"the sins of the yakuza are mine. and if i have to, i'll take on every last one."

i have spent the past month and a half playing the entire yakuza series. blood, sweat, tears, and hundreds of hours have gone into this journey that slowly rose to the crescendo that is infinite wealth. but now that i'm here, there is a void inside me left by the man whose entire legacy has been built up over the entire series.

it's rare i genuinely get deeply involved into the story of any game or series. these days games just seem to take the same plots and rehash them over and over again and so the idea of a good "story" was kind of lost to me. the story of kiryu is one that managed to slowly consume me as the series progressed, and i struggle to see how they can top what they managed to achieve with infinite wealth. it's not often you keep a main character around across almost 10 games and multiple decades, but they somehow managed to do it.

they connect all the dots between you and your past lives, and it feels like you are forcefully but hesitantly dragged into accepting fate alongside kiryu. the memory links you come across touch on aspects of every game and had me so emotional so many times. at times it felt like the world would fall apart without this man, yet he managed to hold it together every time.

"me? i'll take on the yakuza's past. but you... i want you to handle their future."

it really did feel like this game was kiryu passing the torch to ichiban in hopes of creating a better yakuza world. i didn't know how to feel about this since 7 left me with a weird taste, but over the course of this game i warmed up to the idea of it and like the character that ichiban has turned into, one who can obtain that legendary status.

the same goes for the gameplay; 7 was definitely pretty rough and i'll be the first to say i was not the biggest fan of the jrpg transition. 8 changed my mind completely on that matter; every small thing that annoyed me completely disappeared and was replaced with even more of what i loved. the combat, the jobs, the substories, everything just felt like it meshed together perfectly.

this isn't a game i can coherently explain in a review, it is something you need to experience yourself. play the yakuza series in its entirety. yes, it is going to take you forever to complete, but i promise you it is a peak gaming experience.

i really don't know what i'm going to do next, i don't know what rgg is going to do next, but i do know that whatever it is, i'm here for it.

it made it to my top 5 for a reason.

also i would die for seonhee.

bon voyage.

All the issues with the remaster itself aside, this is so far my favorite Yakuza game. The combat is basically Y2's but it controls better and takes a little bit longer for you to get the combo speed as fast as it was, but everything about the combat in this game feels great. All the heat actions and encounters were fun, and every long battle was just incredible because of the better controls and feel of this game.
I liked the story a lot, I think the first couple hours of the game, while slow, is some of the best because it's basically just Kiryu having a vacation.
I can't see why anyone would skip this game at all, nearing the end of this game it came to me just how much I loved it.

"𝙏𝙬𝙤 𝙨𝙬𝙤𝙧𝙙𝙨, 𝙙𝙖𝙣𝙘𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙞𝙣 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙝𝙚𝙖𝙫𝙚𝙣𝙨, 𝙨𝙬𝙞𝙧𝙡𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙗𝙚𝙣𝙚𝙖𝙩𝙝 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙨𝙩𝙖𝙧𝙨...𝙗𝙡𝙚𝙣𝙙𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙖𝙣𝙙 𝙘𝙤𝙣𝙨𝙤𝙡𝙞𝙙𝙖𝙩𝙞𝙣𝙜 𝙞𝙣𝙩𝙤 𝙖 𝙨𝙞𝙣𝙜𝙡𝙚 𝙨𝙬𝙤𝙧𝙙, 𝙜𝙧𝙚𝙖𝙩𝙚𝙧 𝙩𝙝𝙖𝙣 𝙩𝙝𝙚 𝙨𝙪𝙢 𝙤𝙛 𝙞𝙩𝙨 𝙥𝙖𝙧𝙩𝙨."

Dare I say the most important game in the franchise, writing down a formula that this series has come to follow even more than the original two games did. In a franchise as expansive as Like a Dragon/Yakuza, there are bound to be some titles that are left to the wayside with every title in the series being playable in English, officially or by fan-patches, except this one. I guess it’s easy to see why, the first five chapters are constrained, feeling closer to a tech demo testing out what the PlayStation 3 can accomplish which makes the possibility of a remake unlikely and a remaster even unlikelier.

