Interview with Shenmue Martial Arts Advisor Tetsuya Hattori and Masaya Matsukaze (Feb 2000) | Translation

Translation of a four-page feature interview from early 2000 with Tetsuya Hattori, Bajiquan master and martial arts director for Shenmue, along with Masaya Matsukaze, the Japanese-language voice and motion capture actor of the game's protagonist Ryo Hazuki.

When younger, Hattori had studied under Bajiquan grandmaster and friend of Yu Suzuki, Master Wu Lian Zhi, and went on to found his own Bajiquan school within Japan called Kaimon Kensha.

This topic was selected by the Phantom River Stone blog patrons via our monthly poll on the Phantom River Stone Patreon and was available for early access. Thank you for your support!

Tetsuya Hattori and Masaya Matsukaze: The Two "Ryo"s Talk About What Makes Shenmue Great

Tetsuya Hattori, martial arts supervisor for the huge Shenmue project, and Masaya Matsukaze, who plays the leading role - two people for who you could say the story's main protagonist, Ryo Hazuki, is like their other self - talk about what makes the world of Shenmue so captivating and about what lies in future.

Instructor Hattori corrects the stance of the Elbow Assault.

The photo above shows how Hattori taught Bajiquan (Japanese: hakkyoku-ken) during Shenmue's development. He also took part in a number of other activities, including the motion capture for everything relating to Bajiquan and Chinese martial arts, checking the form of moves, adjusting the game's battle system, and creating the scenarios and descriptions for all move scrolls in the Shenmue Passport. Despite this, he is usually a very mild-mannered person. He is also a big fan of the Sakura Wars series.

About Tetsuya Hattori

Born in Tokyo in 1959. He has been interested in martial arts since his youth and began practicing Chinese martial arts, mainly Xingyiquan, in his early 20's. In 1986, he commenced training in Bajiquan under the 7th generation master, Wu Lian Zhi upon the master's first Japan visit, and studied the Wu family's Bajiquan in Mengcun, China. In 1996, he founded Kaimon Kensha, an association specializing in Bajiquan, under the official approval of Master Wu Lian Zhi. (This name is derived from the Bajiquan's full name in Chinese, "Kaimen Bajiquan", as pronounced in Japanese). In Mengcun, Hattori was certified as an 8th generation master of Bajiquan and is currently the only Japanese official disciple of Master Wu.

Tetsuya Hattori

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Poll Result: Patrons' Choice Topic for August 2022

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 that has been voted this time is:

"Interview w/ martial arts instructor Tetsuya Hattori and Masaya Matsukaze (Dreamcast Magazine, Feb 2000)"

In this post we will be translating a four-page feature interview from early 2000 with Tetsuya Hattori, Bajiquan master and martial arts director for Shenmue, along with Masaya Matsukaze, the Japanese-language voice and motion capture actor of the game's protagonist Ryo Hazuki.

When younger, Hattori had studied under Bajiquan grandmaster and friend of Yu Suzuki, Master Wu Lian Zhi, and went on to found his own Bajiquan school within Japan called Kaimon Kensha.

The interview translation will be posted up to the blog in the near future.

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Master Wu Lianzhi: Chinese TV Documentary | Guest Post by Chao Yu

With today's post we welcome back Chao Yu, who presents a Chinese television documentary about the life of Wu Lianzhi, with translated English captions. 

Chao can be found at the Shenmue Dojo as yuc02, and is a long-standing supporter of Phantom River Stone on Patreon.

Hey guys, I recently found an old (circa 2008-10) Chinese TV documentary about Bajiquan grandmaster Wu Lianzhi (吴连枝), which gave a fascinating view of the life of a person who inspired Yu Suzuki in his creations of the Virtua Fighter and Shenmue series.  

Through the documentary, one learns of how Wu grew up in Meng Cun as a youngster gifted in martial arts, but often got involved with fights at school and broke the family code.  Later on the show explained how he (and indeed his ancestors) did not initially earn a living through Bajiquan, but a tragic event thrust him into the martial arts world spotlight, ending with him carrying the burden of passing down the Baji style onto the next generations.  Finally as his tireless efforts began to pay off, a chance meeting with Yu Suzuki gave him the chance to travel abroad, and his name soon spread throughout the world.

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Yu Suzuki Interview by GameCores | Part One: Early Games Development at Sega

Thanks to the prolific translation efforts of yuc02, a newly-translated interview with Yu Suzuki is now available. The text is a transcript of an interview on a radio show by GameCores, which was held when Yu Suzuki was in China for the G-Fusion event last month (December 2018).

The translation starts below. Part Two to follow in a separate post.

GameCores Interview with Yu Suzuki Part One: Yu's Background

Original text (Chinese): https://www.gcores.com/articles/105359

This text is the full transcript of the interview that accompanies the radio program "Let Us Tell You What We Chatted with Yu Suzuki-san About". Thanks to Joe-san and Takeuchi-san’s support, and everyone else’s help with the recording and editing. Finally we thank WeGame for their full support and making this G-Fusion meet with Yu Suzuki possible!

