You might want to sit down.
In 1999, Sega released the first Shenmue adventure game on the Dreamcast. Seven years in production, the game was, at that time, the most expensive title ever released.
A sequel to the free-roaming game was released in 2001 with a sequel planned. A third entry in the Shenmue series has not been released, and an online game called Shenmue Online was in the works. However, this game is believed to be canceled.
There will be a new Shenmue game. It will be released in Japan — this year, even!
However, it will be released as a social networking game. A new entry called "Shenmue Town" will be released in Japan this winter for the Yahoo! Japan version of Mobage-town, which is a hugely popular mobile-based social network.
According to the game's press release, this will be the "third" Shenmue game — that doesn't necessarily mean it's Shenmue III, however. So perhaps don't go looking to this social networking version of Shenmue to clear up Shenmue II's cliffhanger ending.
Besides Shenmue, a version of Atlus's Persona series called Persona 3 Social will be released on Yahoo! Mobage-town.
プレスリリース 株式会社ディー・エヌ・エー [DeNA]