** about that , it' s just a specific word for awesome in the video game industry, we mean by that " great gameplay, great graphic, good ideas, good control, great animation, great story" that' s what we mean by AAA , or at least most of those should be great.

You surely mean Resident Evil 4, then? Cause all the other Resident Evil games are no masterpieces by your definition. Who the hell actually said that a game has to be rated 93% to be considered a master piece anyway?

I was not talking about resident evil 1 or 2 or 4, but the series in general that has been great since day one, and how can u diss resident evil 1, this is one of the most revolutionary titles back at the time, i was just too much impressed like a looot of people , critics included... that was the game that really made the fanbase we know today, then you add the second sequel and code veronica or even nemesis which wasn' t that impressive but still meet resident evil standards.

In www.gamerankings.com , all great AAA titles has at least 90% in score, THIS IS NOT A FACT just my pick as i made a post long time ago, shoowed all the games that got above 90% and many peopele here agreed with me...

check out all the big names, the masterpieces, check their scores, and come back, almost all of them got above 93%... from metroid and zelda to resident evil 4, oblivion, metal gear.... you might object for some games, but when it gets down to 89% THIS IS DEFINITLY NOT VIEWED AS A MASTERPIECE, AT LEAST NOT AS A GAME masterpiece.

Hmm how come you decide THOSE games are " AAA" titles anyway? I mean if we look at your definition of a good game (=good ratings) we get a lot more exclusive " AAA" games. Like Virtua Tennis, Jet Grind Radio or Sonic Adventure.

Sonic is NO AAA title my friend, MARIO 64 walks all over it , MARIO 64 yes ! Sonic got 87% ===> camera problems, dull gameplay in many levels can' t remember what else was wrong.

Virtua tennis is an arcade game, YES it' s AAA all over it back at the time but... i mean you know for god' s sake this is not a game that will sell a console ...

same thing for JET Grind radio.

It took PS2 until it' s third year to accomplish this, which, considering that the Dreamcast only lasted for little more over 2 years, puts them actually at least on par.

Third year , is this some kind of a joke, PS2 by its third year was banging hard, in its second year , it has games like Metal Gear solid 2 and final Fantasy 10, ICO, silent hill 2, jax and dexter, gran turismo 3 and much more, all 2001 releases... third yeaaar come on !!! PS2 wiped out the floor with dreamcast in its second year . PLaystation 2 is a legendary console and i hope Microsoft won' t disapoint me this Gen as for now i own a 360.

I don' t care about either the label AAA or how succesful a console is because my taste seems to be different from most other people.
I don' t care how many AAA titles the PS2 got or how many consoles it sold, I still had more fun with my Gamecube. I read some article (Kikizo was it?) that said that Gamecube owners spent more time actually playing games than other console owners. I draw the conclusion that it' s because the games kicked ass and the Gamecube was awesome

gamecube ?! HOW ? have u owned a ps2 ?

Gamecube is still a much better console than Dreamcast anyway

I was not talking about resident evil 1 or 2 or 4, but the series in general that has been great since day one, and how can u diss resident evil 1, this is one of the most revolutionary titles back at the time, i was just too much impressed like a looot of people , critics included... that was the game that really made the fanbase we know today, then you add the second sequel and code veronica or even nemesis which wasn' t that impressive but still meet resident evil standards.

In www.gamerankings.com , all great AAA titles has at least 90% in score, THIS IS NOT A FACT just my pick as i made a post long time ago, shoowed all the games that got above 90% and many peopele here agreed with me...

check out all the big names, the masterpieces, check their scores, and come back, almost all of them got above 93%... from metroid and zelda to resident evil 4, oblivion, metal gear.... you might object for some games, but when it gets down to 89% THIS IS DEFINITLY NOT VIEWED AS A MASTERPIECE, AT LEAST NOT AS A GAME masterpiece.

Well, why do you judge that the whole Resident Evil series is a masterpiece? RE4 is the only one that got >90% if we look at gamerankings.com so all the other games are maybe " good" or " ok" , but no master-friggin-piece.

