There's simply too much in Shenmue for me to cover it in a simple essay, so this part of the review has been broken into sections that cover each of the major aspects of the game.

Overview:
Simply put, Shenmue is the most visually stunning video game ever. Playing it is often like watching moving interactive artwork. The camera angles and visual detail easily rival a professional animated feature. The main character, Ryo, is a likeable, decent character that draws you into the game. 

Shenmue reminds me a lot of the movie Existenz, about people who get trapped inside a virtual reality game and lose the ability to distinguish reality from virtual reality. In that movie, the main characters encounter game characters that loop in their behavior until they are asked the proper question by the players. The characters in Shenmue are just like this. You can stand and watch them sweep the street over and over, or follow them as they mindlessly walk to work for the day. If you have Ryo talk to them, they will say the same thing over and over - unless they're the key person that you're supposed to talk to. In a sense, this game is a standard adventure game in an incredible graphical environment. Indeed it feels a lot like Shenmue is the first step toward the type of virtual reality portrayed in Existenz.

Like The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask, the game has its own internal time clock that every character functions by. The barbershop opens at 10am, the bars open late in the evening and Ryo must be home at 11:30 at night. The sun sets, the weather changes from hour to hour, and the world changes from day to day. 

Unlike Zelda, there is no ocarina to alter the speed of time or to warp you exactly where you need to go. This means that if Ryo has nothing to do until 2pm, you've got to find a way to pass the time until then. Fortunately, there is an arcade where you can spend time playing classic Sega arcade games, darts and practicing Quick Timer Events. You can even upload your saved high scores to Sega using the Passport disk to see if you've ranked globally.

There is an option to warp to different places from Ryo's house, but I advise against using it. Due to the nature of the game, if you don't walk through certain parts of town at the right time on the right day, you'll miss interesting plot twists. I began my game using the warp feature, and since I have stopped using it the number of plot points has increased significantly.

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Exploration Mode:
The most common aspect of Shenmue is its exploration mode. The whole experience is a little odd. Rather than giving a sense that the player is in complete control, the game feels a lot like taking possession of Ryo's body while leaving him in control of his mind. For example, you can move Ryo around and initiate a conversation by pressing the A button, but what Ryo actually says is completely out of your control. What this amounts to is that Shenmue feels much less like a video game and more like a motion picture that progresses at your own pace. This description may discourage hardcore gamers, but rest assured that once you start the game in motion you'll be hooked. It's a surprisingly compelling entertainment experience.

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Quick Timer Events:
Occasionally, the game will break into a real-time cinema scene. Any time this happens, a Quick Timer Event may occur. Basically, Quick Timer Events flash a button on the screen for a split second. If you press the button before it disappears, the cinema scene (and the game) progresses favorably. This may not sound like the most fun, but it adds a definite amount of suspense every time the game breaks away to advance the plot. You can slip up a few times without causing too much of a problem, and I have yet to really slip up in any significant way.

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Free Battle:
Ryo is a serious student of the martial arts, and you must help him practice his moves if he is to stand a chance against his adversaries. The game provides places to practice alone and to spar with a friendly opponent. As you practice, the game increases Ryo's fighting proficiency, making him better at actual combat. I have found that despite regular practicing, when it comes to an actual fight, Ryo still controls very stiffly. Even so, fights can often be replayed if lost, and the whole experience is set up to be as enjoyable as possible.

To help Ryo stay competitive, he can buy instructions for new moves, and game characters will also teach him new moves from time to time.

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Shenmue Passport
The fourth GD-ROM in the game package, Shenmue Passport, is what really shows how monumental this game is. The main part of the disk has some jaw dropping cinemas of the main characters explaining important aspects of the gameplay. It also has a section where you can listen to the game's music and watch some of the more important cinema scenes that have occurred.

What's really key to the Shenmue Passport disk is the online functionality. Using the Dreamcast's modem and your ISP, you can access incredibly detailed information on every single person and place that you have encountered. Even bit characters have a brief but detailed description, complete with the character's blood type. You can also check the weather forecast for the next few days in the game world, and trade game items online. Not only that, but there's access to Shenmue news from Sega, access to the Shenmue web site, and the disk will even download hints for you if it determines that you are stuck. The last cool feature of the Shenmue Passport disk is the ability to analyze your save files. The stats listed are staggering. It even counts how many times Ryo has bumped into a wall!

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Conclusion:
I could go on an on describing how stunning this game is. True, its gameplay isn't all that groundbreaking, but its environment is. This review doesn't even begin to describe the breathtaking detail present in the Shenmue game world. Never before has there been such a living, breathing, ever-changing world portrayed in a video game. It's a shame that amongst all the hype for the PS2 the Dreamcast is being shrugged off by many consumers. Shenmue proves that (at least for the time being) the Dreamcast is where the breakthrough games are. If you have a Dreamcast, run to the store and pick this game up ASAP. If you don't have a Dreamcast, well, take a look at this game and you'll want one ASAP.