Sega of America say no, and after playing it, we agree

Various reports around the net have suggested that Sega of America will be releasing the US version of Shenmue on July 2, but when we decided to give our representative at Sega a call, we were told the following: "It would be physically impossible to get it localised by then."

Sega actually have a fourth quarter release date planned for the title, which would place it in October, November or December. So why is it taking so long?

Localising the game isn't just a question of translating the dialogue (no, Sega wouldn't confirm subtitling or dubbing to us). If you've played through the game, you'll know that much of the gameplay is visual in nature. A character will ask you to find the Yamamoto household, for instance, and the only way for you to do so is to look at the name placards outside all the homes - and as the placards in the Japanese version are all in Japanese, of course, this makes it impossible for non-Japanese speakers to play the game.

While our representative wouldn't share with us exactly how Sega are dealing with issues such as these, one thing's for sure: the localisation is going to take a bit longer than a July release date would allow.

More when we have it.


Courtesy of IGN.com