Kiryu and company go back in time to do the same thing they always do: tell a phenomenal story with captivating characters in an engaging setting.

I've spoken before about how RGG/Like a Dragon reviews outside of Y7/Like a Dragon boil down to the same talking points, so I figured this review will run pretty short as I want to condense the pros/cons and how that aligns with other RGG titles.

The first positive is that this is again a fantastically written tale of deceit and treachery, however unlike the other titles in the series, doesn't take place in contemporary Japan. I'm a sucker for a well done period piece like Ghost of Tsushima or the Red Dead Series and it's a no brainer at this point that RGG could and would join the ranks of those works by releasing a title of their own. I know this is a remake of a previously released game, but this is my first time playing it. Jidaigeki stuff is under-represented, lets get some more quality titles out of this era! Seldom do you see games release in the west that touch on the unique piece of history that was the beginning of the Meiji restoration and the departure of the Tokugawa Shogunate. Running through it with an ensemble cast of characters from the franchise I've spent the last year focusing on based upon real people who existed in actual ancient Japan (yes that was intentional) made me feel like I was in a candy store. The familiar allies and foes make this journey into the past feel significant, as you have a ground base for who will help you, who will betray you, and who might be a little... mad (I love Goro Majima and I'm not afraid to say it.) To not ramble on about another RGG story I'll wrap it up by saying this is a typical interweaving RGG tale about a captivating piece of history that houses their trademark plot twists and out of the blue assists. Second to how well the story is written, this game is downright beautiful. The zones are small, which is typical at this point for the series, but crafted perfectly to make them feel alive but most importantly the characters look GOOD. RGG has spent the last few years narrowing down on an engine that makes Kiryu and the gang look better than almost any other developer out there, almost turning the characters within the game into real people with how realistic the engine does its work.

Cons are, well, more Yakuza/Like a Dragon cons. The combat is... mostly good, honestly I had more fun with the wild dancer class than I have in any Yakuza game since Majima's bat class in Y0, but it still falls flat when it comes to boss fights. Bosses are simply awful throughout this game, and for the most part that isn't the worst because you can employ the tried and true "stack healing items" strat right before the chapter ending battles, but that gets annoying after doing it time and time again. Surely you could say "git gud," but these battles feel more like a war of attrition and learning unblockable combo timings than they do a test of skill. Bosses have pools of health so inflated they could be used in a pool and will instant break out of your stun-lock (which isn't new to the franchise.) At least this time they don't have multiple health bars (minus the armor bar,) yet the ability to cheat the actual mechanics of the game that the player can't even pull off is straight up antagonizing to you. Additionally, the constant falling when taking damage and having to press A/equivalent to get up is excessively furstrating and kills a lot of rhythm that the combat has. The taking a combo from a boss, pressing A, getting combo'd again, pressing A, combo'd again loop had me in a tizzy. In an attempt to test how much bosses could break the game, I attempted to see how many attacks I could get in before the boss I was attacking would stop blocking near the end of the game and got to thirty-three. Abysmal. Lastly, the ending gauntlet of this game is maniacal, giving players five bosses and a plethora of enemies in between to fight without an opportunity to obtain more healing.

I'd recommend this heavily to any fan of the Yakuza/Like a Dragon franchise. My qualms ending up longer than my positive takeaways with the game are only a result of my previous experiences with RGG and the zero-sum game of propping-up each game's story without spoilers. I had a great experience overall and more Kiryu (rather Sakamoto Ryōma) is always a good time.