This game... for me this game is resident evil 6 of the yakuza franchise. Too much bloat for it's own good. No focus. Quantity over quality. Already causal friendly gameplay made even more casualised with the new spirit moves that makes you unkillable for some reason.

Also there is a lot of new side content. So much so that, they thought artificially lengthening the main story is the right way to pacing the side content(what I mean is half of the game at least filled with go talk this go talk that missions). Only time I had close to getting fun with this game is with racing and dancing competitions. Rest of is meh at best, monotonous boredom and frustration at worst. Also this is the game that stopped doing cutscenes for substories and started cheaply using copy paste animations even for interesting story substories like Akiyama's own substories that reminds his past.

Also there is 4+1(walking karaoke) playable characters but combat is not much improved.

If we look at Akiyama, he sucks now. He can't spam kick like before but they balanced with not being able to good damage opponents either so you have to keep dodging and heavy attacking constantly because that's your only option

New character Shinada feels unfinished with his forced weapon requirements.

Saejima and Kiryu have the new spirit things that makes them invincible and makes the combat damn boring in my opinion.

I can go as far as to say it's no different than a button masher game. You press spirit button, spam attack attack attack. Watch victory. Repeat.

Also you can't die in this game, I mean I guess there is a death screen somewhere? But you have to try your best to see it. Yes, to see the death screen.(or fight an amon, only way to die legit way)

Story starts pretty promising (like resident evil 6), but with every new part and playable character, it devolves into plot twist jank fest(also like resident evil 6). I am not gonna go too much detail but I can say this, if you see a new character in the screen that is not playable, he will probably betray you 20 min later no matter what. Yes, story is that dumb.

Also there is soooo many characters in this game, did you thought yakuza 4 was big? This is even bigger cast than y4, there is like 50 fu##ing characters in it and of course it's so unfocused that when you see a character second time you don't even realize you seen it before. It's that many characters in it. Most of them don't even have conclusions for their stories anyway for some reason.

Also they made Kiryu devolve back to his angry stubborn self (because of a certain nihilistic garbage manipulative teacher as a stupid excuse). I hate Kiryu. I hate Park. I hate stupid idiot brainwashed Haruka. I hate everyone. I hate this... I hate this... I hate this... I hate this game.

Also finishing this damn game take a lot from my will to play next rgg games. It was soo damn time consuming with unnecessary interruptions from itself(for example long fights now have unskippable conversations in them as a new feature, so you can't continue and do nothing but wait for them to finish for continuing to next long battle section) AND THAT RUINED LONG BATTLES FOR ME.

Not just that, game's own pacing is even worse than that yakuza 3, because even if it had a slow beginning, it got more bombastic as it goes on. In this one you start from 0, progress, finish the character, start a new character from 0, progress, finish, start from 0... You do this disgusting amount of times and the game ends FINALLY (At least yakuza 4 have decency to develop a one continuous story).

Also it ends somehow worse than yakuza 4. Did you thought random twist villains wasn't enough? How about a villain you don't even see more than 15 minute in the game???

Not just that, no character have a proper epilogue scene for their endings(did Shinada returned to his life or not with that girl? Or did Saejima finally returned to his own family in the clan with baba? Or what happened to kiryu and haruka after that abysmal ending?) None of it explained. (I am not even gonna go in details with how many side characters stories don't have an end to their stories either)

I don't like this game. I thought yakuza 4 was a letdown but this is not even comparable to that. Sorry for making people upset but this game left this impression on me. It's not for me in the slightest degree.

The game that seperates hardcore from the normie.

Combat
Actually after trying the ps3 version I realised all of the issues people criticize about combat comes from the botched remastered port. But still a good game in it's own right even with a botched port. Why? Because this is one of the rare times that yakuza game requires player to be careful about their timings. You actually have to use dodge and grab button? You can't just spam square endlessly? Wow what a big improvement! Actually it's not that big of a thing but of course people that come from kiwami games probably dumbfounded when they realise they have to use buttons other than attack button. For me it was a fun time but I have a couple of problems that makes me think this is a one step forward one step back with yakuza 2's combat. Improvements are:
-you can bound enemies now! if enemy's back crashes to a wall.
-You can quick select weapons with d-pad now! (But can't store them like you can do in og yakuza 2 for some reason?)
-You have a loooot of new heat actions(some of them just a modified version of kenzan heat actions but it's better than nothing)
-2 new added moves: grap the grounded enemy from their head(this move also resets them), your longest combo have one additional attack
-A lot of new equipable weapons

