Gaming "That's rad!": The Yakuza Series

Just finished Yakuza Kiwami. It's not nearly as good as Zero, but it was still very good and enjoyable. Even with all the sadness...

On to Kiwami 2!

 

Zero really amps up the tragedy - it'd work without Zero but it's so much sharper with it.

 

They also added a bunch of cutscenes to Kiwami explaining Nishikiyama's character arc, so whereas in Yakuza proper it's like

Spoiler

"Oh, yeah, a carp tattoo, sure, I guess,"

in Kiwami it's

Spoiler

"AHHHHHHHH A CARP TATTOO OF COURSE - THE ONLY POSSIBLE TATTOO!"

 

Nishikiyama's arc is also so much better having played 0. Having actually seen them as friends first for more than like one scene.

 

So, you may or may not remember that the original Yakuza 7 trailer dropped near April Fools' Day, and there was initially speculation that the turn-based combat thing was a joke.

It was. They made the switch after people thought it wasn't.



(Also this video is well worth a watch, IMO.)

 

Lol wow

 

Kkkkkiiiiirrryyyuu-chan!

Good news - Judgment is getting PS5 version.

Bad news - it won't be free if you own the PS4 version.

 

Is Yakuza Kiwami just Yakuza 0 without most of the side content?

Three chapters in and that’s my impression of it.

 

Engine-wise, pretty much, and the sidequests are quite faithful to the original, which is unfortunate because it took them a few games to realize the side quests should actually be completely off the wall (K2 does not make the same mistake). If you really milked a lot out of 0 you may just want to mainline the plot, as IMO that and some of the random Majima encounters are the highlights.

 

It's the first game remade so it may suffer in comparison to Zero, made years later, but it's still very good.

 

Oh, forgot to adhere to my own meme: K also has better mahjong than 0. However, that has become totally irrelevant given the newer games in the series are where you should be going for your sweet, sweet Tsumo fix.

 

Have just nabbed the free PS5 version of Yakuza: Like A Dragon.

The PS5 has just started chomping through the 43-44GB download.

 

Reasons to play Yakuza 7 on PS5:
- lesser - graphics look great.
- greater - lot of load transitions that the PS5 renders as seconds only.

Is it very much a Yakuza game? Oh yes. You go from serious gangster politics to seeking a plunger to unblock a toilet.

Not sure about the new battle system. The perfect guard mechanic is a bit vague.

 

I prefer the meditative pace of the Shenmue series toYakuza.

 

Obviously I can only judge second hand for the time being, but the impressions I get make it sound like the turn based system was slightly under baked, if loaded with good ideas about the central conceit about its “realism.” If they continue forward with it I think it’ll get better. I almost feel like that’s a big if, though, RGGS seem to like changing the engine periodically.

Okay. I think most of the thread regulars have positive feelings about Shenmue so I'm not sure you're going to get much pushback on preferring it.

 

I don't find the pace of Shenmue and Yakuza to be much different. You are allowed to do as many side arcade things as you want in both, so you can sorts set your own pace. Obviously Yakuza has actual side quests as well, but again, they're optional. The actual pace of each story is similar.

 

Oh, I know! I wasn’t trying to provoke a fight. Like in Shenmue, I was just slowly ambling in to say something without much passion, and then slowly ambling out.

But the real reason I like Shenmue better is riding a forklift. That was the best.

 

I love Shenmue, I mean it was my favorite game for like ten years. But damn I hate that forklift.

 

This is the Yakuza thread, we're gonna need a pinkie.

 

Majima be like “Shenmue sucks wanna fight about it?”

 

They really missed a beat by not having Kiwami feature a gatchapon collecting element like in Shenmue, and then randomly you’d sometimes get a gatcha containing a note saying “Look behind you” right before you hear “KIRYU-CHAN!”

 

It all kicks off then things get serious when Shimano gets involved.....

 

All I know is that there is only one game I ever played where the game was having a crappy job driving a forklift.

 

0 is the rare prequel you should play first. Several scenes and some side content was added to Kiwami (which is what you should play to experience the original, not the PS2 version) to make it better if you’ve played 0, and because they’re both in the same engine you won’t notice a gameplay shift. I also personally think it’s a better introduction to the series as a whole, as it’s a better representative sample of... basically every game other than the original.