I was genuinely, really excited to play this game, especially after beating SH2, but god fuck is the first half of this game just unbearable. It feels like that they overcorrected in making the gameplay less easy by just making every single encounter annoying. For one, they're all damage sponges, which isn't bad at all, but worse considering that they put in atleast 3 to 4 at a time in one room, and most of the time they are just faster than you. The first half of this game aswell is also just really really linear, with next to no puzzle solving at all, unless you wanna count different shades of finding keys to open doors so you can find more keys to open more doors puzzle solving. I don't hate the fact that the gameplay is more focused on survival horror, but almost all your weapons suck and you're just forced to not engage with this games combat and run around everything, which isn't a problem that's fine, every survival horror is like that, but it's the fact that there is always so many enemies in every single room, and they're all usually very claustrophobic hallways, and the enemies are faster than you and will stunlock you.
What sucks the most, is the fact the last half of the game is basically near perfect. Albeit, it just reuses the hospital from SH2, and remade the theme park from SH1, but that's not bad at all really, especially with the fact the remade theme park is fantastic. The combat/gameplay just becomes better, there's a lot more puzzle solving which, albeit, isn't as fun as it was in 2 or 1 but is still really enjoyable.
The otherworld in this game looks fantastic and I was always glad to see more of it in this game since there was a lack of it in SH2. This game has genuinely frightening moments and scared me a couple times.
The story is also really good, continuing off the ending of SH1, with some really great character writing, Heather I honestly think is the best SH protagonist.

If the entire game was basically just like the last half of it but extended, this would be my favorite, but god is the first half just unbearable.

All the issues with the remaster itself aside, this is so far my favorite Yakuza game. The combat is basically Y2's but it controls better and takes a little bit longer for you to get the combo speed as fast as it was, but everything about the combat in this game feels great. All the heat actions and encounters were fun, and every long battle was just incredible because of the better controls and feel of this game.
I liked the story a lot, I think the first couple hours of the game, while slow, is some of the best because it's basically just Kiryu having a vacation.
I can't see why anyone would skip this game at all, nearing the end of this game it came to me just how much I loved it.

completely forgot to log this game after I beat it

This game is great, while I do think the final couple chapters of the game where it pulls off 12 different twists in one cutscene is silly, everything else about it is great.

Every character is fantastic to play as, all with completely unique movesets and gameplay styles to them. With Kiryu being the last playable and being a complete fucking tank over everyone else. The gameplay feels great, improves a bit on y3s gameplay and expands more with the extra characters. Again, the remaster has its issues that break some parts of the game, but it's still worth playing.

This is basically my entry point into the series aswell, not including when I played Y0 when it came out YEARS ago and haven't replayed it since, but this is very beginner friendly. If you are gonna start with a Yakuza game but aren't sure about the PS2 ones yet, start here.

Unironically a game you could play forever.

I have a decent amount of issues with the story, imo I think it falls apart at the end. But the gameplay and amount of stuff you can do in this game is fucking nuts. Just about all the content in this game is refined to a tea and can be enjoyed by literally anyone, there's basically 3 different entire games in this game with their own plots and ideas to them. I think this game is a massive step up from y4 in terms of gameplay and obviously sheer scale. All the characters feel fantastic to play as.
The ending is also fucking incredible. Probably my 3rd favorite Yakuza game.

Immaculate disappointment.
This game feels like it should be more of a tech demo but it had an entire campaign slapped onto it. The combat is just terrible, it is exactly the same as K2 (go figure) with very minimal changes other than enemies block less. The new city is great but there is just absolutely nothing to do in it, and you can barely even go anywhere because for the sake of realism certain shops and places can only be accessed during different times of the day, which is a horrible idea.
The story has good beats and parts to it but it just isn't interesting at all, this game relies so much on exposition dumping the player that I very quickly lost interest and could only barely hold onto the excitement at the parts of this game that are genuinely really good.
Whenever people say Yakuza 3 is bad and echo the problems of it, I feel like they're talking about this game. It's such a shame too because the first few parts of this game are great and it has some really really good character moments, all of it just doesn't really matter at the end of the story, or falls flat.