[Team Yu]

A backer update video from Yu Suzuki has formally announced what many fans have long been expecting: Shenmue 3's development has been extended until the second half of 2018.

The original estimate of this December was put in place before the project even began, with no budget in place and the scope of the game undecided. With crowdfunding proceeds more than tripling the initial target and Ys Net discovering they can get more out of Unreal Engine 4 than first imagined, it makes perfect sense to push back that release date and avoid placing artificial limits on what the game can achieve.

"It's a beautiful game," crowdfunding pro Justin Bailey told the Digital Dragons expo in Poland last month of the latest build he recently witnessed, "It looks great." And it will look even better after the extra care lavished upon it during the full-term gestation period it deserves.

As we already knew that Shenmue 3 would not be featured at E3 next week, we continue to hope that Sega takes this opportunity to announce remasters of Shenmue 1 & 2 to tide us all over and grow the fan base in time for the release of a fully-cooked sequel.

Stay tuned to this page for information on the relevant streams to watch for any potential E3 developments over the coming days, as the campaign to #SaveShenmueHD heats up.

[Team Yu]

We've never been prouder of the fan community than when Yu Suzuki shared the news that Shenmue 3's development has been extended into the second half of 2018.

In an industry where "DELAY" is often treated like a dirty word, as if it forewarns of a bad game rather than the developer's commitment to quality over haste, it would be easy for any fan base to let its disappointment at having to wait longer for the game get the better of them.

But overwhelmingly, almost universally, what we saw from Shenmue fans when Suzuki's update video became public was immediate understanding, support, and excitement over the extra care and dedication being put into a game originally due this Christmas.

To mark Yu Suzuki's 59th birthday today, we felt compelled to compile just fifty-nine of your comments from across the Web into an eight-minute video, that we think highlights what a remarkable breed of gamer the Shenmue franchise and its creator have attracted over the past seventeen and a half years.

Whittling the selection down to just 59 was extremely difficult, and we know there are many more comments of similar nature on sites that aren't even represented here. But for a snapshot of this high water mark in the community's history, please enjoy the video and share it if you wish.

https://youtu.be/iLKU7fG1M7Q