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The Shenmue anime has a new trailer, and before you ask, it does feature a forklift.
The 13-episode series is coming next month as a collaboration between Adult Swim and Crunchyroll, with the initial air date set for February 5. The trailer sets up what appears to be a very faithful adaptation of the sprawling, modern-day adventure that first hit Dreamcast back in 1999.
The bulk of the Shenmue anime trailer lays out the central conflict that drives our protagonist Ryo Hazuki’s story: the promising young martial artist from Yokosuka, Japan returns home one day to witness his father’s death at the hands of a man named Lan Di. From there, Ryo embarks on a quest to discover Lan Di’s motives and eventually avenge his father.
However, he doesn’t let his drive for vengeance throw off his life balance. The original game was known at least as much for its life simulation elements as for its unfolding family drama; the anime trailer sensibly doesn’t spend too much time dwelling on Ryo’s side hustle as a forklift operator or gravitational pull to the nearest arcade, but it does give them just enough of a nod.
It’s not yet clear how much of the Shenmue saga – which now encompasses three main games – will be represented in this anime. If it keeps going, this may just end up being the way we finally see the conclusion to a story decades in the making.
See where Shenmue falls on our list of the best Dreamcast games of all time.
