New Shenmue announced

Sega has fulfilled the dreams of a legion of hardcore gamers by announcing that a third Shenmue game is in development.

But in possibly less enthralling news, it’s only going to be a mobile phone title. And at the moment it’s only planned for Japan.

Kotaku reports that Shenmue Town is described by Sega as the third Shenmue game”, though that’s very different to referring to it as Shenmue III. It’s due out this year on Yahoo! Japan’s social network Mobage-Town.

The site also adds that the once in-development Shenmue Online has since been cancelled.

A true sequel to Shenmue is perhaps the most requested game amongst the core gamer community. The original games for the Sega Dreamcast are dearly loved, and back in the day very much broke the mould for action titles by adding free-roaming elements and an extraordinary level of depth,