Even now I’m struggling to write about this game in detail because to do so I have to expect that you have played or know the details about this game in some capacity but I know that’s not the case and I’m left feeling more like a car salesman trying to sell you on this game more than anything else. This is a game that’s defined by its connection and parallels to the main series more than how it radically differs from it. Miyamoto Musashi is not Kiryu Kazuma but he is Kiryu Kazumanosuke, a man imbued with a similar sense of purpose. Both are characters who are changed by their meeting with Haruka, both have lost years of their life unjustly, and both have been beaten and betrayed. Instead of the way of the Yakuza, Musashi is dead set in following “the way of the sword”. Fighting is all he knows, strength is the only measure these men can define themselves but it’s all for naught if they can’t even protect the ones they hold dear. Yakuza has messed around with themes of identity and duality, before and since Kenzan, but the manifestation here is one that’s based on myth, main series parallels, and their personas in the narrative. To understand what this game is trying to achieve one has to know all three because that context is needed to realize the sense of self imbued on its characters.

It’s exactly due to these parallels that the final chapter is the most shocking yet makes the most sense, reframing everything you’ve come to know and expect. There’s an inner conflict in this game’s philosophy, you can’t adapt the life of Miyamoto Musashi in the image of Kiryu Kazuma and expect some things not to be seen from a mile away. Everyone even remotely familiar with Musashi, either through history or even other fictional works such as Vagabond knows about his famous battle with Sasaki Kojiro, so the outcome is no surprise. It’s what comes after. It’s a defiance of fate in the most extreme sense possible, a past unchangeable and it rebels against even that to relay to you that what’s most sensible isn’t always right, that you’re not defined as a hero because of your actions written in history you’re a hero because of what you do here, right now. It’s about fighting even the fate that is history itself, even if history is a lie. Even if it doesn’t remember who you truly are. It’s stubborn, but it’s for yourself. It’s only due to that, only due to our ability to love that we’re able to heal. Kenzan takes two separate men, one written in the annals of history and one who's a video game legend , and merges them in a way that every distinction between the two synthesizes into one individual who is arguably greater than both of them. Even if it is a lie.

Lets start out, this game is incredible as a souls like, its put its own twist and creativity behind it!
The world, lore and bosses are amazing!

Weapon mechanics are interesting although technique seems to be a good way to go.

To think this is an indie game baffles be!
Some Bosses are a bit annoying especially with how many are 2 phases. seems a bit of a strange decision

(just copy-paste of my Steam review lmao, played on Steam Deck, works well)
I know this gets said a lot, but games like this make me wish there was a 'mixed' review option on Steam. The gameplay is fun at first, borrowing the frantic, top-down, one-hit-kill gameplay from Hotline Miami slow-mo and weapon behaviours from My Friend Pedro. The fundamental gameplay mechanics are very good, and the first few levels are enjoyable. The earlier levels are concise and fun, but the levels become longer and more frustrating later on. The main difficulty spike comes from longer levels resulting in more repetition rather than new enemy types or intelligent level design. It becomes infuriating and I was keen for the game to end. However, the visuals are gorgeous, even being the inspiration for a sequence in John Wick: Chapter 4. It never gets old and it carries the game in the later sections. The story is, well, there. It isn't special and it doesn't need to be.

The most insulting part of this game are the boss fights. All of the five bosses are exactly the same, consisting of two separated corridors, one with you and some enemies and the other with the boss. The boss is just a normal enemy with a bigger healthbar who constantly moves forward while shooting you. This is copy-pasted in all the encounters, with only differences being different location and a longer length, with the exception of the last one adding a new enemy variety.

Those boss encounters are a perfect example of my issues with The Hong Kong Massacre, repetitive and uninspired design leading to unnecessary tedium and frustration. That being said, the core gameplay is great and the visuals are stunning. It is with regret that I do not recommend this game as it is, to me, a quintessential mixed bag.