Endurance Run: Shenmue - Part 10

Lunch and Shenmue Endurance Run, perfect combination.

On the dot. Ready for my day's heart attacks.

I have now reconfigured my whole sleep schedule around this.

the mue continues

"Shenhouse No. 8"

Let's see if the game actually becomes good on disc 2

Hanging in there for forklift racing. I can't wait to hear Vinny's reaction to having to work a regular job.

Don't you know blackmail is WAAY uncool?

"Vinny, have you ever been in a Turkish prison?"

Today we start the next chapter of the Endurance Run :D

"Way to go, Bro!"

TOM DID NOTHING WRONG

Oh Yeah: cigarette boxes are gross here

I'm awake, the Endurance Run was calling me

It's actually possible to get the bad ending if you burn too many days:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SRREzmNOHQU

Look at Alex backseat gaming up a storm. Let the comment section flow through you.

I believe that if you don't complete the story by 15th April 1987, you'll get the bad ending. I think you'd have to be wasting a fair amount of time for that to happen.

Here in the UK, we also show pictures of that horrible stuff on our packets. It's certainly more than enough to make me say 'nope'.

No...come on Vinny.

It took them over a week to make to get to the warehouse but a lot of progress in this one.

I'm pissed no one got Dan's great tea joke. I got it, Dan.

I love this endurance run but Vinny has no excuse for not hitting the right buttons during the QTEs. It's literally one button he has to push and he misses them every single time.

I love you Vinny, but come on.

I reaaaaally hated the stealth section to get in warehouse 8. Fuck this game.

"I'm having Metal Gear Scanlon flashbacks." Throw a grenade, Ryo! Kill that guy!

Fuckin Tom.

Yes! I'm loving this European noon time Endurance Run.

This was the best episode yet. I am loving the hell out of this series for the most part. Though, I think they missed a great side quest with Hisaka-san. At least they met the old homeless man, which will pay off big time later, assuming they find the follow-ups.

Also, props to Vinny for nailing the QTE when it mattered.

Metal Gear Shenmue.

Also, kinda upset at how angry Vinny and Alex seemed to be getting at Tom. :(

Holy shit, Vinny finally realises how to zoom in on things!

Also, wow! There were so many instances of them assuming the worst for a cheap laugh, followed up with Shenmue immediately outsmarting them.

Thought I'd compile a list of them:

'I bet even though they work here, they won't tell us where Warehouse 8 is!' ... The workers tell them where it is, and when one can't - it's explained he's a temporary worker.

'I bet the guy standing outside Warehouse 8 won't tell us where it is' ... The worker confirms that Ryo has arrived at Warehouse 8.

'North west... it would be helpful if this game had a compass' ... The game literally has a compass, and the character instructs them to follow North West.

'I bet Ryo will drink the coffee and not acknowledge he's buying it for the old man' ... Ryo buys the coffee, doesn't drink it, and is animated giving the coffee to the old man.

'You can't fish with one hand!' ... Guy then animates to using two hands to fish.

'I bet Tom is still at the Harbour at night, this game isn't fancy enough to have him move places' ... Wrong, he actually now works at the harbour by day, and Dobuita by night.

(Assumes guy behind truck is stupid) ... Guy proceeds to give them valuable information.

(Assumes Tom can see warehouse 8) ... Game literally tells you it's a warehouse in the old district; Tom can't see it from that spot, and isn't allowed in that area anyway.

'All the capsule toy machines are the same one' ... Not true.

'Noooo! We'll have to come back tomorrow!' ... Game immediately let's them skip a day and retry.

'You know what's good in this game - the controls' ... Vinny still hasn't learnt the movement controls; hasn't learnt that running is analog; hasn't discovered there's a button that lets you turn on the spot.

(Assumes old man says the coffee incident was yesterday, not ~5 days ago) ... Game actually acknowledges that you've failed the stealth part ~5 times and gives you bonus help scenes.

(Laughs at map; jokes about asking the man to mark it for them, but not expecting him to) ... Guy then asks for the map and marks it for them

In regards to the Stealth part, the developers were trying to gradually make it easier for the player after the 5^th try, without outright giving the answer away in one go. Hence why you get further clues after the 6^th and 8^th + tries.

