Wednesday, April 21, 2021

Poll Result: Patrons' Choice Topic for April 2021

Every month Phantom River Stone holds a poll among our patrons to choose a topic for the blog in the coming month. After tallying the votes (including accumulated votes from previous months), the winning topic for April 2021 is...

"Characters in Shenmue Based on Real People"

Several characters that appear in Shenmue have models that were based on real-life people such as members of the development staff.

One of these, and perhaps the most well-known among fans, is Manabu Takimoto. He appears as a beleaguered architect who can often be found in Sakuragaoka, working on a construction project for a friend. In real life, he runs an architectural company and was also the environment designer for the three Shenmue games released to date.

Manabu Takimoto: top-left: at the construction site in Sakuragaoka, top-right: character model, bottom-left: Shenmue III interview video, bottom-right: from a 2000 magazine interview.

Sadly, it would seem Lan Di's speeding car took away Manabu Takimoto's closest companion...
[Official profile, from the Suka Pass app]

There are several other characters in the game who are based on real-life SEGA staff, some less-well-known than others. We'll be covering them all in our up-coming post.

Watch for it on the blog in the near future!

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