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Playing through Yakuza 0 for the first time (my first Yakuza game ever), wonder if people had a similar reaction to me: Upon clearing Chapter 2 and entering Chapter 3: Wait, what's going on, I'm not Kiryu anymore? Oh jeez, I'm that nutjob Majima that's such a huge meme? Oh, and he has his own upgrades/inventory/quests I need to build up again from scratch? Ugh, what a hassle; way to break my stride, game! Lemme just speed through this and get back to Kiryu... Upon clearing Chapter 4 and entering Chapter 5: Wait take me back to Majima that was getting so good! Noooo! You can't leave me hanging like this! Also I can't get ~sunao ni I LOVE YOU todokeyou kitto YOU LOVE ME tsutawarusa~ outta my head
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Nov 17, 2021 01:01
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| # ¿ May 21, 2024 12:32 |
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So I just made it through Yakuza 0! It was my first Yakuza game and man, it ruled. Can't believe I put it off for so long: I actually recommended it to tons of friends and they loved it, even though I never actually played it, haha. I knew I've love it and it was the Shenmue sequel I wanted, but for some reason I kept holding off and savoring it. It had a bit of a rocky start for me: it was a bit of a slow starter, the combat was a bit stiff and annoying in some respects such as bosses having way too much superarmor/counters/blocks, and I made the supreme mistake of having the charismatic autobiography equipped for too long before I realized my mistake. But despite all that, it really won me over. Random thoughts: Really surprised how much I went from wanting to play as Kiryu to playing as Majima. I really didn't think I'd like the eye-patched guy that much, but geez, it really felt like the Majima Power Hour here with Kiryu just playing a bit part in the end. I guess there was a lot in this game similar to that, thinking about it: tons of people like Nishitani and Kuze really turned from poo poo to hot poo poo as the game went on. Goddamn that final sequence was amazing: doing the raids simultaneously as both Kiryu and Majima, I was absolutely sweating and going 'ora doushita!' right alongside them with every heat action. While the boss fights were quite annoying at times due to aforementioned superarmor/counters/blocks/me stubbornly playing on hard, I felt like I started to get good at whittling them down through death-by-a-thousand-cuts style combat along with strategic heat usage. Seriously that sequence repaid all the growing pains I had with the game with interest: bunch of old dudes ripping their shirts off and whaling on each other: incredible! It didn't always work, but when it did, man, Breaker style felt like cheating, haha. It was always a bit risky to use on boss enemies since it's such a high commitment offence with no defense when you start spinning, but if you get them locked down, their health bars just get deleted. I'd mostly try to stick with Thug and Slugger to be 'fair'. As this is my first Yakuza, I didn't know much about Majima except the whole meme of him chasing down Kiryu all the time in the other games. Maybe you find it silly, but my prediction was that Kiryu was going to blow it in front of Majima, like letting Makoto get shot and die in front of him (or it's a misunderstanding but blames him anyway), and that was going to crack his psyche and send him spiraling down into insanity, where he becomes a Joker-esque figure to Kiryu, constantly hunting him down and not letting him rest as a means of tormenting him with guilt for the mistake he made, testing to see if he can remain a goody-two shoes compared to his new anti-hero persona, and so on and so forth. It didn't end up like that, so I'm actually curious where the whole 'Kiryu-chan' thing comes from since they really never met each other. I can't believe Kiryu just took the car and ditched Nishiki back there. Rude! (Well, he did try to shoot him...) These guys really recover from injuries super fast, huh? Kiryu whipped his shirt off and was bare chested despite just being bandaged up minutes earlier with bullets in his arm and leg, and Majima had plenty of times where he was severely tortured/beat-up and yet went right back to business looking fresh. Not even animes have their heroes recover this fast. ~sunao ni i love you~ I love how someone pointed out that it accurately recreated the stuntman choreography despite them not needing to do so: they use rapid cuts when doing the spin move to hide the stunt double switch, and similarly they hide the stunt man's face with the glare from the lamps when they do the flip. Crazy detail! A few questions: In terms of moving on from this, I was wondering 1) is it worth it to go back into Premium Adventure and finish up stuff like the businesses (and maybe pocket circuit/etc), are there some cool events/lore/fights hidden there and 2) what would be the next game to move onto? I know the obvious answer it most likely Kiwami and Kiwami 2, which I have from bundles, but honestly based on people treating Y0 as the best, I'm thinking I painted myself into a corner and I should just move sideways onto Y7 instead of moving downwards into Kiwamis.
