It's probably easiest to describe the Infinite Wealth experience by describing my final 90 minutes of play.
The beginning of that block was spent running between every restaurant in town to order, literally, the entire menu on the off chance of catching one of the stupidest conversations conceivable between my party of characters whom I've grown quite attached to. Stupid jokes, everyone piss drunk and fucking up every enemy encounter we ran into, and the sheer absurdity of how much food I shoved down their throats on my quest to max out Kiryu's levels through any means necessary.
90 minutes later I experience the emotional nadir of my gaming career with the abject emotional sucker punch of the game's final musical sequence, an experience that had me in tears. Not to linger of how much of a loser I am, but it wasn't a misty-eyed sniffle so much as a head-in-hands bawling. The clarification is worth it to highlight the emotional capability of Yakuza 8, and for people who have played it, there's absolutely no mystery when it comes to the game's secret weapon.
Anyone who's played Yakuza 7 will sing the praises of its protagonist Kasuga. There's no surprises left to be found in this eighth installment; Kasuga is Kasuga is Kasuga. And what Kasuga is is a supernova of charisma. It's foolhardy to make a claim on the entirety of fiction across mediums, but contained to the realm of video games I feel pretty confident in singling out the writing of this character for excellence. Without going into a full character study, I'll say that the writers have found a successful mix of emotional depth and unwavering moral compass. The latter might imply a lack of growth or arc, but instead it's a constant string of challenges for Kasuga's character to shine through. Even if you know where it's going, it's never not exciting to see him keep on the righteous path despite all that goes on around him.
(This is my first parasocial relationship; how am I doing?)
It's the attachment to Kasuga that enables the emotional climax of the story. What, to me, initially seemed like an unrealistic act of forgiveness became the only logical course of events. Of course he resolved things this way, he's Kasuga. It's difficult to write about without spoiling things overtly, but it's a moment that will stay with me for a long time. One of my favorite scenes I've experienced in fiction.
Something I find fun to speculate is the complete opposite experience one could have while playing Yakuza 8. Infinite Wealth has two protagonists, of course, with the other being series idol Kiryu. I'm a secondary; I'm a late-comer Kasuga stan. For most fans Kiryu is the star of the show, and Infinite Wealth is a (backdoor?) tribute to the character and the series. A surprisingly large percentage of the content is dedicated to sending off Kiryu.
This includes references both overt and subtle to events and characters from all of the previous games in the series. Even random spinoffs like that survival horror zombie game (???) are paid homage. This is contextualized as Kiryu making peace with his life in light of his cancer diagnosis. I'd lying if I said it wasn't alienating for someone with no point of reference, but it's very easy to see that the game is not interested in catering to that group. Most of said content is optional, anyway. It's nice that fans have a chance to participate in a living funeral.
Kiryu has his own arc and spotlight within the game, including a scene immediately following the final boss that strikes me as particularly moving should one be familiar with the character. The notion that someone could have as strong of an emotional reaction as I did for a different character speaks to the quality of the game's writing.
I had been penning this review in my mind as I waddled along what was ultimately an 88 hour adventure. Until the story paid off at the end, I had envisioned most of this would have been written about the design of the open world.
Open world's in games are almost a joke these days. You look at your map, see thousands of icons that don't mean anything, climb a tower somewhere, and click fast travel buttons the vast majority of the time. Infinite Wealth has some of this nonsense, but it was the first time I had felt naturally encouraged to explore a world in a very long time.
Several of the side activities presented in the game are intrinsically fun to work through. Aloha Links, the friend making mechanic, simply asks you to press the dedicated Aloha button in the vicinity of certain people on the street. There's 200 potential friends and you bet your ass I found them all. There's a nice sound effect that plays when you form a link, Kasuga looks like an idiot as he mispronounces "aloha", and everyone on the street is having a good time. It's a pleasing gag that, when combined with watching a friendship meter fill until you make a certified buddy to cross off the checklist, never gets old. Take a taxi everywhere and you'll miss so, so many friends. It's just not done!
Other things you would miss include the photo rally that tasks you with snapping pictures of key locations for extremely minor rewards. But of course the reward is in the fun of the treasure hunt itself, as the items you need to photograph are only relayed to you in the form of small, context devoid image that forces you to suss out where it could be. It's very satisfying to be wandering around only to get a sense of déjà vu from some landmark and realizing it's on your list of to-shoot photos.
I had a lot of fun with these two mechanics, but they are admittedly minor. What wasn't minor was the effect they have on your play through. You walk around more, you fight more enemies, you get more resources, you upgrade your weapons more, you happen across more opportunities to train your team of Pokemon (Yeah), you take some time to do side quests, you find the hidden conversations your party could have only by walking by certain locations, your relationship level rises, you work through the party members' individual quests, and I could go on.
The point is that be tacitly encouraging players to actually inhabit the game world instead of warping around it constantly, the game naturally and smoothly delivers a drip-feed of its systems. In other games grinding of some sort would be necessary. Grind for resources, grind for experience points, grind for opportunities to raise your bond with your party. Infinite Wealth incentivizes and trusts the player the find perfect gameplay rhythm that the developers had built into it. It's very impressive.
When you have excellent, well-considered gameplay alongside a story capable of genuine emotional connection. That's a winner. Yakuza 8 is incredible across the board, and the only thing left for me now is the crushing void felt in its absence.
