Anecdotes & Insights - The Spirit of Shenmue Lives On | Famitsu Dec 2024 [Part 6]

In this post, we present the final part of our English translation of Famitsu’s 25th anniversary roundtable with the original Shenmue developers. In Part 5, the team recounted the challenges of building Shenmue II, reflected on the long road until Shenmue III, and shared their hopes for seeing the series reach its conclusion one day.

In this final part, the discussion closes with a message from actor Masaya Matsukaze, the voice of Ryo Hazuki in the Japanese version, who shares his memories of the series’ early days and what Shenmue has meant to him. The developers then reflect on their own experiences and the lasting impact Shenmue has had on their lives, careers, and friendships.

What Does Shenmue Mean to Each of You?

—As we begin to wrap things up, we’ve received a comment from Masaya Matsukaze, who plays Ryo Hazuki. Let us share it with you now.

Masaya Matsukaze – 25th Anniversary Comment

"I have so many memories tied to Shenmue that I don’t even know where to start...

First off, let me talk about the audition. It was all extremely top-secret, and a ton of people participated. One thing that really stuck with me was being told, “Bring a personal seal (inkan) to stamp the confidentiality agreement - if you don’t have it, you’ll be sent home.” I remember thinking that was pretty strange, and also telling myself, “If I forget it, I won’t just fail the audition, I won’t even be allowed to apply, which would be ridiculous,” so I made extra sure not to forget it.

By some miracle, I passed the audition. I later heard the reason I got the role was, “We knew the production would be tough, so we chose someone who looked sturdy and had a good personality.”

A few years later, the game was finally announced with a press event at Pacifico Yokohama! After years of keeping everything confidential and working in a secret facility, without even telling my own parents, Shenmue was finally going public. But during preparations for my own appearance on stage, we ran into a problem during the costume check. Apparently, it was felt that “Matsukaze’s outfit is lame.” So at the last minute, on the night before the event, I had to run to a department store in Tokyo and buy a whole new outfit! There wasn’t time for tailoring, so the fit was a little off - that’s another memory that sticks with me.

Once, in the dressing room for the motion capture, the actor Yukijiro Hotaru said to me, “You’re still young, right Matsukaze? While you’re young, you should try everything. Later on, you’ll naturally start to weed out the things you don’t want to do, and that’s how you’ll find the path you should take.” I’ve lived by those words ever since. The advice I've received from Yu Suzuki and Hiroshi Fujioka is also something I treasure. The people I met through Shenmue have had a profound impact on who I am today.

Cancellation, then revival - when I was told “The series will be put on hold after II,” I was so shocked it felt like my heart stopped. We had already recorded so much motion capture for what came next... Then, years later, when I heard the words, “We’re making a sequel!” I was absolutely speechless. And then came the anime... Shenmue is full of surprises. You truly never know what’ll happen next. I could go on and on forever.

Oh, and speaking of which - I recently made Ryo’s leather jacket as a hobby project!"

See the full video on Matsukaze's YouTube channel

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Anecdotes & Insights - From Shenmue II to Shenmue IV | Famitsu Dec 2024 [Part 5]

In this post, we continue our English translation of Famitsu’s 25th anniversary roundtable with the original Shenmue developers. In Part 4, the team reflected on Shenmue’s enduring legacy and casually revealed that a fully playable PlayStation 2 version of Chapter One once existed but was never released.

Part 5 turns to the creation of Shenmue II, an ambitious sequel built on a rewritten engine and systems to support its larger scale. The developers also share stories from the Shenmue III era and reflect on the possibility of Shenmue IV, discussing their hopes for seeing the story completed one day.

Development of the Even More Expansive Shenmue II

—So far we've mostly been talking about Shenmue I, but were there any specific hardships during the development of Shenmue II?

Hirai: I was responsible for all the system programming in Shenmue II, but as for the other parts of the game, that was almost entirely handled by Mr. Wada.

Wada: The first game was set in a small Japanese town. You didn’t need too many people on screen, the streets were narrow and had lots of corners, so you didn’t have to draw things too far into the distance. But Shenmue II was set in a massive city, Hong Kong, so we had to show more people on-screen, and draw much further into the distance to make the city feel alive and expansive.

