This review contains spoilers
Yakuza 0 is a prequel to the original Yakuza game. I remember playing Yakuza 0 years ago and dropped it for reasons I cannot remember. With the newer Yakuza games (or Like a Dragon as they are called now) getting more attention with the switch to role-playing instead of action/beat ‘em ups, I wanted to give Yakuza 0 another chance. I have a lot to say.
Yakuza 0 is a story driven game. There are lots of cutscenes, dialogue, and the gameplay takes a backseat. I do not mind story driven games. The RPG genre is one of my favorite video game genres and they are known to be story heavy. Yakuza 0’s story is enjoyable, but I was not as invested as I wanted to be. People praise Yakuza 0’s story and I can see it has its moments, but it did not leave the same impact on me like it did for other people.
The story can get bloated at times. The first 4 chapters were a slog to get through. After Ch 4, the story and gameplay start to gather steam. However, like I mentioned earlier, I could not get as invested. I wonder if later games will get me more invested in their stories because Yakuza 0 did not do that for me.
The gameplay has you playing as two characters: Kiryu and Majima. Both have three different styles of combat. Brawler/Thug is your standard fisticuffs; Rush/Breaker have quick attacks, but the damage output is weaker; finally, Beast/Slugger is slow, but they can be strong. Besides your health bar, you have this heat gauge that fills up when you are doing combat. Once you get at least a bar of heat, you can perform heat actions. Think of it like a fighting game character’s ultimate or a Mortal Kombat fatality given how brutal some of these heat actions can get. The gameplay is solid and you can get new moves by spending your hard-earned yen on upgrades. The combat can get repetitive and you might need to grind to get more money. However, you can get more money by selling objects and spending Completion Points.
You explore Kamurocho and Sotenbori by foot as either Kiryu or Majima. The locations have tons of things to do. You can eat at restaurants, play at the arcades, do karaoke, or do the many substories. I am mixed on substories. They can break up the monotony of the main story and give you something different (mostly something wacky), but many of the substories I did were uninteresting. I am glad that the developers added these into the game to make the locations you explore more alive, but some of these substories I could live without. It does not help that some of the NPCs in the substories are of much lower quality compared to Kiryu and Majima. Kiryu and Majima look so detailed yet some of the substories have the NPCs looking like early PS3 models. It is jarring.
Speaking of looks, this game still looks good despite it releasing in 2015 in Japan and 2017 everywhere else. The music was also quite good. The song that plays when you boot up the game gets your blood pumping.
Yakuza 0 did not get me as invested in the story as I wanted, but the game is still good. Solid gameplay, nice exploration, and good visuals and music. I cannot wait to get into more of the Yakuza franchise.
Yakuza 0 is a story driven game. There are lots of cutscenes, dialogue, and the gameplay takes a backseat. I do not mind story driven games. The RPG genre is one of my favorite video game genres and they are known to be story heavy. Yakuza 0’s story is enjoyable, but I was not as invested as I wanted to be. People praise Yakuza 0’s story and I can see it has its moments, but it did not leave the same impact on me like it did for other people.
The story can get bloated at times. The first 4 chapters were a slog to get through. After Ch 4, the story and gameplay start to gather steam. However, like I mentioned earlier, I could not get as invested. I wonder if later games will get me more invested in their stories because Yakuza 0 did not do that for me.
The gameplay has you playing as two characters: Kiryu and Majima. Both have three different styles of combat. Brawler/Thug is your standard fisticuffs; Rush/Breaker have quick attacks, but the damage output is weaker; finally, Beast/Slugger is slow, but they can be strong. Besides your health bar, you have this heat gauge that fills up when you are doing combat. Once you get at least a bar of heat, you can perform heat actions. Think of it like a fighting game character’s ultimate or a Mortal Kombat fatality given how brutal some of these heat actions can get. The gameplay is solid and you can get new moves by spending your hard-earned yen on upgrades. The combat can get repetitive and you might need to grind to get more money. However, you can get more money by selling objects and spending Completion Points.
You explore Kamurocho and Sotenbori by foot as either Kiryu or Majima. The locations have tons of things to do. You can eat at restaurants, play at the arcades, do karaoke, or do the many substories. I am mixed on substories. They can break up the monotony of the main story and give you something different (mostly something wacky), but many of the substories I did were uninteresting. I am glad that the developers added these into the game to make the locations you explore more alive, but some of these substories I could live without. It does not help that some of the NPCs in the substories are of much lower quality compared to Kiryu and Majima. Kiryu and Majima look so detailed yet some of the substories have the NPCs looking like early PS3 models. It is jarring.
Speaking of looks, this game still looks good despite it releasing in 2015 in Japan and 2017 everywhere else. The music was also quite good. The song that plays when you boot up the game gets your blood pumping.
Yakuza 0 did not get me as invested in the story as I wanted, but the game is still good. Solid gameplay, nice exploration, and good visuals and music. I cannot wait to get into more of the Yakuza franchise.