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Jan 3, 2022 06:53
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Just finished Yakuza: Like a Dragon and enjoyed myself very much! Experience was very similar to the regular Yakuza games, where despite me not enjoying the gameplay/combat that much, the dramatic story, wonderful characters and all sorts of crazy side content ended up hooking me so powerfully. Final party composition was Ichiban as Hero (with some Bodyguard blade attacks and Breaker dancing) Nanba as Homeless (with some Fortuneteller lightning and Musician healing) Adachi as Enforcer (with some Musician healing) Saeko as Hostess (with some Idol healing and Night Queen brainwash/fire) I did find the side characters to be very powerful, especially Joon-Gi Han with his incredibly fast and versatile Hitman moveset and Eri's crazy effective Clerk moves, but I wanted to keep the party in the classic composition (I was initially also going to keep everyone in their classic jobs, but went against that and liked experimenting). Some ending and near-ending-ish thoughts since it's fresh in my mind: Protagonist/Antagonist relationship: I feel kinda bad saying this because it was a super emotional moment and the voice actors knocked it out of the park and all that, but I really didn't quite buy the deep relationship between Ichiban and Masato. To me, it felt quite shallow and I don't feel like their relationship in the past was built up enough to cement the brotherly relationship that Ichiban says he felt when confronting him: really felt like the game was just telling me, not showing me. In that regard, I was kind of on Masato's side: it felt like Ichiban was just spouting lovey-dovey family nonsense platitudes and hadn't shown it through actions (I mean c'mon, Ichiban just stood there dumbfounded and ditched him after the nightclub incident in the past, instead of trying to cheer him up or follow him, and in general it just felt like he was following him around out of duty to Arakawa, not love for him). I still think the moment works in general, but just didn't feel like they did enough to really sell me on it: would've appreciated the game expounding more of Ichiban's brotherly moments with him in the past. Fathers and sons: I genuinely thought that the ending was going to focus a lot more on the mismatched father/son relationship, like I thought Masato was going to turn out to have been cognizant of how Arakawa wasn't his actual father and Ichiban was his actual son (perhaps learning of the DNA through the surgery or something, I dunno), and that was really going to flare up his inferiority complex and indignation at being someone nobody wanted, create a whole dynamic where he feels jealous of Ichiban since he always felt Arakawa cared about him more, and that he's annoyed that Ichiban thinks he is blessed when it's the opposite. It's fine with how it turned out, but it almost felt a bit like a Chekov's Gun in that they didn't do much with the element that I thought they could and should. Messy events near end: Some of the stuff near the ending just felt silly. Sawashiro killing the chairman and making the act seem all poetic that Ichiban was late as usual: why didn't he just not do it, are we really supposed to feel pity for him? Adachi conveniently seeing the bomb at the last second and everyone scrambling out felt really dumb (and did they just leave Ishioda to die?) Mirror Face came outta nowhere and just felt goofy, especially with how bad he was mimicking Adachi and just grappling him like a moron: some super assassin he is. Tendo's twisted motivations and heel-turn felt unnecessary and underdeveloped but I guess we gotta have a boss fight against all lieutenants or whatever. Who the hell put that murder ticker up on the screen at the election: was that Nick? Speaking of Mirror Face, I liked the line from him at the end about him betraying Masato because he was annoyed that he viewed him as disposable: I would've loved if the story did that more in that line to highlight Ichiban's better approach to relationships. For example, I would've loved if the Lieutenants all turned to Ichiban's side because they're sick of Masato's attitude: have Ishioda warn the guys about the bomb and scramble out, and forget Mirror Face, just have Tendo himself go along with the act in the end where they get Masato to implicate himself. Moving on from all that: WTF did Kume seriously get away with that? Other game references: Had a good laugh at how many cameos and 'passing the torch' or 'generation clash' moments they started cramming in at the end, what with the Majima and Kiryu fights, amongst others. They were definitely pretty hype but also a bit silly, especially since no matter how good you do, it's technically always a 'you lose' fight in the end to preserve their legendary status. Felt a bit bad though because I only vividly remember Yakuza 0, so some of the appearances like Daigo fell flat. Other random thoughts: This game had some crazy difficulty spikes here and there! There's a few minor ones early on like the Geomijul visit, but especially the Majima fight later on is crazy (though appropriate because, c'mon, it's Majima) They usually introduce a dungeon right before it so I guess it makes sense, but just didn't expect the dungeons to be practically mandatory. Was surprised, then, that the final Millennium Tower didn't spike as well and require visiting the new Kamurocho dungeon: weird inconsistency (though grateful since I wanted the story to keep its pace up). Move imbalance: You'd think that as MP increases, the move damage would, but there are so many weird moves that stand out as being super imbalanced. Joon-Gi Han's lv 1 Head Trauma is god-tier for practically no MP cost and only being able to be used against