Fans have paid for a 15-second ad in the middle of New York’s Times Square to campaign for Ys Net to develop Shenmue 4. The likelihood of ever seeing a sequel to Shenmue 3 shrunk when it received a mixed critical reception and didn’t sell particularly well, but this hasn’t stopped fan website Shenmue Dojo from starting its campaign.
The Shenmue 4 Times Square ad was to get Sega’s attention
The campaign from Shenmue Dojo aims to “support the continuation of the series and attempt to spread global awareness to find YSNET a potential partner for Shenmue 4.” One of those potential partners was Sega, who was tagged in a follow up Tweet that included a live stream of the Shenmue 4 Times Square ad.
Shenmue creator Yu Suzuki explained that he “will never give up on my own personal journey to complete its story” during the credits at the end of Shenmue 3. Unfortunately, he then later revealed that the sequel depended on the sales of Shenmue 3 and whether developer Ys Net could find a publishing partner. While Shenmue Dojo can’t do much to fix the first part, they’re definitely trying to help with the second part.
The site did have some success as its advert was enough to get #shenmue trending on Twitter for a short time. It concluded with the message: “Thank you to everyone that helped to show their support with the timed mass tweets/posts today. It was very much appreciated and proves that together, as a collective, we can spread the awareness that we are not going to sit back without a fight. We will continue to strive until Shenmue 4 is a reality! #LetsGetShenmue4”
Shenmue 4 would be more accessible to newcomers if it ever did happen. Suzuki has previously told IGN that “the most important thing is to make it enjoyable without knowing previous events in the story. I don’t think that a new player wants to know 100% of the story. 20 or 30% could be enough. In Shenmue 3, we implemented a digest movie that teaches the player the main events of the previous games, but for Shenmue 4 I want to integrate that part into the main game”.