Also, it's interesting how the game idiot-proofs the dish smashing scene. That cutscene usually triggers when you zoom in on the dish, but the game realised Vinny was taking too long, and just triggered it as he walked up to it.

Either way, in the next part, they're going to have to zoom in on stuff to collect the required items in Ryo's house (they could have done this on day 1 or when there wasn't much else to do).

This is a good series.

The guy who wanted the coffee will teach you moves later, but they have to go back to him inside the warehouse, the game won't entirely force them to.

Sneak damn it, sneak!

Hey! You're not supposed to drive a forklift with the load up in the air like that! That's a safety violation!!

One of my favourite episodes so far, loving this endurance run.

Also, i must have played through this game at least 5 times and I never knew the homeless man gives you a map of the warehouse or that the girl at the tomato convenience store thinks you could be a popstar.

@castiel: yeah its insane that he keeps missing them!

The way he's botching these QTE segments so hard, you gotta assume it's like how once you get too old you can't do Esports anymore or something, right? Like he's just completely whiffing on these QTEs, and I hear later in the game you get QTEs that don't reset if you fail.

God 10 episodes of this game and one has been really good. I pray for their mental health to be intact when this is all over.

@cooljammer00: Just wait until they play Shenmue 2 and have to deal with Command QTEs...

As much as people are critiquing that Vinny is missing the QTEs, maybe you need to take it a step further and realize that QTEs have ALWAYS been fucking terrible. The idea of a game asking you to press a (depending on game) random button at a moment's notice is such a stupid mechanic, as it doesn't pertain to the actual gameplay systems AT ALL. It's not like Left on the D-pad is a fucking dodge button when you actually are fighting someone during the sequences when you have full control.

Edit: Also consider that this game possibly has the same issue many rhythm games have where the latency from non-CRT televisions is much higher thus any sequence that depends on split-second timing becomes that much harder. I don't know what their equipment is, but I would very much assume they're using an HDTV for their capture purposes.

@grantdanasty: QTE's are fine. They have never been terrible. They have given you some sort of agency in cutscenes where you usually do nothing. I'm surprised people always have this militant approach against QTE's like having to press X during an action event is completely ruining the game for them. Nothing pertains to the actual gameplay ever. Pressing a face button on a video game controller has no connection with any range of human motion, yet we use these buttons in games on a daily basis and it's fine.

That said I'm not sure why Vinny is missing all those QTE's though, maybe it's a latency thing with the monitor they have hooked up.

Also fuck Tom, what a piece of shit.

That stealth section was maybe the funniest part so far.

OH GOD THIS GAME IS TERRIBLE

I always thought that was a really dumb idea. I mean, most people who smoke already know the dangers of it, they don't need photos of a fucking open chest where you can see a bloody stomach and all that shit on it to remind them. I doubt there's ever been anyone who's looked at a pack of cigarettes and went "oh it does this to you? I totally didn't know".

Pretty sure Vinny is missing those QTEs on purpose just to see Ryo get hit.

Did you miss his mastery of Excite QTE 2? Vinny's the definitive QTEsporter of our time.

I think he's doing it on purpose, as Vinny has always shown to be curious of bad outcomes in adventure games.

Also, Master Chen looks a little like John McCain.

Great episode, good progress.

@ghost_cat: I'm pretty sure it's a bit of both.

"It would be nice if we had a compass"

YO BRO

ughkkk more shenmue screaming... love

Alex insisting there's no compass, Dan insisting there are two guards walking the exact same red patrol route... I think there's more than just the fates conspiring against Vinny in this Endurance Run. Here's hoping they muddle through for the thrilling non-conclusion.

(P.S. I love this series. Never had much interest in Shenmue since I didn't own a Dreamcast until a few years after it went defunct, so I appreciate having this proxy playthrough with which to experience the wonder. I would like Dan and co. to play some Yakuza as a follow-up though, maybe the second or third one, just so they can remark on how much it evolves that template.)