Hannibalmick
463 Reviews liked by Hannibalmick
This review contains spoilers
Minor spoilers inside on structure, no specific events referred to.
In 2021 I played Yakuza: Like a Dragon, the 8th mainline installment in the series (though, labeled as LAD7). I had lost my first big job after college, and moved back home with my parents. I felt like I was stuck and had pretty low expectations for my life. So when I say that I connected with Ichiban’s story in LAD7, I really truly meant it. To watch this man at 42, who had lost half of his life to prison for a crime he didnt commit and thrown back into the world at rock bottom, climb back up out of the gutter with his unbridled optimism and kindness for people and life, it was inspiring and left a significant impact on me. Even in your 40s, you can still make something of your life. This was also supported by the immaculate character writing and story of the game, watching Ichiban struggle with his past familial relationships and his criminal past (The series IS called Yakuza, after all) and come out of his hardship with his optimism and faith in others enduring.
I describe all this at the outset of this review to highlight how excited I was at the sequel to LAD7. The story and characters were incredible, but it was the first time the team developing this series had shifted the gameplay from action-brawler combat to a semi-real time turn based RPG. Turn based actions occurring, but the characters would wander around the battle field outside of the players control. It was rough, and clunky, but I saw so much potential. I thought for sure, the next game. The next game if they could carry this quality of writing and merge it with a fully realized system for the gameplay, that would be the perfect Like a Dragon game.
Which makes it disheartening for me to write that Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth is a disappointment. There was absolutely care placed into the game, but I feel like it was put into the wrong places. The pacing of the plot is inconsistent, sometimes meandering for chapters at a time, leading to a crunch of too much happening at once in the back third of the game. And even in this crunch of time, there is still padding added in the form of side content and characters taking up time along the main path, and long, repeated segments of fighting your way through a railroaded section of Honolulu. My impression from the game is that the team was thrilled at the opportunity to set their game in Hawaii, but they were unsure of how to actually build a plot in the setting. There is ample opportunity to explore the new scenic location and thinly veiled justifications to parade you through the city to experience every inch of the new local, but it doesn’t feel meaningful enough with how disconnected and flat the beats of the story feel. Ichiban in this game has to share top billing with series previous protagonist Kiryu, in a way that I feel like hurts the overall experience. This is Kiryu’s last big hurrah, but for the fourth time. It feels like the game starts as trying to tell a story about Ichiban, and his attempt to both reconnect with lost family and fufill the wishes of his family that had passed on in the previous adventure. But that intimate focus quickly gets lost in government conspiracies, a piece criticizing digital cancel culture and the attention span of the general public, and the desire of the series producers to market to and give fanservice for the fans of Kiryu. A significant portion of the side content in this game is spent in reminiscing in the past nostalgia of the series, and all of Kiryu’s old adventures. And while I did enjoy these moments (I am not immune to nostalgia), I cant help but feel like these are moments that could have gone in the Kiryu-specific game that had just released 3 months ago, and that these are moments we could have spent fleshing out and spending time with the new lead character Ichiban. No part of the game speaks more to this for me than the fact that our opening moments are spent with Ichiban, but our closing moments at the end are spent with Kiryu, our new lead now an afterthought.
There are other problems I could cite with the game, such as the Spider-Man 3 problem of too many underdeveloped villains competing for screentime, or the weird out of character writing given to several returning and supporting characters. But overall, I’m left feeling disappointed by this outing. Infinite Wealth is a game that is afraid to let go of the past, which is a sad note to leave on. I hope in RGG’s next outing, they will be able to reel in their scope a little and really do something incredible with Ichiban and the cast of characters they've accumulated over the past two entries.
In 2021 I played Yakuza: Like a Dragon, the 8th mainline installment in the series (though, labeled as LAD7). I had lost my first big job after college, and moved back home with my parents. I felt like I was stuck and had pretty low expectations for my life. So when I say that I connected with Ichiban’s story in LAD7, I really truly meant it. To watch this man at 42, who had lost half of his life to prison for a crime he didnt commit and thrown back into the world at rock bottom, climb back up out of the gutter with his unbridled optimism and kindness for people and life, it was inspiring and left a significant impact on me. Even in your 40s, you can still make something of your life. This was also supported by the immaculate character writing and story of the game, watching Ichiban struggle with his past familial relationships and his criminal past (The series IS called Yakuza, after all) and come out of his hardship with his optimism and faith in others enduring.
I describe all this at the outset of this review to highlight how excited I was at the sequel to LAD7. The story and characters were incredible, but it was the first time the team developing this series had shifted the gameplay from action-brawler combat to a semi-real time turn based RPG. Turn based actions occurring, but the characters would wander around the battle field outside of the players control. It was rough, and clunky, but I saw so much potential. I thought for sure, the next game. The next game if they could carry this quality of writing and merge it with a fully realized system for the gameplay, that would be the perfect Like a Dragon game.