Combat Regressions:
-new heat actions and sound effects doesn't feel as brutal as og yakuza 2 for some reason(and it stayed that way). But at least they are still flashy to make them feel fun.
-There is not enough new moves compared to the kenzan
-Combat feels slow. Actually combat speed is not a big problem, big problem is when you heavy attack you can't dodge until animation gets finished, but slow movement makes recovery times even longer, so you will watch incoming damage without ability do anything until the endgame(final upgrade is combo break, it let's you spam dodge). They probably they made this way to force people to not spam attacks or limit Kiryu, because he was overpowered in 2. But I am not into this decision, because it results with too much defensive play. Maybe if I hadn't played y2 I would seen it as an upgrade because y1 slow as well, but after yakuza 2 it's hard to return this kind of gameplay speed for me.
-Gaining heat takes a lot of time without accesories
-Some enemies have bs moves, like fat guys headbutt you to the death(at least they are still more balanced than kenzan spamming enemies...)
-Compared to the og yakuza 2, you can't combo between 4 ways fastly, you can only do it 2 ways(front and back) like the og yakuza 1.
-Also slower combat makes one on one fights better but makes crowd control worse at the same time

So I liked the new moves and really fun bounding, but like I said combat speed and recovery times felt limiting to me because of that I can't say it's a full of good additions

Story
This game's story is a mess. But have the best characters(for me), so I can't decide if it's a improvement or a decline? Maybe I can explain like I did with combat: it's a one step forward, one step back.
Story is about how kiryu starts an orphanage like his father did and how the land he resides actually have a dark secrets in it. With Kiryu, we slowly learn more about the kids that stay in the orphanage and more about the land's dark secrets. Also this game's story focuses on a pretty small group compared to the previous games and that's really pays off for both the new characters and kiryu itself. Why? Because we really have new oppurtunity to see father Kiryu in this game. People tries to unjustify this with saying previous games had it but not to this degree, so I don't agree with them. You really see the struggle of Kiryu with kids and it's really pays off at with Kiryu's character development. But there is two problems with story, one is the pacing. For some reason, game goes first half full slow, then second half bam bam bam full action. Problem with this: game bores the player with sticking one pacing too long. I like helping people in yakuza games of course but I also like kicking people with my punchs too and game doesn't mix them naturally like the other games unfortunately.
Second problem is, game feels like written with two different people. What I meant is, first half is emotional fatherhood journey, second half is constant action with stupid twists back to back with no stop. Of course all yakuza games have stupid twists at the epilogue chapter of theirs but yakuza 3 rushes the twists so much, that make you think why...? It's like: wow that character coming back? Wow that character actually betrayed me but actually not? Wow that character actually related to this person but actually not? Wow that is the actual mastermind? Back to back to back Bla Bla Bla nonsense. Sad thing is, our new antagonist is pretty interesting but slides away in this nonsense. I think he have less time in the story even less then nishiki somehow? Or I maybe it's not? But the amount of time goes for spending stupid twists and stupid villains are so much that I wonder did they even think what were they doing wrong when they were writing it. Because unused potential is a damn shame in the second half in my opinion.

Also I have small nitpicks
-Game is grey and no, ps3 also can handle other colors fine... so why the game is too much grey?
-You have a "remember the previous adventures" part, yet story have almost no connections to the previous games except the prologue of this game.
-For unlocking all the upgrades, you need a lot of points, I for this fact couldn't unlock the final ones.
-Stupid minigame substories returns(like hostess dressing, golfing, baseballing) and of course they are required to unlock amon
-too many substories in this game, also they felt like half of them copy pasted. I only remember couple of them one is a find the killer one, but also it's the most unnecessary time-consuming one other is a returning couple from yakuza 2, other is a don't drop the ice cream substory. But I still felt there is a lot of copy paste ones even compared to the og yakuza 2
-Amon felt like a recession compared to the yakuza 2
-finding the keys now requires you to go first person for some reason
-there is a really fun bounty hunting minigame now. You select a target and try to find him(this comes from kenzan too). They also have mini stories so they are like mini substories. I liked it but I wish they didn't copy pasted some boss movesets completely. At least remix it like the tournament fights.

and yeah that's my thoughts. For me this game is a step back from yakuza kenzan a little bit and especially og2 but probably the same level as the first game. I am a bit harsh on it but I still choose to give 4/5 because characters are that damn good for me even with the stupid plot twists, they really give the feeling of my own family.

