I have always learned that Shenmue set the precedent for a live, breathing open world in video games when it was released on Sega Dreamcast in 1999. It was followed by some of the most widely awaited video game sequences ever made, and Shenmue III set the record for the most-funded Kickstarter title in 2015.
Today, AT&T's Crunchyroll has revealed that Shenmue is having her own anime series.
According to Deadline, it's going to air on Adult Swim's Toonami in the United States, not necessarily on Crunchyroll itself, and it's going to track the game protagonist Ryo Hazuki in his journey to become a martial artist and to avenge his father's murder.
Apart from the rough description, the photo above, and the fact that Crunchyroll ordered 13 episodes, we don't have anything else to tell. Shenmue founder Yu Suzuki will have executive producer credit and will be managed by Chikara Sakurai whose IMDB profile you can search here.
Shenmue III ended up being a little bit of a failure because the game's 20-year-old reputation for creativity couldn't move on to new times, but maybe the plot would live on as a based anime series.
Personally, I am a big fan of what has sometimes been called Shenmue 's modern successors: the Yakuza series.
