Yu Suzuki talks Shenmue 3 world records and heavy responsibility" to fans

Shenmue 3 smashed crowdfunding records following its surprise appearance on Kickstarter in June 2015 – and legendary creator Yu Suzuki has spoken for the first time about receiving two Guinness World Records for the achievement.

“Everything that happened was beyond my expectation,” Suzuki told the renowned authority on basically everything. “I was touched by the fact that there were so many fans waiting for the release of Shenmue 3.”

The game was announced at Sony’s E3 conference on 15 June, and took 8 hours 43 minutes to surpass its initial funding target of $2million.

In the process it scored the world record for Fastest $1million Pledged For A Crowdfunded Video Game (1 hr 44 mins), and Most Money Pledged For A Kickstarter Video Game – $6,333,296 or £4,066,048. That's a *lot* of Nando’s corn on the cob.

As a result of its humungous backing, Suzuki called the project a “heavy responsibility… because this game is now supported literally by fans.”

“I don’t like to be beaten by others”, he went on. “It is better for me to find an original way and an individual creation [because this] draws more attention. I love challenging creation.”

Shenmue 3 is due for release on PS4 and PC in December 2017.

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Ben Wilson

I'm GamesRadar's sports editor, and obsessed with NFL, WWE, MLB, AEW, and occasionally things that don't have a three-letter acronym – such as Chvrches, Bill Bryson, and Streets Of Rage 4. (All the Streets Of Rage games, actually.) Even after three decades I still have a soft spot for Euro Boss on the Amstrad CPC 464+.