Shenmue 3 Breaks World Record for Fastest Kickstarted Project

Hey, this is a bit of refreshing news not strictly related to E3: apparently people still really like Shenmue!

Alright, alright, let’s back up. Shenmue, if you’re one of the statistically likely people to not know, it’s a old RPG from the Sega Dreamcast days, kind of an early version of Yakuza or GTA, where you explored and lived in a living, breathing open world with a diverse cast of characters, a long story, and the freedom to do just about anything you wanted. Groundbreaking in its day, fans have been clamoring for a new one and yesterday, Sony announced that they had started a Kickstarter for the game, and that fans could get what they desired for a cool two million dollars.

And in nine hours Shenmue 3 had reached that goal. Nine hours. A million dollars in four and a half hours. Holy crap.



Not only is that an extreme amount of money, it’s also the fastest a video game—or an ANYTHING over Kickstarter-has raised a million dollars. It was funded so Quickly, Kickstarter actually tweeted about how unprecedented this was. Fans REALLY want this game, it seems, and even now they’ve raised a cool 2.7 million for the kickstarter. They really want this game.

“Beloved Shenmue Fans Around The World! Thank you so much everyone! You have spoken and the message has been heard loud and clear. We want Shenmue! We have reached our funding goal of $2 million! But! We have Stretch Goals all lined up to make this truly the best Shenmue yet. Please keep the forklift trucking along and lift this Kickstarter up as far as it can go!”

So, yeah. This is wildly successful, which is good, because the Shenmue games have historically been VERY expensive to produce, which was likely a reason it’s been so long since we’ve seen another. I wouldn’t think this project would be the one to overthrow Star Citizen as Kickstarter King, as things have already slowed down, but still… to call this anything but mind blowing, for a series that hasn’t been relevant since the Dreamcast days, would be an understatement.

I wonder if we could do the same for Skies of Arcadia...?