[Original post – update below]
Oh Suzuki-san we love you. Not only are you behind some of the greatest gaming IPs ever, you also know how to have a joke with the gaming public.
At this year’s Gamelab convention in Barcelona, Spain, Yu Suzuki projected an image of a “III” in the familiar Shenmue font during an on-stage interview today (June 27, 2014), causing a bit of a stir at the event and now on the Internet as photos spread.
But before you all get too excited, it looks like this was just a joke on Yu Suzuki’s part, according to a post on the Spanish gaming site, ZonaForo:
[Translated from ZonaForo]
Yu Suzuki, the creator of games like OutRun, Virtua Fighter and, of course, Shenmue, has revealed in his interview in the tenth edition of Gamelab which does not close the door of Shenmue 3.
“If given the right environment, will do Shenmue 3 happy”, Suzuki, ensured that he joked showing the first advancement of the game. “It is a little joke that I did last night,” he warned.
We have spoken with Suzuki on several things, and besides the Chronicle of today in Gamelab – coming today, more afternoon-also we will offer our interview and a detailed overview of what the legendary creator had to say.
While we are obviously disappointed that Yu Suzuki isn’t making a new Shenmue game, we love that he can joke about it and that he still wants to continue the franchise. But, we’ve just got to wait for SEGA to pull the trigger and let our dreams come true.
[Update] We have also been pointed in the direction of a tweet from the official Gamelab Twitter account showing the Shenmue III slide.
Yu Suzuki habla de que nunca parara de crear #Gamelab2014 pic.twitter.com/6PYeeFmSbX
— Gamelab Conference (@gamelab) June 27, 2014
According to @FullReactiveEye, who definitely knows a thing or two about Shenmue, the slide was projected to “stir attention for a publisher. ;)”
[Source: ZonaForo, via