Oh shit this game is good!

After learning that yakuza kiwami 2 cut couple of content from the original, I choosed to play og one and glad I am glad I did it.

Superb atmosphere!
There is really something in this fixed camera points of kamurocho. They show the npcs in unique ways and also show details of the city and blur and bloom effects really gives the illusion of city that lives at night!

Superb Gameplay!
I was thinking how much I am gonna get bored playing this game because it doesn't have styles and I didn't get bored one bit. Because it's too arcady and fast to keep you engaged! You kick an enemy than turn back and punch an another enemy than turn to the left of him to grap and throw him to an another enemy with a super speedly. Kiryu feels like he is in a turbo mod constantly! And that's prevents gameplay to get boring even without different styles to choose with!

Superb Story!
Even after Kiryu choose to be away from the tojo, things he did comes back to haunt him in this game, after he punched everyone in the tojo, of course there is no one left except him to protect the city from the Omi Clan! And damn what a struggle it is! You keep thinking what the hell is gonna happen every point! And that's super good!

But there is a small problem, game's story is too big for it's own good to miss couple of potentials. There is a new romance for Kiryu that can't bloom fully because of the constant fights, there is an old mafia group that comes back from kiryu's past that kind of limits omi's story because story needs them mafias to shine for some reason. But I still damn liked the story! Why? Because Ryuji Goda too damn good to take any problem as negatives. He really pushes Kiryu to the absolute limit and it makes me super excited! Because of that, I forget any miss potentials and keep focused on Ryuji to kick back him to his place! And damn what a fight that is!

Meh side content
It's still the times when side activites feels side thing rather than the focus of the game. But still there is pretty fun stories to go through and activites to take part in. For example friendship introduced in this game and if you help somebody, they give you a unique heat action if you are near them, or there is a mini game where you become a host and manipulate people to spend money(it plays the same way hostess mini game does but it felt more entertaining to me with how insane it gets as it goes through), there is a cabaret minigame that you need to train hostess for a big income. But unfortunaly it's fun as watching a person sleeping. Because someone thought, you need to wait for hostess to do their job for 5 minutes after every session is fun?

There is also some side missions tied to minigames that exists and they are downright evil. Because they require you to finish the hardest version of minigames and hard is an understatement! Beating them wastes so much time that if you are not going for amon don't do it

There is also the usual small stories at every corner of the city. They are pretty short compared to the later titles but still they are fun to do, even if they don't explore things that much. But at least you can finish them in seconds, so they don't tire you like the later titles does

But amon is damn fun in this game! You really need to bring your "A+" game for beating him! So at least it felth worth it after the tiresome minigames.

I thought long that should I give 5 or 4 but I damn like this game so 5 starts worth it in my opinion. Of course maybe you won't like it or will I won't know that, but I say this is a game that is worth experiencing(after you play the first one of course, because there is some story moments tied to it)

Going to this after yakuza 0 feels worse in every point. Less playable characters, less cities, less side content, less playing time. I know this is a remake but it feels too damn rushed. I don't think the development team didn't even tested the progression upgrade system themselves(it's really bad). This is not the only problem, the new content really clashes with the original ones tone. Why? Because story tries to show you how dark the kamurocho and it's people is, but then every step of the way game forces you to see new majima antics even in the damn main story missions. Because of that I thought story is damn boring, but actual thing is story have messy pacing because of that I felt bored. Story isn't bad it's actually pretty good! It's tells story about, how kiryu gets punished all over because of his desicion to escape from his fate, but newly added tonal shift makes you forget that it's a redemption story and in the end only thing you will remember is funny majima wants to fight you again in a hostess outfit.

Also gameplay feels worse in my opinion, because for some reason every style is nerfed? In yakuza 0 one beast combo is enough to destroy a 3 person group. In this one same move only takes quarter of their health bar. Yakuza 0 had some unbalancing issues about styles yes, but I really didn't like how even the open world enemy encounters takes longer now. People try to justify this with "there is speed upgrades, unlock it and everything becomes a breeze". But it's at the end of the unlock cathegory? When I unlock it, at that point I am already at the end game, how does this makes my experience better?

