Get the import gear ready, pack up, set down, because you're in for one heck of a ride!
Alot of people were disappointed with the way shenmue 1 played. By going to endless amounts of people to find just one thing. Great thing about this game is that its more of a streamlined thing now. You can usually go up to someone to ask for directions and can even follow people, or just ask for info. You will get lost as much as you would in the first game.
Its sad that so many games have copied from this games style. Take a game such as god of war for example. Instead of people saying "a qte style of minigame from shenmue", people would say "a gameplay element from god of war." Shenmue really never got the praise it truely deserved, and it deserved a lot to it. You can take part in events like gambling, darts, and even arm wrestling in this game. Shenmue 2 has a wide selection of previous sega arcade games such as afterburner, space harrier, and outrun.
Shenmue 2 does have a wide variety of play styles to it. Times you will just be exploring, looking for people to help continue the story. Other times you will be engaged in free form combat. I believe that the combat on its own could make a game. Qte is a element on which you press a certain button at the right time. On some qte events you can mess up alittle bit, and can still continue on, while others require you to do the whole thing completly right. Shenmue 2 expands on the qte on making a new sorta qte element. The whole screen comes to a pause and tells you which buttons to press and when its done showing you the command, you have to press the buttons in order really fast. That may sound like its easier than a normal qte but in fact its harder, though not too much.
The presentation of this game is absolutely excellent and probably the best part of it! The soundtrack is just amazing. From the music when you land in hong kong, till the end of the game you will probably remember about every background music you hear. There is an english xbox version of shenmue 2 out, but its voice actors are really not that great. While the european and japanese dreamcast versions, on the other hand, much better. The european version also has english subtitles, so you'll be able to understand every word that is said in this game. Signs on the street are also translated. Even for todays standards, shenmue 2's graphics are also really great. I play a game such as prince of persia tsot and i play this game, its like night and day! The graphics of shenmue 2 are just amazing with full on shadows, great looking character models, nice animation, and so on.
Well if your an american wanting to play this on a american dreamcast your really in luck. All you need is something such as a gameshark or codebreaker and this game works just fine. I do reccomend you get the europeon version *though its super hard to find now* as it has english subtitles and menues instead of that xbox port of shenmue 2. This game and its predessessor has revolutionized gaming forever. Being the sequal to the actual first game to what gave you complete freedom. I can whole hartively reccomend this to anybody who has the will to play a 15-20 hour game that is not only inspiring, but is also really fun to play also. My only complaint about this game is that it ends.