Which makes it disheartening for me to write that Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth is a disappointment. There was absolutely care placed into the game, but I feel like it was put into the wrong places. The pacing of the plot is inconsistent, sometimes meandering for chapters at a time, leading to a crunch of too much happening at once in the back third of the game. And even in this crunch of time, there is still padding added in the form of side content and characters taking up time along the main path, and long, repeated segments of fighting your way through a railroaded section of Honolulu. My impression from the game is that the team was thrilled at the opportunity to set their game in Hawaii, but they were unsure of how to actually build a plot in the setting. There is ample opportunity to explore the new scenic location and thinly veiled justifications to parade you through the city to experience every inch of the new local, but it doesn’t feel meaningful enough with how disconnected and flat the beats of the story feel. Ichiban in this game has to share top billing with series previous protagonist Kiryu, in a way that I feel like hurts the overall experience. This is Kiryu’s last big hurrah, but for the fourth time. It feels like the game starts as trying to tell a story about Ichiban, and his attempt to both reconnect with lost family and fufill the wishes of his family that had passed on in the previous adventure. But that intimate focus quickly gets lost in government conspiracies, a piece criticizing digital cancel culture and the attention span of the general public, and the desire of the series producers to market to and give fanservice for the fans of Kiryu. A significant portion of the side content in this game is spent in reminiscing in the past nostalgia of the series, and all of Kiryu’s old adventures. And while I did enjoy these moments (I am not immune to nostalgia), I cant help but feel like these are moments that could have gone in the Kiryu-specific game that had just released 3 months ago, and that these are moments we could have spent fleshing out and spending time with the new lead character Ichiban. No part of the game speaks more to this for me than the fact that our opening moments are spent with Ichiban, but our closing moments at the end are spent with Kiryu, our new lead now an afterthought.
There are other problems I could cite with the game, such as the Spider-Man 3 problem of too many underdeveloped villains competing for screentime, or the weird out of character writing given to several returning and supporting characters. But overall, I’m left feeling disappointed by this outing. Infinite Wealth is a game that is afraid to let go of the past, which is a sad note to leave on. I hope in RGG’s next outing, they will be able to reel in their scope a little and really do something incredible with Ichiban and the cast of characters they've accumulated over the past two entries.
This review contains spoilers
I started this game thinking that it'll be hard for me to get through, as I have always had a difficult time reading visual novels. Yet it almost felt like I breezed past the game, and not once did it appear to me that I was only trying to push through the game because I wanted to finish it as soon as possible.
Even with the first few hours of the game, where it seems like there’s not much that was happening and only a few things that moved the plot, I was still having a lot of fun due to the endearing cast that bounced off each other and a carefree protagonist in Haku. But as soon as the story unravels itself and where Haku went from this laid-back guy to a person with a compelling development and a heavy burden that were entrusted to him, and with how much it changed him and those around him as they tried to navigate the rocky path that was laid down for them, it’s hard to not be enamored by it.
Right now, I wish to write a more articulate review of my thoughts about the game and the characters but hopefully as I play through MoT (idk if I’ll start it right now) I will have a more detailed review about the series.
Even with the first few hours of the game, where it seems like there’s not much that was happening and only a few things that moved the plot, I was still having a lot of fun due to the endearing cast that bounced off each other and a carefree protagonist in Haku. But as soon as the story unravels itself and where Haku went from this laid-back guy to a person with a compelling development and a heavy burden that were entrusted to him, and with how much it changed him and those around him as they tried to navigate the rocky path that was laid down for them, it’s hard to not be enamored by it.
Right now, I wish to write a more articulate review of my thoughts about the game and the characters but hopefully as I play through MoT (idk if I’ll start it right now) I will have a more detailed review about the series.
A lot of cool new mechanics and jobs, bunch of fanservice for the series players, a whole new location. By all accounts this should be my personal 5 stars.
And yet, I kinda felt that some parts of the experience were underwhelming. My gripes are mostly with the story part being (once again) locked by a pretty bad grindwall, that you basically have to do, if you want to progress. This is the second time RGG studio does this, and if they wanted to be faithful to the dragon quest roots (I still remember the grind in XI), then I guess they succeeded, but the grinding dungeons are generally pretty bad in this one. At least in lad:7 you could just spam auto and let it grind by itself in the tower, but here you have to go through these cookie cutter dungeons that are really boring. I’d say that even Tartarus in P3P was more fun than this.
Kiryu is cool as always, Kasuga continues to be a perfect protagonist, the new characters and all the old ones are great. The cast is almost perfect, although that one character being voiced by Toru Furuya even in English is still a bit weird to me.
Ultimately I feel like it’s an almost perfect JRPG for me, if only they made the grind somewhat more fun.
Oh, and dodonko is fine I guess.
And yet, I kinda felt that some parts of the experience were underwhelming. My gripes are mostly with the story part being (once again) locked by a pretty bad grindwall, that you basically have to do, if you want to progress. This is the second time RGG studio does this, and if they wanted to be faithful to the dragon quest roots (I still remember the grind in XI), then I guess they succeeded, but the grinding dungeons are generally pretty bad in this one. At least in lad:7 you could just spam auto and let it grind by itself in the tower, but here you have to go through these cookie cutter dungeons that are really boring. I’d say that even Tartarus in P3P was more fun than this.
Kiryu is cool as always, Kasuga continues to be a perfect protagonist, the new characters and all the old ones are great. The cast is almost perfect, although that one character being voiced by Toru Furuya even in English is still a bit weird to me.
Ultimately I feel like it’s an almost perfect JRPG for me, if only they made the grind somewhat more fun.
Oh, and dodonko is fine I guess.
Now that I’ve had a day to sit on my thoughts of the game I will make an actual non-shitpost review.
This game is a mess. I wasn’t kidding when I said this is the MGS4 of the series. An extremely ambitious, earnest, heartfelt celebration of the series that has extremely high highs but also constantly falls on its face with extremely stupid writing.