Also there is new Nishikiyama cutscenes that are actually really good. But like I said, they are pace breakers like all the other new content in this game. For example you are trying to save your loved one from a mafia and bam a nishiki cutscene that have nothing to do with what you are doing?? It just breakes the pacing. Rather than filling them into the story randomly, just make a seperate campaign for nishiki? Too much work I guess.

Also every new location, or old locations that comes from the og game looks worse somehow? It's like they just did it in 2 days. That's also a really bad look in my opinion.

After playing this, I struggled to choosing continuing or not. But after hearing yakuza 2 is the best game in the franchise I did it and I am glad I did. Also other thing I am glad I did is playing the og release with the newly done undub mod that changes every voice back to japanese dub.

This is the game that I started with like most of the people here. It's not perfect but damn good first impression for me.

Combat
It's fun, majima and Kiryu have 3+1 styles for them and that makes the game more alive, all styles have their own 3 different combos so it always stays engaging. Especially Majima's combat gets crazy as you unlock more skills. Unfortunately it's not perfect. One problem is, heat meter, it effects the speed of combos, also parry moves requires heat as well for some reason. Because of that game really discourages you to use cool heat actions and I found that a bit weird. Game is already easy as it is then why limit the combat? If it was a hardcore game I would understand decisions comes with pushbacks but in this game they have no meaning for it. It just limits the combat?
Other thing I am not the biggest fan of is, combat skills require a lot of grinding. You can lessen it with minibosses roaming the streets at least, but still an issue.

Story
Story is pretty fun. Especially introduction chapters. Actually did I say story is fun? Yes but mostly for the Majima's side
My problem is Kiryu's side of the story gradually lose it's focus and ends in a unsatisfying way. Yeah it does have really good moments, but story mostly felt like you are doing what you are told by other people, not because you are trying to find answers about the mysteries going on and that really breaks the "connecting to the main character part". Because of that I found majima side 10 times more interesting, majima's story is about struggles that comes from both it's responsibility from it's brother and his own judgement about justice and I found that damn interesting. Unfortunately final level of majima's feels forced in my opinion, because you have to clean up of someone's mess, but other than that it was awesome so story mostly on the positive side.

Sidecontent
It's really fun, both it's comedic and suprising sidequests and side activities, until you start doing them for completing.
Not all sidequests are equal. Some of them are about playing minigames a lot of times and they get boring and repetitive.
Side activities are business minigame, racing remote toy cars, telephone talk, hostess matching minigame, rock paper scissors betting minigame. They feel fun at first but when you realize you need to do them 40 times at least to mark them on your substory list is aggravating. Especially business and hostess minigames. They go too damn long. Hostess minigame is more on the engaging side yet it doesn't reward you enough, business side rewards you a lot, but it mostly doesn't require any of your input also requires a lot of waiting too. Unfortunate thing is these two side activities are required to unlock last two styles for both of the characters
Amon. He sucks in this game. Majima's side amon is just a punching bag, super easy. Kiryu's side is just a gimmicky challenge mission. Rather than fighting face to face, Kiryu's amon uses a lazer weapon that you need to dodge and attack him, also you need to dodge the flying objects as well. Disappointing challenge.

Conclusion
Mostly Fun story until it isn't
Mostly fun side content until forced repetitiveness happens
Mostly fun combat with weird restrictions

This is a really hard game to talk about for myself. Because there is things that really good and there is things that really really pushes me to say "why...?". I still liked a lot but I don't think it was a full slamdunk for it's favor.

