Yakuza 3 is another victim of the “heh, we don’t talk about THAT one!” syndrome that plagues a lot of fanbases. You could have an almost perfect series, full of objective 10/10 games, but if there’s one of them that’s a 9.9, they’ll pretend it’s the worst thing ever, doesn’t matter if it’s a mainline title or some incredibly obscure spin-off for the N-Gage. A lot of them don’t realize they’re doing this, but they just want a talking point, their own little Sonic 06.
“Blockuza 3” isn’t really a thing, a lot of you guys are getting fooled by YouTube videos. You’ll only see that level of blocking in the harder modes and extra fights on the arena and stuff. There’s a lot of ways you can overcome the blocking enemies do in this game early on, you can install this mod to restore the sidestep range to get to their back, just like it was in the original PS3 version; you can grab them, use weapons, heat moves, switch targets mid combo, whiff your light attacks to only hit them with the heavy ones. I promise, if you actually engage with the mechanics instead of just mashing, you won’t even need to play this on easy or anything to have fun with the combat.
What surprised me about this game is that it has the most lived-in and immersive world in the series, more than later games. Going from the PS2 games to this, it’s a great feeling to finally be able to look around with a free camera and no loading between areas, it’s like I was sent back in time to how I felt during the transition to the 7th gen. The griminess and dim lights are gone and you don’t see people just lying on the floor, but the cities are as crowded as in those games and there’s a lot of detail on the pedestrians. You’ll see a lot of variety in their walking animations and postures, the way they stop by a bin to smoke a cigarette and share the lighter, the amount of Nigerians in Kamurocho, mirroring the sudden influx of immigrants at the time of release. In the second city, Rykukyu, there’s something you never see in open world cities that breaks my immersion: actual children and families. It even makes sure you won’t see them in the northern part of the district, where all the hostess clubs and bars are. There’s also TONS of old people here and details like how when pedestrians cross the street and the lights turn red, they’ll start to hurry their pace as the drivers get impatient. These little things are just so impressive to me; I’ve never felt that I was in a real city more than with this game.
One way in which the game tries to innovate is with a large weapon focus that's probably a remnant from Kenzan. It's nice to be able to pull them out during gameplay, but the amount of things to craft is a bit absurd, especially since you can easily repair them, and they're kind of expensive. You'll probably make 3 or so and then stop. The other way in which the game innovates is with chase sequences. Now, I don't know if this was my controller being busted or some issue with the remaster, but whenever I tried turning, Kiryu would stop sprinting. It was so bad I had to resort to moving the camera instead. Needless to say, they were a struggle and I'm not ashamed to admit I switched to easy just for some of these sequences.
But does Yakuza 3 improve in the gameplay in any way? Well yeah, actually. Bosses are actually way better now. Genius game design choices are made such as, "What if the boss had one phase where he's invincible and can only avoid his attacks?", or "What if the boss had stances that counter your hits, but you can counter those by grabbing him instead?" Yeah, they're not insanely clever, but it's surprising that the series hadn't done this until now. I actually thought that the final boss was a decent challenge even with health items, since he could hit REALLY hard.
The other great improvement is the side content in general. In my Yakuza 2 review, I mentioned that I could start to get in the mindset of ignoring the main story, but to be honest, you kind of have to force yourself to do that with that game. Here, it was just natural. The fact that the remaster marks them in the minimap made it worse, I would play for like 2 hours and make no story progress at all. All of them are memorable in some form and there's some exciting stuff, like solving a murder, acting in a movie or hunting down hitmen, which has some pretty cool boss fights and ties into one of the main themes of the story. One of my favorites is about THE VERY FIRST GUY YOU FOUGHT IN YAKUZA 1 and what happened to him. It has a great ending.
I recommend stopping yourself from wanting to do everything that pops up on the minimap, because they'll keep showing up regardless of what chapter you're on, as long as you're in that city. You'll go back and forth the two throughout the game, so don't worry about that. Minigames are more entertaining, although they somehow made the batting cage worse, and Kiryu can only sing one Karaoke song when alone. Another great piece of extra content is Inner Fighter 7, which allows you to re-fight some of the main bosses with fun twists like teleporting or fighting three phases of the same guy at the same time, all without heat or items to unlock new moves, a true test of your skill. Yakuza also finally has trials with rankings! There's some fun combat challenges, unexpected pairing of bosses and you can even re-do at least one beat em up level.
That leads me to one thing I'm surprised this game is never criticized for, there's barely any true levels! The first one is alright, though short. The second one is just a few hotel hallways where you chase a fat guy opening every door going back and forth the floors that goes on for WAY too long. The third one is just the streets of Kamurocho, and the fourth one is actually what you expect for the series. I don't even know if you can replay the fourth one on the trials, I didn't unlock all in that category. I hope future games let me replay the levels easily.
