My Yu Suzuki Interview Part 3

Here is the conclusion of my 2000 Game Developers Conference interview with Yu Suzuki...

PART 3

THE FUTURE

GameWEEK: Are you trying to focus at all on networking? Broadband?

Yu Suzuki: I am not focused on bandwidth but I am interested in networking. Rather than width, I am concentrating on latency. With the right compression techniques you do not need large bandwidth. We can still do more with narrowband.

GW: Do you see any latency breakthroughs in the near future?

YS: (starts doodling a sketch of the Earth) Light is the fastest speed known. But even light can only go around the world 7.5 times in one second. We are limited. If you find something that is faster, please let me know! (laughs) Really though, to play Virtua Fighter against someone on the other side of the planet is not possible.

More notes by Suzuki-san. Note the "Earth" doodle

and the number "7.5"

GW: What inspires you?

YS: I watch many movies -- lately, around 30 each month. My all-time favorite is Cassablanca. "Bogey" is the best! I like The Matrix too, although doing that as a game would be very difficult... almost impossible. One other movie I enjoy is Die-Hard. That would be an exciting game, don't you think? I do not usually watch movies for enjoyment but I do study them to aid in my research.

Yu Suzuki is a big fan of the movie Die-Hard

and thinks it would translate into a great video game.

Sega did eventually publish Die-Hard Arcade
but that game had little to do with the actual movie

GW: What do you think of PlayStation 2? X-Box?

YS: (pauses) PlayStation 2 is good at games like Ridge Racer V and Kessen. Lots of motion capability. A game like Shenmue however, would be almost impossible to do on it since it needs to rely heavily on texture memory. X-Box? It sounds very impressive.

GW: Do you like the hard-drive on X-Box?

YS: The hard-drive does not really interest me. You do not need that as much as you need the rendering power.

GW: What can you tell us about Hikaru, Sega's new arcade board? How much more powerful is it than Naomi -- one and a half times, perhaps?

YS: Hikaru is a lot more powerful than that; a lot more powerful than Naomi. (looks at Sega publicist) I would like to tell you but I cannot say more than that right now.

GW: How many total chapters do you think we'll see in the Shenmue series?

YS: Chapters are different from game releases. Shenmue 2 will probably cover chapter two through six.

A scene from Shenmue 2. The game was published

as a Dreamcast title in Europe and as an X-Box game

here in North America

GW: How many releases total, though, do you think?

YS: I do not know yet.

GW: Can you tell us anything about Shenmue 2?

YS: As you probably know, it takes place in Hong Kong. Currently, we are doing tests on what can be done. Shenmue -- the first game -- is a child. By that, I mean it is the first game of its kind that we have done, so it will mature over time. Things you will see in Shenmue 2 will be very much improved -- graphics, gameplay... everything. I am saying 50 characters on screen at one time! There will also be much more action and a faster pace. We are working on new ways to get more out of Dreamcast, which I cannot reveal at this time. Shenmue 2 will demonstrate this, though. By Shenmue 3, I will turn the first game into a dinosaur!

As the interview ended and we gathered our things, Yu Suzuki's translator pulled me to the side and said, "He really likes you. He likes the questions you ask and he says you know so much about Sega. He wants to know if you would like to talk more outside." Naturally I accepted the offer. Once outside the convention center Suzuki-san offered me a cigarette and a chance to ask more questions. "He is happy to answer more of your questions," the translator said.

Smoking our cigarettes, Yu Suzuki and I continued our conversation with the translator present. We talked about everything from movies and games to sports cars and women; all the stuff two guys talk about when they're hanging out. Much to my surprise, he asked me for my honest opinion regarding Dreamcast and its position in the North American market. I voiced my concerns. Suzuki-san also said he wanted to tell me a secret -- on the condition I would not divulge it in print. I gave my word.

It is now 2010 so I feel I can safely speak of the secret. Suzuki-san explained that Dreamcast was underperforming and looked to be in trouble. He also told me that Sega was working on games for the X-Box... and that Shenmue 2 and even Shenmue 3 would likely be X-Box exclusives! I could not believe he was telling me this.

As we shook hands to part ways, Suzuki-san extended an invitation for me to stay at his residence should I visit Japan in the future. I had actually bonded with one of my idols. It was surreal.