Gameplay
With this game, styles finally back! There is now 2 styles our character Yagami uses: crane and tiger. Crane is a wide group control kick based style, Tiger is a more narrow but better suited for one on one action judo? Style. When I first played judgment, I found it pretty boring. Why? Because both Crane and Tiger felt pretty slow, at least crane had some fasty moves that hiding behind some combos. But enemies that interrupt your attacks really killed my enjoyment for it too. It was like yakuza 6 and kiwami 2 unfortunately (maybe if no hit bounce mod existed for it, it would made my experience even better). The problem with judgment is slow combat felt even more slower because of the yagami's anger inducing repositioning himself after rebounding kicks animation. I said okay whatever let's push through and I am glad I did. Because after getting the wall jump then grap upgrade(that one really helps for crowd control), couple of speed upgrades and tiger fissure for tiger style, game really started to feel fun. But unfortunately another problem came through and that is balance. I don't know why but they didn't put any hard hitting upgrade for crane style and because of that, it became more and more obsolete for me. I found this a bit upsetting because with only thing crane have exclusive at that point is a juggle move that you can do on the end of the combo. But it's pretty hard to do when rebound thingy exists so, because of that I feel like a upgrade like easier juggle or no interrupt upgrade like the one tiger has would pretty much solve this issue but that's the end product unfortunately. Another unfortunate thing is reused moves and heat actions for Yagami. I don't know how many people realised but Yagami uses akiyama's kicks, tanimura's turning slap and kiryu's all of the back attacks. Not just that, there is a lot of kiryu's copy pasted heat actions in there as well. Rather than copy pasting it, at least modify a bit to make it more true for the character? Other unfortunate thing is burst/spirit/devil trigger thingy is back and it works like 5. What I mean is you can't get damaged in it, I think they added this for the casual players if they struggle with the mortal system(big boss attacks can damage your max health and only expensive items can cure it), but it throws already unbalanced game straight to the garbage bin. I know that yakuza games designed for casual players but even in hard mod it does make the game too easy. What the hell? I mean yakuza 6 have it too but this is a bigger step back like the yakuza 5(I don't like this press to win system).

So I don't know what you think with combat but it felt to me one step forward, one step back unfortunately. I like the new moves don't get me wrong but things so unbalanced that half of it goes straight to the garbage bin for me unfortunately.

Side Content
"Catching minigame back with a vengeance"
I think this one sentence enough to convey to you how I feel about substories. why? Because I found them pretty pacebreaking when you can combo an enemy multiple different ways, but game thinks holding the control stick up is more interesting. This is not the only problem, there is now variation of it and it's following a person stealthily and it's sucks even more. Because only thing you do is hold the button up, then when the person you are following starts turning you press the hide button and that's it. Unfortunate thing is it takes A LOT OF TIME, even more time than a catching minigame...
There is also new side activites too, one is zombie railshooting minigame that comes from dead souls's assets and I found it pretty fun even though it's pretty short and drone minigame. I haven't completed the drone minigame because there is no story..? It felt pretty weird to me since there is an npc connected to it for the friendship system that goes nowhere.
Friendship system comes back from yakuza kiwami 2 I think? I haven't played yk2 but it was also in the og one and y0 so I know what it is, but in this one there is one annoying thing and that is, it's required to get to amon... I found this pretty stupid because friendship system is a huge chore to get through. You have to do one thing like eating, buying, baseball etc. Multiple multiple multiple times... For what reason? There is a fun substories connected to it yes but only small number of them have it. There is one substory that unlocks after you finished the friendship and it's pretty cool. But the amount of grind you have to put yourself is unreal! At this point I started to wonder are they padding time just to show full completion takes considerable amount time?
After I played substories I became sure of it. Why? Because at least half of the substories requires you to do same thing thrice! I am not kidding. They made it this way because there is only 20 or so "real" substories but with repeats, it becomes 50... I would even replay yakuza 1 substories because compared to judgment, at least they don't take your damn time. Only thing I can say good is amon fight was creative at least. Unfortunately you can cheese it with spamming burst, devil trigger/spirit thingy but at least it was something different.

Story
I look pretty negative ain't I? But now it's time to get positive because since yakuza 1 and 4. This game really tries hard to inject new life to kamurocho and I really felt the danger every point of the story like the yakuza 1 did! I couldn't believe it because it's sooo nicely done! There is a lot factions like new yakuzas, killings, strange ocurrings all over the town that you start to feel kind of unedge and that's super awesome. Not just that, slowly unrevealing the mystery keeps you intrigued in every moment. Unfortunately not every part of the mystery used to it's potential in my opinion(especially things happening after the second half of the game regarding to the serial killer). But rest of it was fantastic. You learn Yagami's past and his motivations to solve this case, you learn his partners that how connects to both past, present and the future, you see how things chaoticly go out of hand! Because of this reason alone just go and play this game, I am not kidding it. If you like detective work and slowly revealing the mystery you are gonna like the main story with couple of exceptions.

World
Normally I would pass this part, but this time I wanted to talk about it. I already talked about uneasy feeling the main story does but there is more. The music tone they use on the overworld is more mysterious and dark this time. Also I wasn't a big fan of friendship thingy yes but seeing some of your friends in random places of the Kamurocho makes it feel alive. Combine this with the mysterious song list and bum. Vibes are flowing into me! Also I forgot to talk about how they added small shorcuts to Kamurocho too! They really tried their best to make Kamurocho feel fresh with this small changes. Because of that like I said I had emotions similar to Yakuza 1(ps2)'s Kamurocho. I mean Yakuza 1 still have the crown for atmosphere but this game is just behind it with yakuza 2.

