Shenmue and its sequel are, without a doubt, classic games. Despite their reputation, Sega pulled the plug on any further installments in Yu Suzuki’s epic series shortly after they exited the console business. Over a decade after the release of Shenmue II on the Dreamcast and Xbox (with North America only getting the latter version), Sony announced at their E3 conference that Shenmue III would be on the PS4 and PC, and funded through Kickstarter. It has been extremely successful, to say the least, with over $3 million raised and over 39,000 backers at the time of this writing. Furthermore, in part due to its success, Sony is assisting its development. Now, Shenmue III has broken the Guinness World Record for the fastest video game supported by a crowdfunding platform to reach $1 million in contributions.
Shenmue III reached this goal in a little over an hour and a half (1 hour and 42 minutes, to be exact), breaking the previous record holder, Torment: Tides of Numeara, by almost 5 hours—it reached $1 million in 6 hours and 5 minutes. Shenmue III is also the second-fastest Kickstarter to reach $1 million, with only the Pebble smart watch, which did so in just 48 minutes, beating it.
The amazing Kickstarter performance of Shenmue III is not the first Guinness World Record that the series has held, as the first Shenmue was made on a budget of $70 million—the highest ever recorded for a video game at the time. Although that record has since been eclipsed by several AAA titles, the new Guinness Record for Shenmue III proves that this series still has its place in the record books.
You can back Shenmue III here.
