Shenmue Review 

I just beat Shenmue on Dreamcast and since ya'll tend to favor my shorter reviews and for the fact that a long review would take tons of effort I'll instead give my brief impressions. 

So, Shenmue is a great game. It was expected to save the dying Dreamcast and did not since it was deliberately a lot slower of a game than some expected and lacked mass appeal. Nowadays, especially with the third game recent being reborn, it's a better time than ever to jump in but the price has spiked on the game so good luck finding a copy.

Gameplay wise Shenmue has a solid fighting system, decent tank controls, cool quick time events (which were invented here btw), and a detailed town to explore. Everybody has something to say and seeking information is a big part as the story of Ryu's father's death is the driving force behind the narrative. While these are Shenmue's core gameplay styles many more exist here too. The basic encompassing thought is that you live out Ryu's life in all aspects and interact with people in realistic ways. 

This is one of Shenmue's standout features, the living, breathing world. Little touches bring it together, shops to buy figurines (maybe just one more...), cassettes, and often just hang out. There's an arcade, bars, etc. etc.All of the people are fully voiced and have something to say with good animation on the characters for the time. While the voice acting is cheesy in execution there's a lot of humor to it's delivery.The story gets more epic and depthy as time goes on (no spoilers here) and is good. The music is good, the characters are memorable. The cutscenes are epic and make for some cool set pieces to show off the Dreamcast and this awesome world.

These are my ramblings. It's good, expect a slow, well thought out game with lots of exploring. It's hard to do this game justice, thus I barely tried to but I'm definitely happy with the experience I had. It's a unique game that is underpraised at points by gamers. 8/10. It's good play it. It's the only way to judge for yourself.