So... Good game. Fun but badly balanced combat. Masterpiece level of atmosphere. Monotonous side quests. Really good story with an unfortunate weak villain. They balance itself together with positives and negatives so unfortunately it doesn't go as far as to masterpiece level. But still recommended.

After playing bloodborne and dark souls 3, playing the oldest soul game sounded meh to me. But I was determined enough to see every souls game so I played. And I am glad to say I am really happy for giving this decision.

Why? Because this game still have exclusive things that no souls game ever did it, so it's still feels fresh somehow. But of course with their first time, there is unfortunate shortcomings as well.

I will only talk about differences compared to the souls games because of that you will not understand some of the things that I will say if you haven't played the game.

World

First I thought world is kind of disappointing, because it was too straight, yeah you can select which world to start but every world looked like straight ways to me unfortunately, but then I realised oh shit. This game's world is actually massive but condensed.

What I mean by saying this is, there is a surprise in every corner of this game. Not just that, game does every step so naturally that you don't even realize.

First you see the which kind of world you are in, then you see which kind of enemies in it then you see how the game combines the both beautifully. What I mean is for example you are in cave, what do you expect? Some miners and usual grotesque monsters right? But as you go more deeper and more deeper, game evolves and changes the cave area to be an volcanic area, then the enemies become more volcanic and rock like, then you go even deeper in and you find an ancient area that holds scary boss like ancient monsters.

Now did you get what I mean? Game shows a different part of the world in every. Step. Of. The. Way. and you really feel the world building and immersion with this one, once you feel that, you realize actually how massive the game is. Because it keeps changing with every progress.

I can confidently say this game have god level world building in it. It's feel so natural that even tho I haven't played every souls game, this game feels more superb then the ones that I have played in this area.

Gameplay and Challenge


After playing older games, when you come back to this you kind of feel dumbfounded. Because it's slow and really heavy. You can make this more bearable with equipping less heavy equipment and using a ring that gives you an ability to carry more weight but you still feel the heavy weight of it. I felt kind of not sure about this situation but then I realized it is not that important anyway in the end. Why?

Because this game acts a bit more puzzle like. Rather than making your character more reactive for action, you should consider how to act in that area, and not forget PATIENT IS THE KEY maybe even more with this title, because of it's puzzle nature.

For example there is an area with poisonous water that slows your movement also it does have enemies that can move fast in it so then you should use ranged equipment to kill them before they get to you, or there is a area that have enemies that have unkillable souls in it, so you have to find the host to kill them, not just that bosses are the same way.

There is a boss that only a certain kind of equipment can really hurt, there is a boss that stealth is the key for beating it, there is a boss that you should use pillars as a shield to defend yourself from it.

Of course every souls game does this to an extent but demon's souls is the one that tries the most with giving every bosses and areas some uniqueness and never repeats that one thing again. I really find this nice. Because the ones that I played mostly changed their boss attack patterns and timings, but didn't felt entirely different.

Unfortunately it's not a complete win, because I felt like they couldn't balance some things right in this game.

What I mean is, when it comes to some bosses, some of them stays too passive and you can slash them to the death and some bosses are too much aggressive so it forces you to stay a bit too much defensive. There could be a better midpoint I think.

Also not just that there is one unfortunate thing that undoes every challenge in second half of this game and that is the health system. Why? Because you can carry near infinite of them if you grind. So, near the endgame you can buy so much that, no amount of challenge can stop you at that point and I found this a damn shame in this beautiful game... (At least dark souls fixes that, but bloodborne have the same problem for some reason??) Don't get me wrong I am not saying it should be harder. But this one problem just obliterates the challenge completely and makes it a bit empty

Unfinishness

Now everybody knows that snow area cut at this point right? But I feel like it's not that big of a problem. The bigger problem is, in every world ending part gives a bit of disappointing feeling. I haven't seen anyone talk about this but in every world's final boss, except the first one, doesn't have it's own fleshed out finale level and I find this really disappointing. Most of the time final boss area is so desolate that you can practically run to it's finale boss without any challenge. I don't know if this comes from the unfinishness of this game but this really bothers me, so this reason and balancing reason alone I can't give 5/5 even tho part of my heart cries to give it...