I'll talk about story now, so if you haven't played the game, you can just stop reading. Awkwardly, Yakuza 3 has to solve the loose ends that 2 didn't care to do. After Kiryu gets cucked from a great love interest by the writers, he settles his rivalry with Majima and sets everything up for Daigo to become the next chairman. 2 years pass and we get another turning point for the series in which a lot of the narrative becomes this adult slice of life drama. Relatively small problems in the orphanage sections are treated with this urgency that is rare in the medium. Stories are solved without needing to punch anyone. To add up to this, with the orphans, you get this honest portrayal of children that's even more rare in media in general, more than Haruka's who was always too mature. It admits, for example, that sometimes children are just straight up racist for no reason. It's very interesting to see how Kiryu deals with these domestic problems, sometimes unsure of how to do it, and cleverly, we also get to see the children develop without his input. Simply put, the Ultimate AAA Dadgame.
On the other hand, you have the crime part. The idea that Kazama is alive and an assassin is insane, but could've made for great character growth for Kiryu. For a long time, it looks like it's building up a theme criticizing the military occupation from the USA in Japan, even pitting Kiryu against the CIA in a global conspiracy, but both these things fall apart when we learn that the military base expansion bill was just a ploy in conjunction with the CIA, and that the Kazama look alike is actually his twin brother who is a good CIA agent, and the evil ones are just the arms dealers they've been fighting all this time. Yes, it's contrived, but not all of it is bad.
Tying the two plots together are the themes of orphans, trust, and that anyone can live an honest life. It may seem like the game puts TOO much emphasis on found family and how the orphans are discriminated, but keep in mind that the social context and government of Japan puts more importance on the interests of biological parents than the child's, even if they've abandoned them, and combined with other factors, it results in extremely low adoption rates and education for the children. Embodying these two themes is Mine, the best main villain I've seen in the series so far. An orphaned sigma male grindset man that goes to extreme lengths for true human contact, with insane, but honest feelings about Daigo, thinking he'll make him a favor by killing him. After understanding everything, Kiryu gets ready to throw down with this nonchalance that I kinda love, as if this was just another substory in his life, he'll just have to beat some sense into him. In the end, Mine kills himself and Richardson, cleaning the Tojo Clan's name from his actions, but it's silly, and I wish he was kept alive.
The final scene was such a surprise. One of the secondary villains who was hyped up as a boss, just leaves the plot halfway through the story, and I was ready to take some points off the game. But instead, he shows up at the last second to kill Kiryu for ruining his life, while he insists that anyone can change for the better, that he'll continue to trust in people and he'll help him, before getting stabbed. Many people think the post-credits scene showing him alive and well in the orphanage ruins the moment, but I think it only strengthens it. Him living is proof Hamazaki was wrong, his ties to the yakuza can't kill him, and it's with the help of others he put his trust in that he's saved. Anyone can live an honest life.
Boy, I sure hope Kiryu doesn't get away from these kids to protect them in future titles, that would suck.
“Blockuza 3” isn’t really a thing, a lot of you guys are getting fooled by YouTube videos. You’ll only see that level of blocking in the harder modes and extra fights on the arena and stuff. There’s a lot of ways you can overcome the blocking enemies do in this game early on, you can install this mod to restore the sidestep range to get to their back, just like it was in the original PS3 version; you can grab them, use weapons, heat moves, switch targets mid combo, whiff your light attacks to only hit them with the heavy ones. I promise, if you actually engage with the mechanics instead of just mashing, you won’t even need to play this on easy or anything to have fun with the combat.
What surprised me about this game is that it has the most lived-in and immersive world in the series, more than later games. Going from the PS2 games to this, it’s a great feeling to finally be able to look around with a free camera and no loading between areas, it’s like I was sent back in time to how I felt during the transition to the 7th gen. The griminess and dim lights are gone and you don’t see people just lying on the floor, but the cities are as crowded as in those games and there’s a lot of detail on the pedestrians. You’ll see a lot of variety in their walking animations and postures, the way they stop by a bin to smoke a cigarette and share the lighter, the amount of Nigerians in Kamurocho, mirroring the sudden influx of immigrants at the time of release. In the second city, Rykukyu, there’s something you never see in open world cities that breaks my immersion: actual children and families. It even makes sure you won’t see them in the northern part of the district, where all the hostess clubs and bars are. There’s also TONS of old people here and details like how when pedestrians cross the street and the lights turn red, they’ll start to hurry their pace as the drivers get impatient. These little things are just so impressive to me; I’ve never felt that I was in a real city more than with this game.
One way in which the game tries to innovate is with a large weapon focus that's probably a remnant from Kenzan. It's nice to be able to pull them out during gameplay, but the amount of things to craft is a bit absurd, especially since you can easily repair them, and they're kind of expensive. You'll probably make 3 or so and then stop. The other way in which the game innovates is with chase sequences. Now, I don't know if this was my controller being busted or some issue with the remaster, but whenever I tried turning, Kiryu would stop sprinting. It was so bad I had to resort to moving the camera instead. Needless to say, they were a struggle and I'm not ashamed to admit I switched to easy just for some of these sequences.