My Yu Suzuki Interview Part 2

It was March of 2000. As my great friend and editor Ben Rinaldi and I sat across the table from Yu Suzuki during the Game Developer's Conference in San Jose, we couldn't help but become enamored. Here was a man who literally helped change the course of video game development with titles like Hang-On, Space Harrier, Virtua Fighter -- and now, Shenmue! Through his translator and publicist, Tomoaki Inoue, Suzuki-san very pleasantly answered questions and offered his perspective on gaming in general...

PART 2

COMING TO AMERICA

GameWEEK: You are directly overseeing the localization of Shenmue, is that correct?

Yu Suzuki: Yes, that is correct.

GW: Are there American voice actors involved?

YS: Yes. There are subtitles, but there are also English voice-overs for all of the 350 characters. We auditioned and came up with 200 voice actors for these roles.

A cut scene in Shenmue

Shenmue: A world so rich and detailed,

even the soda machines are operational

GW: What about all of the signs and nameplates? Will they be changed to read in English?

YS: In the American version, when you view a nameplate, it zooms in close and reads in Japanese, but there is also a subtitle below in English. The street maps are in Japanese and English.

Notes written by Yu Suzuki during the interview

GETTING DOWN TO BUSINESS

GW: What is it like to work for the console market, versus the arcade market?

YS: For Shenmue -- for console -- the main difference was the size of the team. There are other differences though. To do arcade titles we have to look at a lot of things like motion control and cabinet design, for example.

GW: Arcade or console... do you have a preference?

YS: Designing for both console and arcade is a lot of fun. When I made F355 Challenge for the arcade, I was able to go to the circuit to gather data. I went to Maranello to meet with the Ferrari people. Not only that, but there was a great restaurant across the street from Ferrari headquarters! (laughs)

GW: When might we see F355 Challenge on Dreamcast?

YS: (Sega publicist quickly jumps in to discourage a response) I cannot say that right now.

NOTE: Not long after this interview I was able to pry the truth regarding F355 Challenge out of an industry friend... Acclaim (or Ack-lame as I used to refer to them) had contracted to publish the game. I can't recall why this was the case, maybe low sales expectations on Sega's part?

F355 Challenge was a beautiful Dreamcast game

and -- with the exception of not being rendered on

three screens -- faithful to the arcade version in many ways

GW: Outrun was a popular game in America. Might we see a sequel sometime?

YS: (glances at Sega publicist) Uh, next question? (laughs)

GW: How many projects do you oversee at any one time?

YS: No more than two at once so I can stay directly involved.

GW: Are there any differences in the work environment since CSK Corporation took AM2 under its wing?

YS: Not many. I am currently trying to come up with a new company name.

GW: What are your feelings about the decline of the arcade market?

YS: The small, dirty places in Japan will disappear soon. The big, clean locations will survive. This will actually benefit Sega. (referring to places like GameWorks in the U.S.) Sega is also planning to connect locations with fiber optic lines to offer network play. I'm not sure when that's going to happen, but... (Sega publicist jumps in again) Uh, I did read in the paper recently that our president said he has a goal in mind...

GW: Would that goal be sometime this year?

YS: Not too far away.

GW: Sega's arcade divisions -- AM2, for example -- have always been known for innovation. Suzuki-san, you've contributed so many unique gameplay concepts and many times others imitate those concepts. You do Afterburner, Namco does Ace Combat. You do Virtua Fighter, Namco does...

YS: I am glad you brought that up. After I completed the first Virtua Fighter for arcades, one of my leading members left to become a Namco employee. He also took a few programmers with him.

GW: Tekken...

YS: Yes, Tekken.

Tomorrow: Part 3, the final installment of my interview with Yu Suzuki

My Yu Suzuki Interview Part 1

While working in the video game industry I was incredibly fortunate for many reasons. To be perfectly honest it was dream come true, that's really the only way for me to describe it. Not only did I work with so many amazingly talented people, I made friends with dozens of awesome individuals who loved gaming as much as I did. I was also able to meet some of my heroes inside the industry; people like Shigeru Miyamoto, Dave Perry, Yuji Naka and Yu Suzuki.

When I was employed with GameWEEK as managing editor, I sat down to interview Sega's Yu Suzuki during the Game Developer's Conference in San Jose. It was, without question, one of the shining moments of my career and I will never forget it. As part of my salute to Shenmue and its 10-year anniversary, I decided to bring you that interview, originally conducted in March of 2000. It is broken down into three parts.

Here it is, part 1 of my GameWEEK Yu Suzuki interview...