When we looked at that, it became obvious: there was absolutely no way to achieve that using the system from Shenmue I. I talked with Hirai and the tech team, and we ultimately decided we had to rebuild everything from scratch.

Hirai: The scripting system, the engine, even the C-language parser - we basically changed all of it. At the time, I was also involved with Space Channel 5 Part 2, so if issues cropped up, I would temporarily shift my focus back to Shenmue II to help out.

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Anecdotes & Insights - Shenmue’s Legacy and the Unreleased PS2 Port | Famitsu Dec 2024 [Part 4]

In this post, we continue our English translation of Famitsu’s 25th anniversary roundtable with the original Shenmue developers. In Part 3, the group discussed Hirai’s “Shenmue Maker” system, the unique team culture under Yu Suzuki, and the creative energy that fueled the project’s breakthroughs.

Part 4 explores Shenmue’s lasting impact on the developers’ lives and the wider industry - and, casually dropped into the conversation, comes the revelation that a fully functional PlayStation 2 port was developed but never released!

Shenmue's Pivotal Role in the Developers' Lives

Okayasu: I think Shenmue really changed the lives of a lot of the people who worked on it.

—A lot of staff came and went during its development. How did all of you feel about that constant turnover?

Okayasu: It was honestly just a "throw more people at it" kind of strategy - pure manpower tactics. And that meant some of the new staff were competent, but others were completely useless.

Kasahara: We had people coming in as "programmers" who had never even written a line of code. It was total chaos. There were even people whose only job was to go out and recruit others. Their performance was judged by how many people they brought in - once they delivered someone, their job was done.

—Ahhh... so the whole staffing and operational system was unstructured, and individual tasks didn’t necessarily add up to meaningful progress overall.

Matsuda: Which made things a nightmare for those of us actually on the ground.

Okayasu: Matsuda, what did you think when you got caught up in what we called the "Shenmue Hunt" and you were told to join the Shenmue team?

Matsuda: Oh, I didn’t even get a say in whether I joined the team or not. It wasn’t optional. I still clearly remember that it was right before my very first summer vacation as a new graduate.

Before joining the Shenmue team, I was thinking, “Wow, AM2 really works hard. Pretty intense,” but I figured I’d take a nice break over summer and refresh myself. Then, right before the break, my manager called me in and said (doing an impression), “Matsuda… there’s this game called Shenmue. We’re short on people. The time has come for your talents to be of use. You want to grow as a designer, don’t you?”

And the moment I said, “Yes!” my summer vacation disappeared.

Everyone: (laughs)

Kasahara: That voice impression was actually kind of close. (laughs)

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Anecdotes & Insights - "Shenmue Maker" & Yokosuka's One-Year Build | Famitsu Dec 2024 [Part 3]

In this post, we continue our English translation of Famitsu’s 25th anniversary roundtable with the original Shenmue developers. In Part 2, the team shared tales of late nights and endless debugging, reflecting the uncompromising standards that defined the project.

Part 3 highlights Takeshi Hirai’s ingenious “Shenmue Maker” system that kept all 88 programmers in sync, and dives into anecdotes about working under Yu Suzuki, including the Zushi Marina retreats where late-night debates (and drinks) helped shape Shenmue’s vision. We also hear a special anniversary message from Yu Suzuki himself.

Hirai's "Shenmue Maker" Programming Concept

— Were there any other parts of the programming that were especially difficult?

Hirai: The "games within a game" at the You Arcade were pretty tough. You can play Space Harrier, Hang-On, and so on inside the game. But to do that, we had to temporarily set aside the data from the main game, load and run the arcade game, and then after playing, return to the main game - and deal with the fact that various internal data would come back completely scrambled. Getting everything to cleanly return to the way it was, as if nothing had happened, and seamlessly resume the main story... that was actually a pretty complex process.

— I see.