The pacing is some of the worst we’ve seen from RGG. For a game that can easily be 100+ hours long it is both too long but also too short in areas. It constantly pulls you away from the main story to do very involved mini game/sub system tutorials but then has no time in the final hours to wrap up most of the story. At least 4 of the main characters this game is about don’t show up in the final cutscene. You just have to be told about what they are doing from a mouth piece so we can wrap shit up. Kiryu is just kinda left in this weird limbo as they don’t explain what the fuck got them to this point with an achievement titles “man who reclaimed his name”. It genuinely feels like there is either an entire chapter or at least a huge segment of one missing from the end. One of the main villains just stops showing up for 10+ hours only to be seen again in a cut away and is completely unrecognizable for at least another few hours. They then try to do the coin locker scene again with them and it feels completely unearned because they haven’t done anything. The two main villains you do fight are extremely forgettable and underwhelming. One is given what you’d imagine to be a super important connection to Ichiban but it never comes up. The two share a single cutscene at the start of the game and that’s it. Why was it even a plot point to begin with then???? So many plot threads just go no where or are left extremely unsatisfying as they hand wave them away so it can’t be viewed as “a plot hole”. I seriously think how they structure their stories needs to change because I don’t think the Yakuza writing formula they’ve had for 2 decades translates to a 100 hour JRPG. Imo the best way to enjoy the main story of these games is when you can just progress the plot freely and not be bogged down by side content or busy work. I usually save that stuff for premium adventure so the story isn’t so “start and stop”. But you can’t do that in these games because of the rpg leveling and just how the story constantly blocks you to do other shit I am currently not interested in. No RGG I don’t give a fuck about your Pokémon clone and it’s 30 minute+ forced tutorial I just want to get on with chapter 4 please.
Most of the cast has nothing to do in this game which would be fine if they didn’t force them to have boring ass drink links you need to do to make them objectively better in gameplay.
The gameplay needs massive changes going forward because Jesus Christ was I sick of the multiple grinds it imposes. The long battles they do in this game are terrible. In previous entries you’d have a long gauntlet where you’d have to fight to a location and they do this here but they constantly make you take the most out of the way route and block off better ones with excuses like “there are dudes over there!” Only to send you down an alley with 7 fights. If 9 does the same formula 8 repeated from 7 I might just drop the series. I do not want to go back to scrounging for money and being locked out of jobs till chapter 5 again. I do not want to have to do massive material grinds for good gear. I do not want to have 80% of the moves you get to be fucking useless because they aren’t an AOE and don’t deal elemental damage.
Highlights of this game is everything they do with Kiryu outside of the final chapter. Life links are overall goated outside of some implications of how no one reacting to Kiryu being alive despite you are only able to see them after Kiryu is broadcasted on national news to be alive.
There is honestly too much to talk about with this game So I’m just gonna end it by saying this: I’ll look back on the good in this game as some of the best but I never want to replay this game ever again. Also this game only makes Gaiden look even dumber and further cements it at as a $50 scam. Yokoyama fucking lied Hanawa is not important and he fucking knew that.
Mark my words that this game while currently being hailed as the best game in the series, that its perfect and other things like that will be looked back on a lot more negatively once the honeymoon phase is over, once hypebeasts move onto the next thing, once people won't freakout if you have anything negative to say about it. It won't be a hot take or "being contrarian" to think that the game is mid, super front loaded and falls apart in the end. It's fine if you do think its perfect and its your favorite game or whatever but the amount of people who lose their shit when you have anything negative to say about this game or gaiden is seriously annoying.
This game also made me get into a car accident so fuck it lol
This game is a mess. I wasn’t kidding when I said this is the MGS4 of the series. An extremely ambitious, earnest, heartfelt celebration of the series that has extremely high highs but also constantly falls on its face with extremely stupid writing.
The pacing is some of the worst we’ve seen from RGG. For a game that can easily be 100+ hours long it is both too long but also too short in areas. It constantly pulls you away from the main story to do very involved mini game/sub system tutorials but then has no time in the final hours to wrap up most of the story. At least 4 of the main characters this game is about don’t show up in the final cutscene. You just have to be told about what they are doing from a mouth piece so we can wrap shit up. Kiryu is just kinda left in this weird limbo as they don’t explain what the fuck got them to this point with an achievement titles “man who reclaimed his name”. It genuinely feels like there is either an entire chapter or at least a huge segment of one missing from the end. One of the main villains just stops showing up for 10+ hours only to be seen again in a cut away and is completely unrecognizable for at least another few hours. They then try to do the coin locker scene again with them and it feels completely unearned because they haven’t done anything. The two main villains you do fight are extremely forgettable and underwhelming. One is given what you’d imagine to be a super important connection to Ichiban but it never comes up. The two share a single cutscene at the start of the game and that’s it. Why was it even a plot point to begin with then???? So many plot threads just go no where or are left extremely unsatisfying as they hand wave them away so it can’t be viewed as “a plot hole”. I seriously think how they structure their stories needs to change because I don’t think the Yakuza writing formula they’ve had for 2 decades translates to a 100 hour JRPG. Imo the best way to enjoy the main story of these games is when you can just progress the plot freely and not be bogged down by side content or busy work. I usually save that stuff for premium adventure so the story isn’t so “start and stop”. But you can’t do that in these games because of the rpg leveling and just how the story constantly blocks you to do other shit I am currently not interested in. No RGG I don’t give a fuck about your Pokémon clone and it’s 30 minute+ forced tutorial I just want to get on with chapter 4 please.
Most of the cast has nothing to do in this game which would be fine if they didn’t force them to have boring ass drink links you need to do to make them objectively better in gameplay.
The gameplay needs massive changes going forward because Jesus Christ was I sick of the multiple grinds it imposes. The long battles they do in this game are terrible. In previous entries you’d have a long gauntlet where you’d have to fight to a location and they do this here but they constantly make you take the most out of the way route and block off better ones with excuses like “there are dudes over there!” Only to send you down an alley with 7 fights. If 9 does the same formula 8 repeated from 7 I might just drop the series. I do not want to go back to scrounging for money and being locked out of jobs till chapter 5 again. I do not want to have to do massive material grinds for good gear. I do not want to have 80% of the moves you get to be fucking useless because they aren’t an AOE and don’t deal elemental damage.
Highlights of this game is everything they do with Kiryu outside of the final chapter. Life links are overall goated outside of some implications of how no one reacting to Kiryu being alive despite you are only able to see them after Kiryu is broadcasted on national news to be alive.