Sonic is NO AAA title my friend, MARIO 64 walks all over it , MARIO 64 yes ! Sonic got 87% ===> camera problems, dull gameplay in many levels can' t remember what else was wrong.

Virtua tennis is an arcade game, YES it' s AAA all over it back at the time but... i mean you know for god' s sake this is not a game that will sell a console ...

same thing for JET Grind radio.

Yeah but my main point was that you included games like Ecco the Dolphin or Grandia II, calling them AAA games, while games like Sonic or JGR got much better ratings on GameRankings. And well, if Sonic is no AAA, why is Sonic Adventure the best sold Dreamcast game?

Third year , is this some kind of a joke, PS2 by its third year was banging hard, in its second year , it has games like Metal Gear solid 2 and final Fantasy 10, ICO, silent hill 2, jax and dexter, gran turismo 3 and much more, all 2001 releases... third yeaaar come on !!! PS2 wiped out the floor with dreamcast in its second year .

Once again, I was using holy GameRankings.com as my source. And if we compare Dreamcast game ratings to PS2 ratings, after 2 years, the Dreamcast has got MORE games that have been rated >90% than PS2.



Anyway, the moral of the story: It' s obvious I often referenced GameRankings.com. But to be honest, I don' t give a shit about what a bunch of critics rated a game. I mean it' s absolutely hilarious to call a game a masterpiece cause it scored over 93%, and deny that title another game cause it scored, like 92.9999999%. (For example: Grim Fandago, Okami, Metal Gear Solid 1, Chrono Cross or Final Fantasy 7) I just wanted to point out the stupidty of saying that a game has to break that magic 93% barrier or otherwise it' s no masterpiece.

ok 93% , i really just picked it up, i didn' t do any " research" , it was an estimation , this thing bthat is for sure for me are the games that get above 90% are all great and should be played... Dreamcast has many of those but MOST of them were arcad games, games for quick fun like crazy taxi for exemple, awesome game but if you are not an occasional gamer , you want the big guns like the games i mentioned above...

Resident evil code veronica on dreamcast (the original release) got 93.5 %

Resident evil on Game cube got 90 % , the original one is too old to be ranked in gamerankings , it' s not even the same reviews as back then , but if the gamecube got 90% , how much the original resident evil on PSONE could have get?

No score was given for resident evil 2 on PSone (too old)

the third one as i said is not impressive, a bit of letdown (and i swear i didn' t even look at gamerankings) , it got 87 % and it soemwhat deserve it , well i' ll give it 89% but anyway

what i wanted to show is that gamerankings is the best site for me to get a good idea if the game is great or not, if it is above 90% and if its your genre , you should probably go for it blindfolded.

and sorry about that grandia II, i thought people consider it as an AAA titles ( i didn' t ) still i think it' s pretty close and it' s a great game that i beat and enjoyed it.

Evilkiller, Gameranking for me is not the holiest of holies , for me it' s the best score out there on the internet you can get, may be there are some screw up (i should find them yet) but this is just a great website.

I do have the impression that you want to contradict me just for the sake of it, i still don' t get your point, up to the end of 2002, do you consider Dreamcast better than PLaystation 2? read ps2 2001 releases and please try to answer this question. also do you think that Shenmue is a masterpiece , that is " excellent" in almost everyway

Well only thing I wanted to point is that I think it' s stupid to judge a game if you only look at some websites scores. No offense intended.

(too lazy to use quote tags. " " is what you said)

" and sorry about that grandia II, i thought people consider it as an AAA titles ( i didn' t ) still i think it' s pretty close and it' s a great game that i beat and enjoyed it."

Well, see, that' s the point. You enjoyed it, you think it' s an AAA game. That' s fine (and I won' t contradict, mostly because in my opinion any game that is fun and offers enjoyment is a triple A game). See, me and a few other guys enjoyed Shenmue, we consider it a masterpiece - so what' s wrong with that? Why isn' t that fine?