Kurooka: Here’s a funny one - you know the capsule toy machines, right? Well, one of the items you can get is Sonic. But Sonic was the only one modeled with an unusually high polygon count, and during development, there was this bug where the game would crash whenever you got Sonic.

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Anecdotes & Insights - Shenmue Devs on Crunch & Debugging | Famitsu Dec 2024 [Part 2]

In this post, we continue our English translation of Famitsu’s 25th anniversary roundtable with the original Shenmue developers. In Part 1, the team recalled the brutal work culture, the “general election” that decided the lead programmer, and how some staff turned themselves into NPCs.

Part 2 turns to the harsh realities of debugging, with stories of cardboard naps, 24-hour shifts, bizarre bugs, and the obsessive attention to detail that made Shenmue both a nightmare to create and a one-of-a-kind masterpiece.

The Harshness of the Development Environment

Hirai: You really shouldn’t be starting meetings at 10 p.m., right? We did have a nap room, though. That said, my previous company wasn’t very different, so I thought, “Ah, it’s the same here too.” That was just the era we were in. Still, during Shenmue’s development, I felt way more pressure. I remember seeing my timecard showing "XX" hours for a single month.

Note from Switch: The original article did not provide the exact figures; “XX”/“YY” are placeholders for the actual numbers.

Kasahara: If we’re talking about work hours, then it has to be Wada. Like we mentioned earlier, when you looked at his timecard, he’d barely gone home all month. And he wasn’t the kind of guy to fudge the numbers or cheat the system either. His recorded hours for one month were something like "YY" hours.

— (We could only laugh.) I mean, there are only about 720 hours in a month, assuming 24 hours times 30 days.

Hirai: Wada was known as the ‘mainstay’ of the team. He was always present in the office - that’s how dedicated he was. And he wasn’t even a full-time employee! (laughs)

Kasahara: No matter when you showed up, he was always there.

— Mr. Wada, why were you working that much...?

Wada: I was a contract employee, and I originally worked at another company doing various types of development, but I was brought onto Shenmue under contract. And the content of that contract was to “see Shenmue through to release.” So I felt that unless the game shipped, I hadn’t fulfilled my responsibility. I was just doing what I believed was required of me.

To put it simply, I just didn’t go home for two months. (laughs)

Especially toward the end of development, we had about two solid months of debugging, and the team had to operate 24 hours a day. There were times during debugging when the game would crash, and the testers would be stuck, unable to do anything, until morning. That happened several times, but with no programmers around at those hours, the bugs couldn’t be fixed.

Once someone said, “We can’t do any debugging because there’s no programmer here,” I realized I had to be available around the clock. After that, I basically worked 24 hours a day.

Ryo catches some sleep... unlike some of the developers [Image added by Switch]

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Anecdotes & Insights - Shenmue Devs Celebrate 25 Years | Famitsu Dec 2024 [Part 1]

To celebrate the 25th anniversary of Shenmue's release on the Dreamcast in Japan, Famitsu.com invited several former project members to reminisce over dinner about their experience working to create the masterpiece that is Shenmue and reflect on the game's legacy.

Left to right: Takeshi Hirai, Eigo Kasahara, Makoto Wada, Keiji Okayasu, Kenji Miyawaki, Takashi Matsuda, Toshiyuki Kurooka

The participants were key members from the original Shenmue development team:

• Eigo Kasahara, who served as Planning Director for Shenmue I and II, and also worked on the Shenmue Passport and the PS4 remaster.
• Makoto Wada, a programmer on Shenmue I and lead programmer on II.
• Takeshi Hirai, the main system programmer on Shenmue I.
• Keiji Okayasu, the Assistant Director on Shenmue I, II, and III.
• Toshiyuki Kurooka, a programmer on Shenmue I, who focused on events around the Hazuki residence and the basement. 
• Takashi Matsuda, a CG designer on Shenmue I and II who created many of the game's NPCs. 
• Kenji Miyawaki, a graphic designer responsible for character designs and UI across the series.

The discussion is full of fun stories and inside jokes, while at the same time revealing just how intense the work environment was at the time, and the immense dedication shown by the development team to bringing the games to life. Not to mention the startling revelation that a PS2 port of Shenmue I was developed internally but never released...