Q: You were born into a family that revolved around the music profession, so why did you choose not to work in music, but instead the gaming industry?

YS: You’re right, my parents both worked in the music industry. They produced traditional music, and my father wanted me to carry on the work; but children are always a bit rebellious, and although I did dabble with music, I went instead towards the rock music route. Anyway, my view is that most children don’t develop in the way their parents would have wanted.

Q: When you were at Okayama University, you had already done research into 3D animation. What in particular did you research?

YS: 3D architecture drawings: building up from wireframe into surfaces that are correct from different perspectives. Personal computers at the time were quite primitive, so we used the mainframe computer at the university to run simulations as well.

Q: You entered Sega in 1983, and by 1984 you were already supervising your first project, the SG-1000 title Champion Boxing. It must be quite rare for someone to be able to take up such responsibility after just one year?

YS: At the time the term “supervisor” didn’t exist in Sega, I was just a project leader. Normally it would take 7-8 years’ experience to be one, and even then only people from the planning department would become a project leader. I don’t know what my boss was thinking, but anyway I became one in my second year!

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Interview with Yu Suzuki on Shenmue 3 [Gamersky]: Full Transcript - Part One

We recently posted a translation by yuc02 of a report summarizing an interview held with Shenmue III director Yu Suzuki and animation producer Hiroaki Takeuchi at the recent G-Fusion Tour event in Xiamen, China.

• Yu Suzuki's China Interview Report Part One: Shenmue III Details
• Yu Suzuki's China Interview Report Part Two: Early Game Development Years

Today's post, kindly translated once again by yuc02, is a full interview transcript, carried out by Gamersky.com.

The translation starts below. Part Two to follow in a separate post.

Shenmue 3 Director Yu Suzuki Interview - Fighting System’s Complete Revamp [Part 1]

Original text from https://www.gamersky.com/news/201812/1135488.shtml

Following WeGame’s invitation, the author had the privilege to meet with Shenmue 3 director Yu Suzuki (YS) and animation producer Hiroaki Takeuchi (HT) in Xiamen, and with fellow journalists conducted an interview about the state of the game.

Shenmue 3 director Yu Suzuki (left) and animation producer Hiroaki Takeuchi (right)

Q: Apart from the location of Shenmue 3 being set in Guilin, what other aspects of Chinese culture will be represented? The first two games in the series contained the Chinese martial art Bajiquan; will Shenmue 3 introduce more martial arts styles?

YS: In my early game development years I visited China numerous times, and learned Bajiquan from Master Wu [Master Wu Lian Zhi], with whom I still keep in touch and meet every year, although not on this occasion. I am quite familiar with China, and have visited Xiamen’s Kulangsu for cultural studies, and learned about Chinese architectural styles for the game. We did not carry out any studies on new martial arts, but have incorporated other Chinese styles such as Xingyiquan in the game, although these will not be part of Ryo’s repertoire; rather they’ll be styles owned by other characters.

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Shenmue III: Yu Suzuki Talks On Stage in Xiamen [Video | ENG Subs]

On December 16th, Yu Suzuki took to the stage to talk about Shenmue III to an audience of gaming fans at the G-Fusion Tour event that was held in Xiamen, Fujian province in China (as announced at the end of November).

As with the recent Tokyo Game Show, animation producer Hiroaki Takeuchi also took part.

The following items were announced during the stage talk:

• There will be a version of Shenmue III released with Simplified Chinese subtitles.
• The distribution of Shenmue III in China is to be handled by Tencent (on the WeGame platform) and Oasis Games (for PS4).

Also during the talk, a slightly modified version of the "The Prophecy" trailer for Shenmue III was shown, with Chinese subtitles, to a warm reception from the audience.

We have added English translated captions to the video which can be viewed below. Or, if you prefer to read a written version, a full transcript of these follows.

Video (ENG subs): Yu Suzuki & Hiroaki Takeuchi on Shenmue III

Watch the video of the talk below: 

Transcript

Yu Suzuki (YS): Everyone, I'm Yu Suzuki. I'm glad to be here today.

Hiroaki Takeuchi (HT): Nĭ hăo! My name is Hiroaki Takeuchi.

Q: We've heard that you've come to China several times. Is this your first time in Xiamen?

YS: I've been here once before, about 3 or 4 years ago. I came to research the circular tower-like structures of the Hakka people, which look sort of like missile bases.

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Yu Suzuki: Shenmue III Latest Information (TGS 2018)

View the video below the article text.

At the 2018 Tokyo Game Show on September 22nd, Yu Suzuki and Shenmue III animation director Hiroaki Takeuchi spoke for a short time on the topic of Shenmue III. 

The Shenmue topic was a special section within a larger presentation about a VR game created by JPPVR (and their software subsidiary VReS) for which Suzuki is general producer. Sitting next to Suzuki and Takeuchi is Taichi Shibuki, the CEO of VReS.

