This is probably the most Yakuza game that I've played, all the good and the bad. If I had to point someone to a single Yakuza game that encapsulated the series in a nutshell, I think I would point them to this.
Enjoyed the story even if some plot points made me go 'oh, ok i guess we're doing this now'. Also this game probably has some of my favorite non comedic side quests in the Yakuza games. I think the reason why is that because since there's so many new playable characters, the main story doesn't have time to fully expand on each of them, but the side quests do a really good job in fleshing each character out.
Combat though is hot doo doo water. This combat system is the other side of Yakuza 3's bad Yakuza combat coin. Instead of enemies constantly blocking your attacks like in 3, they instead non stop hit you with unreactable instant stun attacks that make you sit still for like 4 seconds, grab you like crazy which drains your heat insanely fast (god forbid you're fighting multiple guys at once in a small area where you get chained grabbed the moment you get out of another's grab), and enemies constantly spamming their dodges where if you're stupid enough to try and even attempt to attack them, they'll get right out of your way and you'll be either standing there hoping your attack will recover in time so you could try and dodge out of the way (which goes like 2 inches in this game for some reason) or you keep on mashing that light attack button hoping your combo will auto correct towards the opponent. Trying to fight enemies in this game would have made me content that the series changed to turn based, luckily I know that the combat isn't like this anymore because of later games in the series. (Oh god please Yakuza 5 have a better tuned combat system)
~100%ing Review~
Hostess maker might actually be the worst mini game in these games I've had the displeasure of playing
Enjoyed the story even if some plot points made me go 'oh, ok i guess we're doing this now'. Also this game probably has some of my favorite non comedic side quests in the Yakuza games. I think the reason why is that because since there's so many new playable characters, the main story doesn't have time to fully expand on each of them, but the side quests do a really good job in fleshing each character out.
Combat though is hot doo doo water. This combat system is the other side of Yakuza 3's bad Yakuza combat coin. Instead of enemies constantly blocking your attacks like in 3, they instead non stop hit you with unreactable instant stun attacks that make you sit still for like 4 seconds, grab you like crazy which drains your heat insanely fast (god forbid you're fighting multiple guys at once in a small area where you get chained grabbed the moment you get out of another's grab), and enemies constantly spamming their dodges where if you're stupid enough to try and even attempt to attack them, they'll get right out of your way and you'll be either standing there hoping your attack will recover in time so you could try and dodge out of the way (which goes like 2 inches in this game for some reason) or you keep on mashing that light attack button hoping your combo will auto correct towards the opponent. Trying to fight enemies in this game would have made me content that the series changed to turn based, luckily I know that the combat isn't like this anymore because of later games in the series. (Oh god please Yakuza 5 have a better tuned combat system)
~100%ing Review~
Hostess maker might actually be the worst mini game in these games I've had the displeasure of playing