"I didn't go home for two months." - One of the dinner participants.

"This isn't that kind of game!" - Yu Suzuki, upon discovering that the developers had implemented boob jiggle physics.

"We created Yokosuka from scratch in just one year - after the game's announcement (at the Shenmue Premiere)" - Takeshi Hirai.

The article translation starts below.

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Poll Result: Patrons' Choice Topic for July 2025

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:

Famitsu.com article: 25th Anniversary Shenmue Reunion with Key Former Developers

To celebrate the 25th anniversary of Shenmue's release on the Dreamcast in Japan, Famitsu.com invited several former project members to reminisce over dinner about their experience of working to create the masterpiece that is Shenmue and reflect on the game's legacy.

Left to right: Takeshi Hirai, Eigo Kasahara, Makoto Wada, Keiji Okayasu, Kenji Miyawaki, Takashi Matsuda, Toshiyuki Kurooka

The participants consisted of key members from the original Shenmue development team:

• Eigo Kasahara, who served as Planning Director for Shenmue I and II, and also worked on the Shenmue Passport and the PS4 remaster.
• Makoto Wada, a programmer on Shenmue I and lead programmer on II.
• Takeshi Hirai, the main system programmer on Shenmue I.
• Keiji Okayasu, the Assistant Director on Shenmue I, II, and III.
• Toshiyuki Kurooka, a programmer on Shenmue I, who focused on events around the Hazuki residence & the basement. 
• Takashi Matsuda, a CG designer on Shenmue I and II who created many of the game's NPCs. 
• Kenji Miyawaki, a graphic designer responsible for character designs and UI across the series.

The discussion is full of fun stories and inside jokes, while at the same time revealing just how intense the work environment was at the time, and the immense dedication shown by the development team to bringing the games to life. Not to mention the startling revelation that a PS2 port of Shenmue I was developed internally but never released...

"I didn't go home for two months." - one of the dinner participants.

"This isn't that kind of game!" - Yu Suzuki, upon discovering that the developers had implemented boob jiggle physics.

"We created Yokosuka from scratch in just one year - after the game's announcement (at the Shenmue Premiere)" - Takeshi Hirai.

Coming soon to the blog!

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Shenmue Characters Based on Actual People: Susumu Aketagawa, Takeshi Hirai, Akira Nagai, Yoshihito Nishii, Hiroaki Takeuchi, Manabu Takimoto, Hiroshi Tamura, Yoshihiko Tashiro, Hidekaze Yukawa, Kenta Shimizu, Jin Xin Nan, Takashi Matsuda

Several characters that appear in the Shenmue games have in-game models based on real-life people.  This is not surprising in the case of Shenmue III, where several higher-tier backers were included in the game as a reward for their pledges. What may not be so readily realized is that several of the people Ryo meets in the first game of the series, as workers or residents of Yokosuka, were also modeled on actual people, including but not limited to members of the project development staff and people associated with Sega.

Today's post presents the findings of research to identify and gather together as many of these characters from the early games in the series as possible.

Let's get started!

Characters Based on Actual People: Shenmue I

Susumu Aketagawa

In the game: He is the hard-working owner of Yamaji Soba Noodles in Dobuita who is now considering retirement.

In real life: The name and model of this character are those of the voice & recording director for Shenmue I and II, Susumu Aketagawa. He was invited to provide his own voice for the game, but  declined, commenting with a laugh in a 2019 interview that "I wasn't willing to go that far".

When he worked on the Shenmue project, he was approximately the same age as his character in the game, although they do not share the same birthday date. It is unknown whether he is a big fan of soba noodles, although he did mention in the interview that he used to enjoy going for a lunch of boiled whitebait on rice at a restaurant near the Sega offices.

Left: Susumu Aketagawa in the game is the owner of Yamaji Soba Noodles in Dobuita. Right: directing a recording session for Shenmue around 1998 (top-right) and in a 2019 interview (bottom-right).

Aketagawa-san's profile: retirement from the noodle business beckons.

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