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| A new dragon rises. |
As a fan of the Yakuza series since Yakuza 0, I've been slowly feeling burnt out with the games as the gameplay got repetitive with each entry (despite them being great). Enter Yakuza: Like A Dragon (or Yakuza 7), a soft-reboot of the renowned series, that stars a new hero a in a new town with a completely new gameplay twist. Replacing the gameplay style is one thing but also replacing main hero Kiryu is a whole other thing, so does the game and its new character live up to the lofty expectations?
We follow a new hero in Ichiban Kasuga, a lowly yakuza who takes the blame for a murder he didn't commit. After spending 18 years in prison, he's finally free... only to find that his yakuza family has completely ditched him. Alone and confused, he now finds himself in Ijincho, Yokohama a new city rife with thugs, secret conspiracies, and eccentric folk to meet. He joins a colorful band of friends in hopes of finding the truth of his family's betrayal while unravelling a huge political conspiracy between the police and yakuza.
The story has to be among the beat stories in the series with how the tragic betrayals, outlandish twists, jaw-dropping reveals, and well-written characters were delivered. Kasuga's a more bubbly and upbeat personality compared to Kiryu, but I loved watching his adventure unfold throughout the story. Couple that with the equally amazing cast of characters like Adachi, Nanba, Saeko and the rest whom all were likeable too.
In Yakuza: Like A Dragon, gameplay takes a full revamp by blending the series' beat em up combat with a new turn-based RPG system! Basically, if you've played an RPG before then it's all too familiar but if you haven't, it's easy to understand. You control Kasuga and his three party members as they fight enemies, explore the town, and level up and unlock new skills. In battle each character has their HP and MP, where the latter allows them to use attack, healing, or buffing/debuffing skills. As you level up, you unlock more powerful skills for your party-- and the way they pull-off skills is just plain over-the-top and flashy that'll leave you both entertained and dumbfounded. Like A Dragon takes heavy inspiration from Dragon Quest with Ichiban always referencing RPG tropes, mechanics, and music.
As such, there are "Jobs" that each character can take that offer various combat perks. For example, the Bodyguard can use swords and piercing attacks that inflict bleeding while the Idol can sing songs that restore the party's health and buff-up their defence. These unlock new skill sets for example a Bodyguard can use sword-based moves, Every character had them so they weren't unique as characters had similar jobs and didn't give you a lot of reason to branch-out.
Similar to summons in RPGs, Kasuga can call for back-up with "Poundmates", characters who will provide you with support during combat by either offering extra damage to enemies or HP/MP refills to allies. You can unlock them through completing side missions or by playing through the story. The more powerful the Poundmates, the more expensive they get to summon too.
The game is huge one in terms of content as you can partake in various mini-games like visiting the SEGA arcade, compete in Go Kart tournament, taking tests that increase your stats, hang around at bars with your friends, take over a struggling business, and just exploring around town beating goons. The latter two are packed with a full story mode, which was cool. Overall, it took 60 hours to beat with me completing nearly all of the substories, where you'll meet characters and help them out and side-content like the business management mini-game. Some issues I had were that things can get clunky at times as characters tend to get stuck/bump onto objects when moving in battles and the camera often obstructed my view.
Yakuza: Like A Dragon looks great thanks to the venerable Dragon Engine. The character models are expressive, backgrounds are detailed, and visual effects are top-notch. Granted, there are tech shortcomings with noticeable load times when transitioning to battles, reused animations from previous games, and texture flickering. As usual, the voicework is phenomenal with the cast delivering fantastic performances all-around, especially Kasuga. The English voices are good with many notable actors. As for the soundtrack, it was a mix of electronic and retro tracks that were great.
Yakuza: Like A Dragon was a fantastic adventure that amazingly exceeded my expectations. The story and characters were thrilling, the production-values are top-notch as always, and the gameplay was surprisingly great. I wasn't too thrilled when the turn-based RPG mechanics were being crossed with Yakuza's beat 'em up gameplay (even though I'm a fan of RPGs), Ryu Ga Gatoku Studio managed to make it work as they created a solid gameplay system that's a lot of fun. Despite some shortcomings with the gameplay, the experience remained a great one. All in all, Yakuza: Like A Dragon is a must-play for series fans and even newcomers will find enjoyment given it's a fresh start for the series.
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