There is honestly too much to talk about with this game So I’m just gonna end it by saying this: I’ll look back on the good in this game as some of the best but I never want to replay this game ever again. Also this game only makes Gaiden look even dumber and further cements it at as a $50 scam. Yokoyama fucking lied Hanawa is not important and he fucking knew that.
Mark my words that this game while currently being hailed as the best game in the series, that its perfect and other things like that will be looked back on a lot more negatively once the honeymoon phase is over, once hypebeasts move onto the next thing, once people won't freakout if you have anything negative to say about it. It won't be a hot take or "being contrarian" to think that the game is mid, super front loaded and falls apart in the end. It's fine if you do think its perfect and its your favorite game or whatever but the amount of people who lose their shit when you have anything negative to say about this game or gaiden is seriously annoying.
This game also made me get into a car accident so fuck it lol
TDA is not written by Kouki Yoshimune, so it is normal to feel a difference within the composition of the work to the original franchise, this is certainly to be expected. Yoshimune has a unique storytelling power that Wei cannot convey to the same extent. Saying that he is inferior to Yoshimune seems like I'm dissing the author, but I believe he is a good writer, but in retrospect, Yoshimune has a unique characteristic of his own. composition of the plot where we can easily identify its writing and a strength with words that can capture us and touch us intimately. I believe that many moments of TDA would have been better if it were a composition by Yoshimune, especially the dramatic moments of the characters, Tatsunami and Yuzuka's past and so on.
Perhaps because Wei had to carry Yoshimune's legacy and work within someone else's literary world influenced his writing, after all he had to build the story within the Muv-Luv standards determined by Yoshimune. I'm not going to go into technical aspects, because I didn't come to read Muv-Luv determined to address these issues, but what is clear as day to me is the way that Wei builds the relationship between the characters and the world of Muv-Luv :TDA in relation to Muv-Luv and this certainly defines one of the differences in the writing between the two authors.
While Yoshimune writes the characters' innermost lives, their daily lives and from them we see the world being built, relationships being formed, etc. Wei writes his scenario with the world taking precedence over the characters, that is, the characters' relationships and the construction of the world itself, geopolitics, are constructed by the world itself and not by the characters. The world delimits the characters and their relationships and after that it is up to the character, whereas during Yoshimune's writing it was the characters who ended up delimiting the world - I know this may seem a little confusing, but see it as a question of the way that the world is presented within TDA.
Don't we see TDA's world being wider than Alternative's even though Alternative has much more time to explore its own scene? Then. Overall, this discrepancy between Wei and Yoshimune's writing is a positive force for TDA in a sense, since the world taking precedence over the characters, determining their relationships, demonstrates human inferiority in relation to the vast world to which she is subjected and again a distancing from the world and a form of nihilism, which is rectified within the work with humanity closer to extinction than ever. This feeling that the world escapes us, eludes us, is precisely what TDA wants to bring, because like Alternative, our mission is to recover this world from antagonistic forces.
And now notice that even though Yoshimune and Wei's writings are different they arrive at exactly the same central point. Yoshimune, when playing the characters to explore the world and see everything only through his single vision, as we delve deeper into the world we come across our own inferiority in relation to it. Wei, by placing the world on the characters, forcing the world to determine the characters' relationships, makes us face again our inferiority in relation to the world. The way Wei plays the world over the characters is the very geopolitics that TDA has an explicit and abundant focus on compared to any other work by Yoshimune. Takeru exploring the world and creating his relationships comes across political relationships that, in Unlimited, are almost non-existent because he is just in training. In TDA, political forces have been present at all times since the work began, they are so strong that they cannot be ignored and are as threatening as any BETA.
(Oh, just a side note, is that TDA has a habit of straying from the Protagonist's POV from time to time, which is obviously a characteristic of Wei's narrative. However, Yoshimune uses all of his narration and world-building only through Takeru's vision, with except for some moments like the final stretch of Alternative when we see the POV of all the heroines)
TDA itself reflects a lot of what was already being said by Yuuhi in Alternative:
"When different governments and organizations take varying positions on the same issue. It's because they have differing ideals and beliefs."
What becomes even more evident is the power struggle that takes place within Japan with Ikaruga and 'Yuuhi', where the Shogun herself does not say that Ikaruga has no reasons or motives for doing what he does, in fact she defends him from Tatsunami saying that he is It's wrong to try to see everything as black and white.
The Day After is a good addition to the Muv-Luv universe even if it doesn't follow the canonical line after Alternative, despite not having all of Yoshimune's mastery within the narrative nor having production ahead of its time that ML and MLA had, TDA is a great Sci-fi story just like the main franchise.
And I can't help but be particularly looking forward to Resonative since the wider world of Muv-Luv comes into the hands of Yoshimune, which for me is a great indication that the production will be as formidable as that of its predecessors and we will finally have a work of the franchise capable of rivaling MLA.
Perhaps because Wei had to carry Yoshimune's legacy and work within someone else's literary world influenced his writing, after all he had to build the story within the Muv-Luv standards determined by Yoshimune. I'm not going to go into technical aspects, because I didn't come to read Muv-Luv determined to address these issues, but what is clear as day to me is the way that Wei builds the relationship between the characters and the world of Muv-Luv :TDA in relation to Muv-Luv and this certainly defines one of the differences in the writing between the two authors.
While Yoshimune writes the characters' innermost lives, their daily lives and from them we see the world being built, relationships being formed, etc. Wei writes his scenario with the world taking precedence over the characters, that is, the characters' relationships and the construction of the world itself, geopolitics, are constructed by the world itself and not by the characters. The world delimits the characters and their relationships and after that it is up to the character, whereas during Yoshimune's writing it was the characters who ended up delimiting the world - I know this may seem a little confusing, but see it as a question of the way that the world is presented within TDA.