PART 1

INTRODUCTION

Throughout all of the good times and bad times over the last fifteen years, Sega has owed much of its staying power to one man. His name is Yu Suzuki.

Graduating from The Okayama University of Science, Yu Suzuki joined Sega Enterprises in 1983 with an Electronic Science major in hand. It didn't take the young programmer very long to get noticed by company officials. Two years after starting his employment, he finished his very first arcade game, Hang-On. It was an instant success. Since that time, Sega's creative front man -- who turns 42 years-old this month -- has managed to come up with hit after hit for the coin-operated amusement industry, with many titles making their way to Sega's home consoles such as Genesis, Saturn and more recently, Dreamcast.

Currently positioned as corporate VP of software R&D, Suzuki is best known as the mastermind behind Sega's Virtua Fighter series. So much so, in fact, that The Smithsonian National Museum of American History has a Virtua Fighter cabinet on display in Washington D.C.

And then there's Shenmue, Sega's "do or die" Dreamcast game. Taking five years and a reported $40 million to produce, Shenmue is the most ambitious, most expensive video game ever assembled. A sort of "RPG/Adventure/Fighting" hybrid, the game was released in Japan late last year and was praised not only for its innovative approach, but its sheer size and scope. A four GD-ROM set, Shenmue is currently undergoing localization and is scheduled to release in the U.S. this fall.

A whole hell of a lot is riding on Shenmue's release in America and no one knows that better than Sega itself. How will gamers in this country react to Shenmue's unorthodox gameplay? How tightly will players embrace a game so heavily steeped in Japanese culture? No one knows for certain but in the meantime Suzuki was kind enough to sit down with GameWEEK for lunch during the recent Game Developer's Conference in San Jose. Here's what the "King of All Arcades" had to say...

THE PURSUIT OF REALITY

GameWEEK: What kind of feedback have you been getting so far from Shenmue players in your country?

Yu Suzuki: The fourth disc in Shenmue -- the Passport disc -- lets users go online to the Shenmue homepage and allows us to receive data from those users. We are getting a lot of feedback. Only one out of 30 responses has been negative. With the Passport disc, users can go in and leave specific comments regarding what they liked or what they did not about the game through the BBS we have in place (this will likely be the case with the U.S. version of Shenmue as well -Jim). Some users are telling us they would like the control to be improved in Shenmue 2. I will see to this.

GW: Are there things that you would have liked to include in the first chapter, but did not due to time constraints?

YS: There are many. Some of these we hope to include in Shenmue 2.

Shenmue's immersive world is like no other

GW: The sounds... dogs barking; children playing; the gurgling water from the Koi pond... did it take a long time to put it all together?

YS: Yes, it consumed a lot of time and data. I worked with many sound effects people in the movie industry (grabs a pen and begins to sketch on Sega company letterhead). Let's say there's a shop here playing music. Then there's a speaker attached to a pole down on this end of the street playing a different song. So when the character walks through here, you can actually feel the sound of one song fade and the the other song get louder. Let's say there's an icy spot, a snowy spot, a dirt spot, a concrete spot and a puddle. The sound of Ryo's footsteps changes as he walks over these different surfaces.

GW: With regard to realism, how far do we have to go to experience the ultimate "living world" in a game?

YS: I did not pursue realism. I pursued reality. It's different. (pauses) If I could pose a question to you, how many interesting or fun things happened to you last week?

GW: Very few.

YS: (smiles) Yes, that is realism. Realism is boring. In a game you have to have one exciting event at least every ten minutes to make it entertaining.

A DIFFERENT APPROACH

GW: The QTEs (Quick Timer Events)... we like them a lot. What's the feedback been on them? Will you continue to feature QTEs in future chapters?

YS: There are barely any negatives on the QTEs so we will probably include more in the future. The QTEs are very easy to grasp for all players.

An example of a QTE in Shenmue

GW: There was a bit of concern here in the states that the QTEs might be a bit unexciting, similar to the gameplay introduced with Dragon's Lair. Are you familiar with the laserdisc games of the mid 80's?

YS: Yes, I am familiar with the games you are referring to. For QTEs though, the options are more complex, and you can try over and over. For the type where you only get one chance, the timing is a bit broader, a bit easier. For QTEs the game branches off the story depending on the result. As you make each attempt at a QTE, the timing shifts so that if you fail, the next try will be a bit easier. This makes it totally different than Dragon's Lair-type games.