But does Yakuza 3 improve in the gameplay in any way? Well yeah, actually. Bosses are actually way better now. Genius game design choices are made such as, "What if the boss had one phase where he's invincible and can only avoid his attacks?", or "What if the boss had stances that counter your hits, but you can counter those by grabbing him instead?" Yeah, they're not insanely clever, but it's surprising that the series hadn't done this until now. I actually thought that the final boss was a decent challenge even with health items, since he could hit REALLY hard.
The other great improvement is the side content in general. In my Yakuza 2 review, I mentioned that I could start to get in the mindset of ignoring the main story, but to be honest, you kind of have to force yourself to do that with that game. Here, it was just natural. The fact that the remaster marks them in the minimap made it worse, I would play for like 2 hours and make no story progress at all. All of them are memorable in some form and there's some exciting stuff, like solving a murder, acting in a movie or hunting down hitmen, which has some pretty cool boss fights and ties into one of the main themes of the story. One of my favorites is about THE VERY FIRST GUY YOU FOUGHT IN YAKUZA 1 and what happened to him. It has a great ending.
I recommend stopping yourself from wanting to do everything that pops up on the minimap, because they'll keep showing up regardless of what chapter you're on, as long as you're in that city. You'll go back and forth the two throughout the game, so don't worry about that. Minigames are more entertaining, although they somehow made the batting cage worse, and Kiryu can only sing one Karaoke song when alone. Another great piece of extra content is Inner Fighter 7, which allows you to re-fight some of the main bosses with fun twists like teleporting or fighting three phases of the same guy at the same time, all without heat or items to unlock new moves, a true test of your skill. Yakuza also finally has trials with rankings! There's some fun combat challenges, unexpected pairing of bosses and you can even re-do at least one beat em up level.
That leads me to one thing I'm surprised this game is never criticized for, there's barely any true levels! The first one is alright, though short. The second one is just a few hotel hallways where you chase a fat guy opening every door going back and forth the floors that goes on for WAY too long. The third one is just the streets of Kamurocho, and the fourth one is actually what you expect for the series. I don't even know if you can replay the fourth one on the trials, I didn't unlock all in that category. I hope future games let me replay the levels easily.
I'll talk about story now, so if you haven't played the game, you can just stop reading. Awkwardly, Yakuza 3 has to solve the loose ends that 2 didn't care to do. After Kiryu gets cucked from a great love interest by the writers, he settles his rivalry with Majima and sets everything up for Daigo to become the next chairman. 2 years pass and we get another turning point for the series in which a lot of the narrative becomes this adult slice of life drama. Relatively small problems in the orphanage sections are treated with this urgency that is rare in the medium. Stories are solved without needing to punch anyone. To add up to this, with the orphans, you get this honest portrayal of children that's even more rare in media in general, more than Haruka's who was always too mature. It admits, for example, that sometimes children are just straight up racist for no reason. It's very interesting to see how Kiryu deals with these domestic problems, sometimes unsure of how to do it, and cleverly, we also get to see the children develop without his input. Simply put, the Ultimate AAA Dadgame.
On the other hand, you have the crime part. The idea that Kazama is alive and an assassin is insane, but could've made for great character growth for Kiryu. For a long time, it looks like it's building up a theme criticizing the military occupation from the USA in Japan, even pitting Kiryu against the CIA in a global conspiracy, but both these things fall apart when we learn that the military base expansion bill was just a ploy in conjunction with the CIA, and that the Kazama look alike is actually his twin brother who is a good CIA agent, and the evil ones are just the arms dealers they've been fighting all this time. Yes, it's contrived, but not all of it is bad.
Tying the two plots together are the themes of orphans, trust, and that anyone can live an honest life. It may seem like the game puts TOO much emphasis on found family and how the orphans are discriminated, but keep in mind that the social context and government of Japan puts more importance on the interests of biological parents than the child's, even if they've abandoned them, and combined with other factors, it results in extremely low adoption rates and education for the children. Embodying these two themes is Mine, the best main villain I've seen in the series so far. An orphaned sigma male grindset man that goes to extreme lengths for true human contact, with insane, but honest feelings about Daigo, thinking he'll make him a favor by killing him. After understanding everything, Kiryu gets ready to throw down with this nonchalance that I kinda love, as if this was just another substory in his life, he'll just have to beat some sense into him. In the end, Mine kills himself and Richardson, cleaning the Tojo Clan's name from his actions, but it's silly, and I wish he was kept alive.
The final scene was such a surprise. One of the secondary villains who was hyped up as a boss, just leaves the plot halfway through the story, and I was ready to take some points off the game. But instead, he shows up at the last second to kill Kiryu for ruining his life, while he insists that anyone can change for the better, that he'll continue to trust in people and he'll help him, before getting stabbed. Many people think the post-credits scene showing him alive and well in the orphanage ruins the moment, but I think it only strengthens it. Him living is proof Hamazaki was wrong, his ties to the yakuza can't kill him, and it's with the help of others he put his trust in that he's saved. Anyone can live an honest life.
Boy, I sure hope Kiryu doesn't get away from these kids to protect them in future titles, that would suck.