Don't we see TDA's world being wider than Alternative's even though Alternative has much more time to explore its own scene? Then. Overall, this discrepancy between Wei and Yoshimune's writing is a positive force for TDA in a sense, since the world taking precedence over the characters, determining their relationships, demonstrates human inferiority in relation to the vast world to which she is subjected and again a distancing from the world and a form of nihilism, which is rectified within the work with humanity closer to extinction than ever. This feeling that the world escapes us, eludes us, is precisely what TDA wants to bring, because like Alternative, our mission is to recover this world from antagonistic forces.
And now notice that even though Yoshimune and Wei's writings are different they arrive at exactly the same central point. Yoshimune, when playing the characters to explore the world and see everything only through his single vision, as we delve deeper into the world we come across our own inferiority in relation to it. Wei, by placing the world on the characters, forcing the world to determine the characters' relationships, makes us face again our inferiority in relation to the world. The way Wei plays the world over the characters is the very geopolitics that TDA has an explicit and abundant focus on compared to any other work by Yoshimune. Takeru exploring the world and creating his relationships comes across political relationships that, in Unlimited, are almost non-existent because he is just in training. In TDA, political forces have been present at all times since the work began, they are so strong that they cannot be ignored and are as threatening as any BETA.
(Oh, just a side note, is that TDA has a habit of straying from the Protagonist's POV from time to time, which is obviously a characteristic of Wei's narrative. However, Yoshimune uses all of his narration and world-building only through Takeru's vision, with except for some moments like the final stretch of Alternative when we see the POV of all the heroines)
TDA itself reflects a lot of what was already being said by Yuuhi in Alternative:
"When different governments and organizations take varying positions on the same issue. It's because they have differing ideals and beliefs."
What becomes even more evident is the power struggle that takes place within Japan with Ikaruga and 'Yuuhi', where the Shogun herself does not say that Ikaruga has no reasons or motives for doing what he does, in fact she defends him from Tatsunami saying that he is It's wrong to try to see everything as black and white.
The Day After is a good addition to the Muv-Luv universe even if it doesn't follow the canonical line after Alternative, despite not having all of Yoshimune's mastery within the narrative nor having production ahead of its time that ML and MLA had, TDA is a great Sci-fi story just like the main franchise.
And I can't help but be particularly looking forward to Resonative since the wider world of Muv-Luv comes into the hands of Yoshimune, which for me is a great indication that the production will be as formidable as that of its predecessors and we will finally have a work of the franchise capable of rivaling MLA.
A promising opening act! Lots of interesting setup being done in the story, here's hoping it actually has a satisfying payoff this time. Also, the map design and visuals are about as surreal as a dream world should be, which is a nice surprise.
Wow!
Penacony is an amazing world with beautiful asthetics and setting, the design of penacony is great, the new music is fire, the new changes are very good, new gameplay elements and new puzzle, all add great value to the game, the voice acting is good English and japanese but especially japanese voice acting the tone the emotion in the voice, it's just the first part of penacony story and it's that good, good pacing with no long boaring storytelling, the theme of penacony is fantastic between the reality and dreams , the new characters all have their own personalities and motives, that make the story interesting, firefly was an amazing character for example, the story now is more matured, the dialogues were fun , the side content is a lot, and the 2 Boss fights were amazing
Penacony is an amazing world with beautiful asthetics and setting, the design of penacony is great, the new music is fire, the new changes are very good, new gameplay elements and new puzzle, all add great value to the game, the voice acting is good English and japanese but especially japanese voice acting the tone the emotion in the voice, it's just the first part of penacony story and it's that good, good pacing with no long boaring storytelling, the theme of penacony is fantastic between the reality and dreams , the new characters all have their own personalities and motives, that make the story interesting, firefly was an amazing character for example, the story now is more matured, the dialogues were fun , the side content is a lot, and the 2 Boss fights were amazing
This review contains spoilers
One of the most fun to play yakuza games to date, however, I felt the story in this game was one of the lowest in the series. No character growth for anyone involved except for Kiryu. Which wouldn't be bad at all, except they just handed off the series to Ichiban. Making Ichiban almost a side character to the main story, besides his mother being slightly involved, isn't a good thing for infinite wealth or the yakuza series in general. I love Kiryu as much as the next guy, but his story has been told. Bringing him back to be the lynch pin of this game sets an uneasy precedent for the future of the series. I had a really good time playing this game, and even got the platinum. but the ending of this one shows the writers are hitting a wall when it comes to storytelling. Its frustrating seeing how badly this series is wanting to get away from the yakuza moniker, but at the same time rehashing the same contrived storyline's over and over again. I am hoping that moving forward, the series can learn the let Kiryu's story rest, and we can move on to stories that do not necessarily need to rely on the Tojo.
Finished today.... I think I should stay away from mainline titles from now on. Because surely their badly paced jrpg nature is not for me.
Gameplay wise it's a huge improvement. Now you have combo attacks, you can move, you can use environmental objects and there is grapple required enemies now. So they solved almost every problem of mine from 7.
For example If you stay in the right position and attack from right point you can send enemy with knockback attack(the ones with arrow pointing where the enemy gonna fly back) at places and if you can knock them to other partners you initiate a combo move and it's mad fun(when the physics doesn't screw up that is). I can even go as far as to say when it works it's the best jrpg gameplay I had played currently. You can get so creative with knocking that it's INSANE.
For example knock an enemy like a bowling ball to other enemies or bounce them like a ball between party members or punch them to walls again and again to stun them to hell. Gameplay choices are almost endless.
Also substories comes back and this time they are not just spam dialogue buttons anymore, some of them include minigames or a bit more interactive now! That's an awesome upgrade. Not just that, fan service inside of them is simply insane and impossible to make you dissappointed.
