Sony featured the long-awaited Shenmue 3 during their E3 livestream, supposedly as a favor to the fans. Yu Suzuki announced that the Kickstarter was live, and the crowdfunding support came crashing in so fast that they didn’t even have to wait half a day to go beyond their initial funding goal. Sony later confirmed that they had some level of involvement in the project, but have remained ambiguous on the matter.
Since the initial goal has been reached, stretch goals have been revealed, and backers are ticking those off one by one. They already had plenty of cool stuff to draw in supporters, but a new backer reward is stealing the spotlight: a replica of Ryo’s jacket. That’s right, you can get your own Ryo Hazuki jacket. You can wear it while playing and pretend that you’re the one going on an epic journey, we promise we won’t tell.
The trademark leather jacket of Shenmue 3’s protagonist that you’ll receive is not just any old replica, it’s a Yu Suzuki approved replica. Something this special comes at an equally special price, something to the tune of $3,000. You’ve got about 28 days to gather that money and throw it at the Shenmue 3 Kickstarter, if you haven’t already.
Shenmue 3 has an estimated release date of December 2017 for PC and PlayStation 4. Sony’s involvement in the project could make it a PS4 exclusive, but the Kickstarter’s FAQ section says that expansion to other versions for the Xbox One and Wii U are still undecided.
