Pre-TGS: Shenmue Passport

TOKYO - As part of Sega's press conference at its headquarters in Tokyo today, Yu Suzuki showed off some new features of Shenmue. The most interesting feature was a new disc for the game (bringing the total of Shenmue discs up to four) called Shenmue Passport. The new disc features several minigames, along with several other modes in which you can view game movies, post scores to the Internet, and check out extra data on the stages and characters. We noticed the following minigames: space harrier, hang-on, darts, excite QTE 2, QTE title, slot machine, 70 man battle, and forklift race. Mr. Suzuki actually showed us a video of the forklift race, and it's really quite amusing - you race down alleyways against others forklift riders.

Also, the Dream Passport features a mode where you can import VMU data from the arcade title F355 Twin (the upgrade version of F355 Challenge). The older version of F355 let gamers print out race data on paper, while the newer version lets you save data to a VMU. With this VMU you can race data and watch your races at home on a miniature track on the Shenmue Passport

We'll have more details on Shenmue and its Shenmue Passport from the Tokyo Game Show this weekend.