Also we have new major minigames that is dondoko island and sujimon fights. I haven't played dondoko because I don't care that much about town simulation games but played sujimon hell of a lot and I recommend you because it makes good amount of money when you arrive to it's last point(also you will hecking need lots of money in this game). So, It was fun.
And that's where my praise ends.
I don't want to talk about story nor the boring villains nor the awful... AWFUL PACING. But I will with talk about it briefly as possible. First things first is I can say story itself actually made me miss 7's Arakawa storyline. Because I couldn't care about Kasuga's mom storyline and so all the emotional baggage went to garbage. That means the whole main campaign.
There is nice suprises I am gonna give you that, for example that Yamai dark clothed guy from the trailers was pretty interesting, or new party members really had interesting stories about them. But spending with side characters isn't the main point right?
What is the main emotional core of this story? It's mom I guess... I mean it's suppossed to be I assume? But then why the heck she have just 15-25 minutes in the whole 70 hour GODDAMN MAIN STORY AND I AM EXPECTED TO EMOTIONALLY CONNECT TO HER? I don't know.
Maybe it's Kiryu's story huh?... No. Kiryu is only here to help Kasuga to finish his adventure and support him from the sides with making his own search. He doesn't have emotional connection to anything going on and he is like, I don't care I am deathly cancer anyway, so... I WILL FINISH THIS FOR KASUGA and act pissed of like always. He makes damn good fanservice moments there is no lie for that. Especially last chapters gonna give you a lot with familiar faces. But funny enough, fanservice is still mostly in substories and their time just 5 minutes or close to that, so try to engage as much as you can with the old characters you love in that 5 minutes because it's just that. A substory. Nothing more.
Kiryu have only one objective and that is just helping Kasuga. So he just does that. (Also both of their finale bosses sucks ass and they straight go to my own most boring top 10 yakuza villains list, they are that boring. Maybe they could even rival with y4 villains when it comes to cliche B movie forgettable types who knows)
Also remember I said gameplay is fun? Yeah they mess this as well. With grind of course. What I mean is just like 7, finale part suddenly boosts enemy levels up to ROOF. AND OF COURSE I AM PISSED OFF.
Surely, it looks like like A dragon soft reboot titles isn't for me nor their pacing with spending 3 times longer on side characters and stuff rather than the main story. But it looks like new type of fans having a lot of fun. I see 5/5 everywhere. What can I say, have fun. I am not here to take that. But maybe it's best for me to stop here for like a dragon other than maybe spin off titles.
Anyway that's all I will say. Bon voyage or whatever.
Gameplay wise it's a huge improvement. Now you have combo attacks, you can move, you can use environmental objects and there is grapple required enemies now. So they solved almost every problem of mine from 7.
For example If you stay in the right position and attack from right point you can send enemy with knockback attack(the ones with arrow pointing where the enemy gonna fly back) at places and if you can knock them to other partners you initiate a combo move and it's mad fun(when the physics doesn't screw up that is). I can even go as far as to say when it works it's the best jrpg gameplay I had played currently. You can get so creative with knocking that it's INSANE.
For example knock an enemy like a bowling ball to other enemies or bounce them like a ball between party members or punch them to walls again and again to stun them to hell. Gameplay choices are almost endless.
Also substories comes back and this time they are not just spam dialogue buttons anymore, some of them include minigames or a bit more interactive now! That's an awesome upgrade. Not just that, fan service inside of them is simply insane and impossible to make you dissappointed.
Also we have new major minigames that is dondoko island and sujimon fights. I haven't played dondoko because I don't care that much about town simulation games but played sujimon hell of a lot and I recommend you because it makes good amount of money when you arrive to it's last point(also you will hecking need lots of money in this game). So, It was fun.
And that's where my praise ends.
I don't want to talk about story nor the boring villains nor the awful... AWFUL PACING. But I will with talk about it briefly as possible. First things first is I can say story itself actually made me miss 7's Arakawa storyline. Because I couldn't care about Kasuga's mom storyline and so all the emotional baggage went to garbage. That means the whole main campaign.
There is nice suprises I am gonna give you that, for example that Yamai dark clothed guy from the trailers was pretty interesting, or new party members really had interesting stories about them. But spending with side characters isn't the main point right?
What is the main emotional core of this story? It's mom I guess... I mean it's suppossed to be I assume? But then why the heck she have just 15-25 minutes in the whole 70 hour GODDAMN MAIN STORY AND I AM EXPECTED TO EMOTIONALLY CONNECT TO HER? I don't know.
Maybe it's Kiryu's story huh?... No. Kiryu is only here to help Kasuga to finish his adventure and support him from the sides with making his own search. He doesn't have emotional connection to anything going on and he is like, I don't care I am deathly cancer anyway, so... I WILL FINISH THIS FOR KASUGA and act pissed of like always. He makes damn good fanservice moments there is no lie for that. Especially last chapters gonna give you a lot with familiar faces. But funny enough, fanservice is still mostly in substories and their time just 5 minutes or close to that, so try to engage as much as you can with the old characters you love in that 5 minutes because it's just that. A substory. Nothing more.
Kiryu have only one objective and that is just helping Kasuga. So he just does that. (Also both of their finale bosses sucks ass and they straight go to my own most boring top 10 yakuza villains list, they are that boring. Maybe they could even rival with y4 villains when it comes to cliche B movie forgettable types who knows)
Also remember I said gameplay is fun? Yeah they mess this as well. With grind of course. What I mean is just like 7, finale part suddenly boosts enemy levels up to ROOF. AND OF COURSE I AM PISSED OFF.