GW: The Free Battle system... there's a lot more complexity there. How satisfied were you with this portion of the game?

YS: Hmmm... sixty, maybe seventy percent. If I tailored it to the complexity of Virtua Fighter, normal people wouldn't be able to play it. The timing in a real fighting game is very critical (begins thumping his fingers on the table)... it's all about how fast you can react. An RPG is a game where you have to use your brain. Shenmue is a totally different type of game. Having a real, true type of fighting game in Shenmue would not be good. What I am saying here is that the Free Battle system in Shenmue is totally different from that of Virtua Fighter, so you can just randomly press buttons and win in Shenmue (starts pounding his fingers on the table at a frantic pace).

Virtua Fighter 2

GW: I understand... we refer to that as "button mashing" in the U.S. Was this done so that young children would be able to play as well?

YS: Yes, but most kids are pretty good already!

GW: Do you enjoy playing games?

YS: I do enjoy Puyo Puyo very much, but I do not have much time to play. I also like playing air hockey with my daughter. The games with the hammer and the little animals in the holes is a lot of fun, too!

GW: You need a Whack-A-Mole game in Shenmue 2!

YS: I will try!

The YOU Arcade in Shenmue

GW: The slot machines in Shenmue are very realistic...

YS: Yes. The payout rate is different for the machines. If you go to the fortune-teller, she will tell you your "lucky number" for the week, say, number 16. Then you can try that machine for better results. Every week the casino manager changes the payout rate. The slots were made with high accuracy. We've done enough tests to meet the standards of Las Vegas machines. They were tested 50,000 times. Of course, we had the computer do it! (laughs) Another thing... the jukebox in the game is the same model as the very first jukebox Sega ever made.

GW: Unbelievable. That is serious dedication.

YS: Going back to your earlier question about what I wanted to include in Shenmue, there is one thing I wanted to do but I did not have the time. There's a pool table in the back of the MJQ bar. I really wanted to make the perfect 9-ball. I love billiards and I would very much like to do that in Shenmue 2.

Tomorrow: Part 2 of my interview with Yu Suzuki

Shenmue... On Sega Saturn

Let me file this under "W" for WTF I DID NOT KNOW THIS.

Shenmue was published as a Sega Dreamcast game, by Sega, we all know this. But I just stumbled across (supposed) video footage of Shenmue running on — RUNNING ON SEGA SATURN HARDWARE! WHA--?

And sure as shit, here it is. It looks to be legit.



The Saturn was regarded as a fairly shitty system with paltry processing muscle but jesus, if that doesn't look amazing, all things considered.

I seem to remember Yu Suzuki saying something about the Shenmue series being originally planned for the Saturn platform but I never knew how far they got with it. I've certainly never seen footage of it! Maybe my time away from the games industry has put me more out of touch than I thought. This is a trip.

Does anyone out there know whether or not this footage is legit? I would love to know...

Shenmue Is 10 Years Old

On November 6th of this year, Shenmue (Sega, Dreamcast) will be ten years old — at least to gamers here in North America. The game was released in Japan in 1999 so technically Shenmue is already ten years old. Hard to believe.

The reason I even bring this up is due mainly to Sega's recent release of Yakuza 3 for the PlayStation 3. Yakuza 3 has me thinking a lot about Shenmue and just how great and special that game was for its time. Yu Suzuki introduced a lot of fresh ideas and he created the first game world you could feel as if you were actually living in. Not only were the graphics better than any other console game at that time, the gameplay was incredibly unique.

Shenmue on Dreamcast (Sega, 2000)

Yakuza 3 on PlayStation 3 (Sega, 2010)

I am not afraid to admit, Shenmue was not perfect. But even if you factor in some of the game's missteps — the lengthy cut scenes and terrible English voice dubbing to name two glaring examples — it was truly an amazing piece of work and way ahead of its time, thanks to one man: Sega's Yu Suzuki.

During my time at GameWeek I sat down to interview Yu Suzuki. It was one of the most memorable experiences of my life. Through his interpreter, Suzuki-san answered many questions I had regarding the state of Dreamcast, the creation of games, and the video game industry as a whole. It was almost an out-of-body experience to be sitting at a table with such a well respected game development icon and one of my personal idols. At the end of the interview, Suzuki-san joyfully signed my copy of Shenmue.

Yup, that was ten years ago. As part of my tribute to Yu Suzuki and his magnum opus, I am planning to post the interview, in its entirety, very soon.