Bruh I can't take this game anymore. There's hints of the original Shenmue spirit here but it's utterly twisted by a lack of honesty in its core component. You can tell this story in a better way if you just make a smaller, shorter game. Why delude yourself into thinking that you're an epic? I never seen a game try to pad its length out as hard as this, and I am not even the kind of person who slowly dies inside anytime a piece of entertainment media meanders in its pacing and such. Everything in the game is designed to be make the game longer, and there's barely enough rewarding moments to make it worthwhile. Having to train by learning new moves and improving your stamina is a nice idea, but the constantly meaningless prolongement of the main story is nowhere near good enough to justify the effort and time being put into said training. Not to mention the combat feels pretty unsatisfying by itself, it feels more like watching a bunch of hollow doll puppets flinging their appendages around. They did nail the nostalgic Dreamcast vibes through the environment visuals, the music is as good as always, and I like that you can call characters from the previous games and just chat for a bit. Still, as a massive enjoyer of the first two Shenmues (Shenmue 1 is very high on my list of favorite games), I can't help but be a little sad right now.