Surely, it looks like like A dragon soft reboot titles isn't for me nor their pacing with spending 3 times longer on side characters and stuff rather than the main story. But it looks like new type of fans having a lot of fun. I see 5/5 everywhere. What can I say, have fun. I am not here to take that. But maybe it's best for me to stop here for like a dragon other than maybe spin off titles.
Anyway that's all I will say. Bon voyage or whatever.
This review contains spoilers
Infinite Wealth is a huge step up from Yakuza: Like a Dragon in everything but story. The combat improvements they've made had me hooked a lot more than what 7 was able to do, and all the sub-stories and minigames were a blast to play. Unfortunately, this is one of the weakest Yakuza games when it comes to the story in my opinion. A lot of time was spent building up to different plot points, with very few of them having a satisfying resolution. In saying this, the ending was sufficient for me, and I enjoyed the Life Links. Ichiban continues to be an incredible new protagonist, but I hope they gave him the opportunity to shine like he did in 7 again. I'm hoping RGG do what's best and let Kiryu rest for good this time.
This review contains spoilers
J'attendais le jeu comme le Messie et peut être que c'est pour ça que j'ai été légèrement déçu
Le gameplay est quasi parfait. Une énorme amélioration par rapport au 7, beaucoup plus de possibilités et de personnalisation. Le gameplay du Dragon de Dojima est incroyable. Egalement un grand retour des QTE pour notre plus grand plaisir. Le jeu est également bien mieux équilibré, là où on sentait parfois que le 7 était vraiment le premier projet de ce genre de l'équipe.
Malheureusement, l'histoire est un peu décevante. Dwight est un méchant trop trop nul. Le fait que les trailers mettaient à fond en avant comme quoi Kiryu ferait ses derniers adieux; bah du coup il revoit qu'Akiyama et Komaki (dans des scènes vraiment touchantes pour le coup). Même pas putain d'Haruka, et comment dire que la dernière scène du jeu m'a bien énervé, pitié RGGS faites-le mourir une bonne fois pour toute. Egalement, Ebina allait beaucoup mieux en boss final pour Ichiban, vu leurs liens et le fait qu'ils soient littéralement opposés l'un de l'autre. Les Daidoji aussi, dans Gaiden t'avais vraiment une impression de grande organisation tout ça pour que dans celui-ci ils soient complètement nuls à chier. Ah et le dernier pied de nez, le fait qu'on nous a parlé trop de fois d'Ichiban qui allait fix sa relation avec Saeko, tout ça pour que ça se termine sur une blague qui ne fait rien évoluer.
Je ne déteste pas IW mais il a trop de défauts pour que je puisse le mettre dans mes LaD favoris.
Le gameplay est quasi parfait. Une énorme amélioration par rapport au 7, beaucoup plus de possibilités et de personnalisation. Le gameplay du Dragon de Dojima est incroyable. Egalement un grand retour des QTE pour notre plus grand plaisir. Le jeu est également bien mieux équilibré, là où on sentait parfois que le 7 était vraiment le premier projet de ce genre de l'équipe.
Malheureusement, l'histoire est un peu décevante. Dwight est un méchant trop trop nul. Le fait que les trailers mettaient à fond en avant comme quoi Kiryu ferait ses derniers adieux; bah du coup il revoit qu'Akiyama et Komaki (dans des scènes vraiment touchantes pour le coup). Même pas putain d'Haruka, et comment dire que la dernière scène du jeu m'a bien énervé, pitié RGGS faites-le mourir une bonne fois pour toute. Egalement, Ebina allait beaucoup mieux en boss final pour Ichiban, vu leurs liens et le fait qu'ils soient littéralement opposés l'un de l'autre. Les Daidoji aussi, dans Gaiden t'avais vraiment une impression de grande organisation tout ça pour que dans celui-ci ils soient complètement nuls à chier. Ah et le dernier pied de nez, le fait qu'on nous a parlé trop de fois d'Ichiban qui allait fix sa relation avec Saeko, tout ça pour que ça se termine sur une blague qui ne fait rien évoluer.
Je ne déteste pas IW mais il a trop de défauts pour que je puisse le mettre dans mes LaD favoris.
This review contains spoilers
I'm torn, I believe this has some of the best side content, gameplay improvements, world building, etc - in the series... but the story just isn't there I'm afraid...
I don't find Ichiban meeting his mom nearly as compelling as persevering the "It's only business" style betrayal, and challenging the Prime Minister of Japan who happens to be someone who once was someone he looked up to, only for both of which to end horribly. I don't know how they could have topped Yakuza 7 but nonetheless, I couldn't help but feel like Infinite Wealth tried to use beats from Yakuza 7 but they don't work as well without the impact.
There was a true sense of pay off by the time Yakuza 7 ended, you witnessed the "end" of the Yakuza, you fought against a dragon, you outsmarted the the Governor after beating a heavyweight boxer built up so magnificent-ly, only for it to crash down at the end, masterful. Such an emotional experience... the only time I felt similar levels of emotion was when you fought the three legends in the Alps, caught me off guard, that's where it lies.
Ebina is mostly unseen throughout the game, with a silly goal, pal-ing up with a Hawaiian zealot, some random guy who also happened to hate Yakuza, and his vtuber-by-gunpoint cancel culture person. I couldn't help but feel like everytime the vtuber that it was just so unserious, using some random vtuber to cancel people. The overlap between a vtuber and a crime syndicate just doesn't make sense to me, I only ever felt like it made any impact when it affected Kiryu getting in trouble with the Daidoji, which also doesn't happen really happen.