humans, Enforcer's Paralysis Prongs is also incredibly good and exploits a common lightning weakness, Hostess's lv 1 Sparkling Cannon is way better than any of the other ice moves you learn and so many bosses are weak to ice (my Hostess Saeko destroyed Kiryu and many others), so many Essences and Poundmates are weaker than normal moves, and so on and so forth, like how I'm now learning about how Peppermill Blow is crazy good. I think some of them might be awkwardly balanced around them being class-specific or shared, like how despite Pyro Breath doing barely any more damage than Pyro Belch for practically double the MP cost, I guess it makes sense since only Pyro Breath can be utilized on another class? Nanba and Saeko: Kinda felt like Nanba and Saeko were building up a little bit of a relationship with their rapport: anyone get that feeling? Was curious whether it was gonna become something romantic, but I don't think it ever did (unless there's some side content I missed). FutureCop fucked around with this message at 17:08 on Apr 26, 2023 |
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Apr 26, 2023 16:32
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So, with finishing up Yakuza Like a Dragon and Yakuza 0, I'm planning on eventually moving onto my next game. Most likely it will be either Yakuza Kiwami, Judgment/Lost Judgment, or Ishin Like a Dragon. I realize this is probably a stupid question with no objective truth, but I'll say it anyway: what game is considered to have the best, more refined combat amongst the series? Doesn't have to be specifically amongst the ones I'm considering, but I suppose I would be looking for the best to move towards. In terms of 'best' combat, I guess I'm looking for the one that feels the most fun and fair and smooth feeling: while I got used to the combat in Yakuza 0 and thought it did have some depth and design to it, I'll admit that it was rough to get used to with how stiff the player control is, and how enemies are so heavily block/grab-escape-inclined and have zero-telegraph attacks and what looks like input-reading dodges at times, stunlocks both on the player side and the enemy side, and the combat is so heavily cheesable through items/weapons. Basically is there a Yakuza series game that comes close to feeling like Streets of Rage 4 or God Hand or DMC? And as another question: it seems like Lost Judgment is considered a huge improvement from the first one: is this true, and if so, does this mean you can skip to it?Solenna posted:I read it as a really one sided thing where Ichiban had totally bought into the whole family thing (makes sense given how unstable his life was as a kid/teenager) but Masato was so full of resentment and self loathing that he refused to believe anyone honestly gave a poo poo until the very end. Yeah, that's kind of how I was taking it as well: again, I think I felt like I understood what they were going for, but it just wasn't sold as elegantly as I liked. Kinda felt like an asspull or a retcon with how it is established without much beyond his words, though perhaps I'm not giving it enough credit since I played the game over a long period and perhaps some of the establishment faded away in my memory. FutureCop fucked around with this message at 03:15 on Apr 28, 2023 |
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Apr 28, 2023 03:11
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Been playing Ishin recently and really getting addicted to it. Forever amused by all the constant distractions you gotta go through: oh sure I'll meet you for my first day job training, just hang on, gotta help this old man chop logs, and this lady wants me to listen to her stories, and I gotta feed this dog, work at the udon shop, fight these bandits, tend my garden, etc etc. Kinda surprised I'm enjoying it so much: I mean, I like the Yakuza games a lot, but this one seems to be grabbing me a bit more both from a combat and an adventure/sidequest perspective. Wonder if it's the fact that everything has a bar to fill and contributes to virtue, or I think it was a bit quicker to let you off the leash? I wonder. Anyone have any tips for gear and smithing? Not sure how necessary it is to get other swords/guns instead of just enhancing your starters, not sure whether spear/odachi are worth it, and not sure how best to level the smithy (should I just donate a bunch of cheap swords? or disassembly? or crafting?) Also, am I wrong or is Wild Dancer just too good and cool that I'm not even sure it's necessary to use the others? For example, I like swordsman but it's so slow and stiff for the small damage boost it gives comparatively. FutureCop fucked around with this message at 20:59 on Apr 29, 2024 |
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Apr 29, 2024 20:57
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| # ¿ May 21, 2024 12:32 |
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So I recently just beat Like a Dragon: Ishin! Yay! Had a pretty good time and all that, and was surprised at how much of the side activity I was doing as I usually don't go that deep. Thinking about that, I was a bit curious as to how people feel about the post-game content in these games: I do like me some boss fights and I've never gone against the famous Amon even once in this series and was wondering if it's worth it to get there, especially since I'm worried like it might be too much of a grind to do so and the combat would probably just involve spamming exploits, cheap shots and high stats instead of any sort of skillful play. What are people's experiences with this, and even not just in Ishin: is there perhaps a best game in the series to do it in?
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May 18, 2024 18:56
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