" Evilkiller, Gameranking for me is not the holiest of holies , for me it' s the best score out there on the internet you can get, may be there are some screw up (i should find them yet) but this is just a great website."

Well, I didn' t say it' s not. I just said I don' t think you should base your judgement purely on a few numbers. I myself also visit GameRankings very often though I primarly use it as a link list if I want to read some reviews about a game.

" I do have the impression that you want to contradict me just for the sake of it, i still don' t get your point, up to the end of 2002, do you consider Dreamcast better than PLaystation 2? read ps2 2001 releases and please try to answer this question. also do you think that Shenmue is a masterpiece , that is " excellent" in almost everyway"


As for PS2 line-up:
Well, for me there have been some major disappointments in the 2001 line-up. Take for example FFX. In my opinion that game is, by far, the worst FF ever. Or MGS2, I simply think that game was too cinematic in my opinion and made me play with Raiden. Makes it the worst MGS so far imo. The only three 2001 games I think are really excellent are GTA III, Gran Turismo 3 and Ico. And yes, I think there wss still a high enough quantity of Dreamcast games that are on par with that line-up (But, as I pointed out, for me, 2 of the supposedly strongest titles in that line-up were big disappointments.)


As for Shenmue:
If we look at it from a solely video game point of view, I' d have to say no. Yes, I admit, if we look at it from that angle it' s has some issues. But well, so do have other games that are considered masterpieces (Take Resident Evil for example. Those controls are really, really awful. Or SotC, the game is basically one boss fight after another. And while the fights itself are really fun, riding to them is somewhat boring. And we also get that unsatisfying ending.). But if you look at the bigger picture, this (and the other games I picked out as examples) offers something very special. A very intense atmosphere, a special flair, a world that offers you the possibility to get completely lost in it (in a positive sense), peppered with many small details that simply amaze you.

In Resident Evil it' s for example that intense horror atmosphere. Imagine the RE gameplay but without that ambience - would you still consider it a masterpiece? No, you wouldn' t, because this flair is exactly what defines RE. Not knowing what awaits you in the next room, wince at small sounds, being constantly afraid - that' s why people play Resident Evil. That' s what makes it a masterpiece.

Well only thing I wanted to point is that I think it' s stupid to judge a game if you only look at some websites scores. No offense intended.

I played all the games i mentioned above and i beat most of them, i beat all resident evil games ALL except that survivor gun crap. i owned dreamcast and played most of its good/great games and beat shenmue . THAT IS WHY i could trust Gamerankings as the score does not Contradict my opinion, So when darkness GOT 83% i was very disapointed as i know FOR SURE that this is NOT THE GREAT TITLE i was so expecting.

Resident evil is considered a masterpiece not only for its atmosphere (which is totaly awesome) but the graphics at the time were very impressive, even when it moved to 3D on dreamcast, it was a blast and carried that way to the amazing 2D on gamecubes and last Resident evil 4... Moreover, it has attaching characters, beautiful art design, nice bosses, Awesome cut scenes and i looove those puzzles... see how many ingredients?

FFX for me is one of the best final fantasy out there, Graphics, Awesome system Battles, GREAT Cut scenes, Music, loved the story... Sadly it lacked " somewhat" the open huge world found in other final fantasies

Final fantasy 12 is the worst IMO but still a great game (played and beat from 6 to 12 )

Yeah well I didn' t like any of the PS2 Final Fantasy. Somehow the characters didn' t appeal to me. Just can' t emphasize with guys like Tidus. I still think the SNES FFs have been the best.

As for RE:
Well, I know that RE is made up of more than just gameplay and atmosphere (Though I' d count puzzles to gameplay) but what I wanted to point out is that the atmosphere is the one thing that defines RE the most.


As for The Darkness:
Well it has some big issues (stupid AI, confusing at times) which explain the low ratings but you should rent it at least. I rented and enjoyed it very much, even though it took me only 9 hours to beat it.