The Daidoji did NOTHING about this, they were set up to be such an opposing force in Gaiden, yet, feel like they had conveniently no power here, relying on other people to find Lani, conveniently not knowing Eiji wasn't on the good side, confidently not knowing Chitose wasn't a unwilling accomplice, but always knowing what Kiryu is doing but doing virtually nothing about it
The two final bosses really did nothing for me, Bryce was just a cartoonishly evil cultist, Ebina just had a hate boner for the yakuza and wanted them gone. Sure it is evil, but it feels like such a roundabout way to do it, while I do think it could've been the only way that could have been realized, I just think they could have done something better entirely.
I do really like Kiryu's plea, I feel like it would do nothing but it scratched the itch I felt the entire game, just a bit. What I don't like is him staying alive, I get it's cool that he regained his name (further confirming how useless the Daidoji are) but it really felt like he was too valuable to kill outright, but there's just an utterly lack of anything going on that pulling the trigger on something (or someone) would've made the story feel a sizeable portion more impactful. The story really felt like a 50 hour long villian of the week affair, which is a shame considering how much was packed into Yakuza 7, despite that, I do feel the game is worth playing, incredibly fun combat, replayable side content, a full new map with tons to see, it's just a shame my favorite element of these games wasn't the strong suit.
I don't find Ichiban meeting his mom nearly as compelling as persevering the "It's only business" style betrayal, and challenging the Prime Minister of Japan who happens to be someone who once was someone he looked up to, only for both of which to end horribly. I don't know how they could have topped Yakuza 7 but nonetheless, I couldn't help but feel like Infinite Wealth tried to use beats from Yakuza 7 but they don't work as well without the impact.
There was a true sense of pay off by the time Yakuza 7 ended, you witnessed the "end" of the Yakuza, you fought against a dragon, you outsmarted the the Governor after beating a heavyweight boxer built up so magnificent-ly, only for it to crash down at the end, masterful. Such an emotional experience... the only time I felt similar levels of emotion was when you fought the three legends in the Alps, caught me off guard, that's where it lies.
Ebina is mostly unseen throughout the game, with a silly goal, pal-ing up with a Hawaiian zealot, some random guy who also happened to hate Yakuza, and his vtuber-by-gunpoint cancel culture person. I couldn't help but feel like everytime the vtuber that it was just so unserious, using some random vtuber to cancel people. The overlap between a vtuber and a crime syndicate just doesn't make sense to me, I only ever felt like it made any impact when it affected Kiryu getting in trouble with the Daidoji, which also doesn't happen really happen.
The Daidoji did NOTHING about this, they were set up to be such an opposing force in Gaiden, yet, feel like they had conveniently no power here, relying on other people to find Lani, conveniently not knowing Eiji wasn't on the good side, confidently not knowing Chitose wasn't a unwilling accomplice, but always knowing what Kiryu is doing but doing virtually nothing about it
The two final bosses really did nothing for me, Bryce was just a cartoonishly evil cultist, Ebina just had a hate boner for the yakuza and wanted them gone. Sure it is evil, but it feels like such a roundabout way to do it, while I do think it could've been the only way that could have been realized, I just think they could have done something better entirely.
I do really like Kiryu's plea, I feel like it would do nothing but it scratched the itch I felt the entire game, just a bit. What I don't like is him staying alive, I get it's cool that he regained his name (further confirming how useless the Daidoji are) but it really felt like he was too valuable to kill outright, but there's just an utterly lack of anything going on that pulling the trigger on something (or someone) would've made the story feel a sizeable portion more impactful. The story really felt like a 50 hour long villian of the week affair, which is a shame considering how much was packed into Yakuza 7, despite that, I do feel the game is worth playing, incredibly fun combat, replayable side content, a full new map with tons to see, it's just a shame my favorite element of these games wasn't the strong suit.
This review contains spoilers
what a disapointment, combat improvement over seven is the only thing going for it
story is a complete let down, they were positioned to make the best yakuza game ever with the passing of the torch of kiryu to ichi but they just fumble it completely
the first 9 chapters of the game can be considered typical rgg-yakuza buildup but all of it is thrown out of the window when an unvoiced generic npc comes up to you and just tells you the location of Akama, just like that.
hanawa being completely hyped up with interesting plot points and considerations to be randomly killed off unceremoniously and confusingly when five generic npcs break into a room, overpowered the entire party and kill two people in the space of a single in-game cutscene.
ichi being borderline obnoxious with his complete unwillingness to show genuine emotion besides 'hey guys look at me im so silly and always happy'
rgg have kinda spoiled yakuza on my after playing it for so many years
i hope they dont fuck judgement too
story is a complete let down, they were positioned to make the best yakuza game ever with the passing of the torch of kiryu to ichi but they just fumble it completely
the first 9 chapters of the game can be considered typical rgg-yakuza buildup but all of it is thrown out of the window when an unvoiced generic npc comes up to you and just tells you the location of Akama, just like that.
hanawa being completely hyped up with interesting plot points and considerations to be randomly killed off unceremoniously and confusingly when five generic npcs break into a room, overpowered the entire party and kill two people in the space of a single in-game cutscene.
ichi being borderline obnoxious with his complete unwillingness to show genuine emotion besides 'hey guys look at me im so silly and always happy'
rgg have kinda spoiled yakuza on my after playing it for so many years
i hope they dont fuck judgement too
Ibr, Im only logging this because I want to fully separate part 1 and part 2 from each other cuz I do not like the direction part 2 seems to be going so here we are. Now can we get Kevin's face off this cover please
I love part one, I do think the ending has its fair bits of flaws and underwhelming bits but I think it was a decent ending and I cant down on the whole of part 1 cuz of that. Some of my favorite moments come from it
I love part one, I do think the ending has its fair bits of flaws and underwhelming bits but I think it was a decent ending and I cant down on the whole of part 1 cuz of that. Some of my favorite moments come from it
MY LIFE IS RUINED!!!!!! PEAK FICTION!!!!! HAKU I KNEEL GOAT OF THE CENTURY!!!!!!