• This was Yu Suzuki's second appearance on the JPPVR stage at TGS,  See the video (subtitled) of his earlier appearance on one of the event's Business Days: Yu Suzuki Tells Arino-Kacho About Shenmue 3 at the Tokyo Game Show

Kicking off the talk segment is a showing of the latest Shenmue III trailer, "The Prophecy," with its announcement of the release date of 27th August 2019, giving it some additional exposure to the Japanese domestic audience.

Apparently Takeuchi had been invited casually by Yu to join him for the stage session without knowing details of what it would be about, and he does a good job of heightening the sense of excitement for the game's upcoming release.

Partway through, Takeuchi switches to the growling voice of "Mr. X", a fictional masked character that he used to play in the 1980s, appearing in Young Jump magazine and the video game magazine GTV. (Alas, these efforts are largely ignored by the announcer!).

Yu touches on the current activities of the game's development, indicating that the battles are being fine-tuned. He also states that he won't be travelling to China as wants to "avoid being beaten up" - a reference to his 1994 research trip for the original Shenmue games where he was famously dealt an accidental blow from his friend Master Wu Lian Zhi during a martial arts demonstration.

Something that leaves a deep impression is the extent of the dedication that Yu has to the development of Shenmue III. He reveals that he often works through the nights and catches up with naps during the daytime. Takeuchi even cracks a joke about his reduced alcohol intake compared to the days of Shenmue I & II!

One of the highlights of the talk for me is when Yu Suzuki expresses the joy he gets from being able to create Shenmue III: "After it's over, I want to go back and start creating another, as soon as I can."

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New Series: Yu Suzuki's Research Trip to China Part 1 | Kazunari Uchida's Blog Post Translation

In the early 1990s, Yu Suzuki spent two weeks in China gathering material for his upcoming Virtua Fighter II game, and his findings also greatly influenced his creation of Shenmue. In this first part of a new series, Phantom River Stone has translated blog posts by the person who accompanied Yu on this journey.

Today's post topic was selected by Phantom River Stone patrons in our monthly poll for a topic suggestion for the month of July. 

In the year 1994*, Yu Suzuki made a trip to China to research and gather material that had a direct impact on his creation of the Virtua Fighter games, and also on his later concept for "Virtua Fighter RPG" which eventually came to be known as Shenmue.

*Note: a correction has been made to the year. Originally this was stated as 1993, based on sources such as Yu Suzuki's GDC 2014 talk and corroborated by the online biography of Kazunari Uchida who accompanied him. However, articles in issues of the Japanese Beep! MegaDrive at the time confirm that the year the trip took place was 1994.

To date there has not been a lot of information available about this trip. Yu has made mention of this trip during presentations, notably his talk on Shenmue at the 2014 Game Developers Conference in San Francisco at which he shared photos of some of the places visited. Then during my investigation for this article, I came across some posts on a personal blog that were written by the person that Yu made the trip together with - and who later worked with him on the actual Shenmue project: a man by the name of Kazunari Uchida.

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Examining the Warehouse Battle Scene | Kickstarter Update #85

A Brief Recap of Kickstarter Update #85

Accompanying Kickstarter Update #85 was a brand new battle scene image, and in this post we will be polishing up our spectacles to see what details it contains.

But just before we dive into it, here's a quick recap of some of the main points the recent Kickstarter Update brought us:

• A $450 Toy Capsule Box Set reward is now available as an upgrade or add-on via the Shenmue 3 page on the Fangamer site. With this reward, you get all four capsule toys that will actually appear in the game: Ryo, Shenhua, Chai and Forklift. The $250 reward is included.
  
  (July 28th update: Fangamer has indicated to a backer that the illustration in this $450 upgrade / add-in will be signed by Yu Suzuki, as was the case with the Kickstarter campaign reward. See this post on the Shenmue Dojo forums).
  
  
• Regarding the content of the PC & PS4 physical disc versions of the game, the following information was given: "Development is moving forward to have all necessary data to play the game contained on the disc. Please rest assured that the disc will not be just a prompt for an internet download." It was noted that an internet connection will be needed for game updates and reward activation.
• Over $7 million in pledges have now been received. The total pledged amount through Kickstarter and Slacker Backer combined is now $7,063,329 (as of July 20th). This means that the stretch goal of "AI Battling" has officially been reached. To read more about what this goal entails, see our post The AI Battling Stretch Goal.

For the full text of Kickstarter Update #85, visit the official page.

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The Shenmue Art Book: Overview of Contents | Shenmue Merchandise

In today's post we'll look at one of the rarer pieces of Shenmue merchandise, and one that remains somewhat shrouded in mystery even today, ever since its publication back in 1998.

The item I am referring to is one that has become known to fans as the "Shenmue Art Book". This it not an official name, since the front cover simply reads "Shenmue". The YS logo of Yu Suzuki adorns the back.

Front and back cover of the Shenmue Art Book.

What Is the Shenmue Art Book?

It can be best described as a high-quality, full-color booklet consisting of 36 generously-sized glossy pages and is cram-packed with photos, concept art, maps, development flowcharts and text (in Japanese) relating to the first two Shenmue games.

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