This is my personal game of the year 2021. I had to start out this review by saying that because I adore this game it is one of the best that RGG has put out, and it is worth the 100+ hours I spent on it.

Story: For starters, I like to state that this game deals with some heavy topics, so keep that in mind, and at the beginning, the game is very good at stating the heavy topics that are involved. It, not every day a story has me questioning everything I think is right or wrong, this story is one that I say goes in with an open mind, but expect to be very invested in it. Usually, when I do Yakuza style games I try to do as much side content as I can, while I did do some during the main game, most were done after the main game cause the story was pulling me in the further I got and since this was a global release I did not want to get spoiled. In this case, the story is a gripping one with a few missteps along the way that do not take away from the experience.

Gameplay: I will say with every dragon engine game that has this action style combat RGG knows how to make improvements, and boy is the combat smooth in this game. Going from LAD to this made me feel right at home, and showed how much I miss this style of combat. I always have a heart for the turn-based style combat but there is just something totally different when doing the action style stuff of Yakuza games. But then there flops to the gameplay, the new mechanics were not very implemented in a good way. Parkour was very nice t have but could be finishing at times, and then there the stealth in the game. I am not going to beat around the bush the stealth in this game was not my favorite stealth. I am not a stealth type of player, but in some cases, I can tolerate (like this game), but I think that it can be improved for later entries in the series if we get them.

Music: Ah the music in this game is just perfection. There are going to be tracked in this game that I will be listening to for a long time afterward. All the boss themes were bops, and are worth going back to listen to on their own.

Sidequests: So the main beef of this game is its side content. Most of like I said earlier was done post-game cause I wanted to get through the story to avoid spoilers. Let m just say this game is loaded with side content I spent 60 hours after beating the game to 100% because the game is just that big. They are school stories which in its own sense is another game in this game, it has so many activities in it that I would say take 10-20 hours alone. Side cases are still very good but I think they had more duds in this one to me. All the minigames are good, some are frustrating but that Yakuza, the climax battles have made a return to which are known as the gauntlet in this, and I had to do some (thankfully not all) to get the plat. When I say this game is loaded it is loaded.

Platinum experience: For the plat for this one, it is typical yakuza. Getting 100% including skills, side cases all shops, city, and school missions involved. I am glad I got this plat, and I plan on doing it again when I redo this game on the ps4 version but I will say if you're going to go for it do another alongside it. When I mentioned the gauntlets earlier thankfully not all were required for the plat cause tose were nerve-wracking to the point where I just got very lucky in the ones I needed to do. Plat requires 2 playthroughs to one on the highest difficulty alongside the initial one.

Overall thoughts/Enjoyment: Lost Judgment builds upon what its predecessor does while also showing how mechanics need to be reworked if they do ever decide to come back. 9/10