The beginning of that block was spent running between every restaurant in town to order, literally, the entire menu on the off chance of catching one of the stupidest conversations conceivable between my party of characters whom I've grown quite attached to. Stupid jokes, everyone piss drunk and fucking up every enemy encounter we ran into, and the sheer absurdity of how much food I shoved down their throats on my quest to max out Kiryu's levels through any means necessary.
90 minutes later I experience the emotional nadir of my gaming career with the abject emotional sucker punch of the game's final musical sequence, an experience that had me in tears. Not to linger of how much of a loser I am, but it wasn't a misty-eyed sniffle so much as a head-in-hands bawling. The clarification is worth it to highlight the emotional capability of Yakuza 8, and for people who have played it, there's absolutely no mystery when it comes to the game's secret weapon.
Anyone who's played Yakuza 7 will sing the praises of its protagonist Kasuga. There's no surprises left to be found in this eighth installment; Kasuga is Kasuga is Kasuga. And what Kasuga is is a supernova of charisma. It's foolhardy to make a claim on the entirety of fiction across mediums, but contained to the realm of video games I feel pretty confident in singling out the writing of this character for excellence. Without going into a full character study, I'll say that the writers have found a successful mix of emotional depth and unwavering moral compass. The latter might imply a lack of growth or arc, but instead it's a constant string of challenges for Kasuga's character to shine through. Even if you know where it's going, it's never not exciting to see him keep on the righteous path despite all that goes on around him.
(This is my first parasocial relationship; how am I doing?)
It's the attachment to Kasuga that enables the emotional climax of the story. What, to me, initially seemed like an unrealistic act of forgiveness became the only logical course of events. Of course he resolved things this way, he's Kasuga. It's difficult to write about without spoiling things overtly, but it's a moment that will stay with me for a long time. One of my favorite scenes I've experienced in fiction.
Something I find fun to speculate is the complete opposite experience one could have while playing Yakuza 8. Infinite Wealth has two protagonists, of course, with the other being series idol Kiryu. I'm a secondary; I'm a late-comer Kasuga stan. For most fans Kiryu is the star of the show, and Infinite Wealth is a (backdoor?) tribute to the character and the series. A surprisingly large percentage of the content is dedicated to sending off Kiryu.
This includes references both overt and subtle to events and characters from all of the previous games in the series. Even random spinoffs like that survival horror zombie game (???) are paid homage. This is contextualized as Kiryu making peace with his life in light of his cancer diagnosis. I'd lying if I said it wasn't alienating for someone with no point of reference, but it's very easy to see that the game is not interested in catering to that group. Most of said content is optional, anyway. It's nice that fans have a chance to participate in a living funeral.
Kiryu has his own arc and spotlight within the game, including a scene immediately following the final boss that strikes me as particularly moving should one be familiar with the character. The notion that someone could have as strong of an emotional reaction as I did for a different character speaks to the quality of the game's writing.
I had been penning this review in my mind as I waddled along what was ultimately an 88 hour adventure. Until the story paid off at the end, I had envisioned most of this would have been written about the design of the open world.
Open world's in games are almost a joke these days. You look at your map, see thousands of icons that don't mean anything, climb a tower somewhere, and click fast travel buttons the vast majority of the time. Infinite Wealth has some of this nonsense, but it was the first time I had felt naturally encouraged to explore a world in a very long time.
Several of the side activities presented in the game are intrinsically fun to work through. Aloha Links, the friend making mechanic, simply asks you to press the dedicated Aloha button in the vicinity of certain people on the street. There's 200 potential friends and you bet your ass I found them all. There's a nice sound effect that plays when you form a link, Kasuga looks like an idiot as he mispronounces "aloha", and everyone on the street is having a good time. It's a pleasing gag that, when combined with watching a friendship meter fill until you make a certified buddy to cross off the checklist, never gets old. Take a taxi everywhere and you'll miss so, so many friends. It's just not done!
Other things you would miss include the photo rally that tasks you with snapping pictures of key locations for extremely minor rewards. But of course the reward is in the fun of the treasure hunt itself, as the items you need to photograph are only relayed to you in the form of small, context devoid image that forces you to suss out where it could be. It's very satisfying to be wandering around only to get a sense of déjà vu from some landmark and realizing it's on your list of to-shoot photos.
I had a lot of fun with these two mechanics, but they are admittedly minor. What wasn't minor was the effect they have on your play through. You walk around more, you fight more enemies, you get more resources, you upgrade your weapons more, you happen across more opportunities to train your team of Pokemon (Yeah), you take some time to do side quests, you find the hidden conversations your party could have only by walking by certain locations, your relationship level rises, you work through the party members' individual quests, and I could go on.
The point is that be tacitly encouraging players to actually inhabit the game world instead of warping around it constantly, the game naturally and smoothly delivers a drip-feed of its systems. In other games grinding of some sort would be necessary. Grind for resources, grind for experience points, grind for opportunities to raise your bond with your party. Infinite Wealth incentivizes and trusts the player the find perfect gameplay rhythm that the developers had built into it. It's very impressive.
When you have excellent, well-considered gameplay alongside a story capable of genuine emotional connection. That's a winner. Yakuza 8 is incredible across the board, and the only thing left for me now is the crushing void felt in its absence.