The end of the Kiryu saga, The Song of Life, is an interesting specimen of a Like a Dragon game. It's the debut of the physics-based Dragon Engine, and there are shortcomings that are obvious from the difficulties they had in making Kamurocho at this new level of detail. However, while there are plenty of comparisons to make between this game and LaD 3, I actually prefer to think of this game as more similar to the original on PS2. It shares a self-serious story, focus on Kiryu as a flawed but honorable beat-em-up sort of guy, and a visceral but clunky combat system (and one that gets a bad wrap at times). It's my understanding that this game was developed alongside 0 and Kiwami, a throwback game to the first and a remake of said original in the same engine, and in my opinion, it shows that that first game was fresh in mind at the time this one was made.

I'll start on my favorite bit of this game - the storyline was phenomenal and brought the series back to the tone of the first game and the movies that inspired it. For the game's short length, it made the most of the drama of every boss fight and long battle, and the new cast of friendly characters felt more like a team and a family than usual for this franchise. The pacing was quite good compared to the lengthy and long winded nature of 5, though this game struggles with "belaboring the point" in dialogue much like 0 still did. My favorite element of this game's plot was the interrogation of Kiryu's tendency to fight to fix problems: he leaves a path of destruction every time he goes to Kamurocho or gets involved in crime business elsewhere, and this game is interested in challenging his ideals on that front unlike 4 and 5. It's refreshing to see this beloved character once again struggle with his nature of beating people up to get what he wants.

Though, as much as this game pays attention to the darker side of Kiryu and the criminal underworld, it's still in the era of goofy Yakuza hijinks. Once you take a step away from the main plot to do some side content, it's straight to the same wacky tone as 0's substories most of the time. Like a Dragon 0 rode a fine line between tonal shifts throughout the plot, and made room for that sort of silliness in the breaks you had between the drama in multiple ways. In 6, it's self-serious most of the time and it creates more intense whiplash than the series already had up to this point. You could say not to do side content, but rushing through the story in these games stunts your ability to level up and take on the challenges of the main story, especially on higher difficulties that demand a higher level of combat mastery than the standard or easy modes.

Speaking of leveling up, this game introduces a brand new system of experience types. There are five different types, and each is used to varying degrees in a long list of upgrades laid out in a similar fashion to the orbs system from LaD 4. I'll give credit that it's refreshing to once again have numerous choices on how to spend stats after 0 went the direction of a skill tree that basically normalized most playthroughs past the choice of which styles to level up first. However, this new system forces a lot of attention to go to side content, which is understandably frustrating for those who don't want to spend a good chunk of playtime managing a hunger system and looking for restaurants with balanced meals for the stats they want to upgrade.

Combat in this game was an interesting beast - it was refreshing and interesting in a way I did not expect. I knew going into this one that it was the first of the new engine, and therefore would likely have similar game feel and balancing issues as LaD 1 and 3 did. What I didn't expect was such a strong evolution of the original game's "pick things up and beat guys senseless" concept. Sure, 2 and its sequels had much better game feel and generally good combat compared to this game, but this is Like a Dragon. This is a series about Kiryu, a guy who's job was to beat people up to collect money for the Tojo Clan, and who can't seem to shake his urge to use his fists whenever serious problems arise in the darker side of his life. Much like that first game, the combat is very rough at the start and gets better as you scour the towns for things to do that give you experience and allow you to level up your stats and unlock abilities. If you are struggling to enjoy the combat in this game on a first playthrough, I encourage you to invest upgrades in experience boosts and a quicker hunger cycle to get stats and combat moves faster.

The game has two towns, Kamurocho and the new Onomichi. The classic city isn't quite in full form, with a good chunk of the top of the map completely inaccessible due to "construction". It's quite funny to see the developers actively admit that they couldn't build the whole city in time in-universe, though the construction barriers also randomly appear at times in the story to guide the player in linear segments. Onomichi is a much smaller map, which makes sense given it's a small town, though it's lacking in terms of restaurants and side games for a place that around half the game takes place in. That said, both locales look absolutely wonderful and the compromises are somewhat understandable given the achievements the team made in that department.

The ending of this game was certainly longer than it needed to be, but touched all the bases that the final full Kiryu game needed to. I felt emotionally satisfied by the final boss for the first time in the series since 2 or 3 (one day I'll explain what I mean by this) and the final act in general did a great job in tying everything together. Much like 4, this game is extremely twist heavy and I expect I'll get more disappointed with bits of the story as I spend more time away from this game. But as it stands, Like a Dragon 6 was more than I hoped it would be and I'm certainly glad I got around to playing it after taking a break from continuing the series for a long while.