User reviews

Sega returns with another action adventure beat'em up game. This game, they've released Yakuza, a game set in a fictional part of Tokyo's red light district, which seems typical and screams "Japan's take on their underground world as a video game" to try to boost a sale but it seems to be worth it as this game tells a great cinematic story set in the Japanese crime scene.

Yakuza is a beat'em up where the player take control of Kazuma Kiryu who finds himself in prison, taking the blame for a murder of the chairman of his clan for his brother. He spends 10 years in prison until his release, only to find, everything has changed. It is a typical based story you'll find anywhere about a character who went to prison to be released to find their own world has changed! With that, a large amount of money goes mission where the other clans in the game are trying to find and I'm sure you'll know where the ending of the game ends up.

In terms of gameplay, Kazuma can run around the district and interact with other characters and trigger cutscenes to help him process, the challenge are the brawls, which are known in the area in the real world counterpart of this game. Kazuma knows how to fight and winning these brawls gives Kazuma experience points where he can spend unlocking new moves and getting stronger. Getting items from stores help him heal and improve his strength, which can help him a lot.

Not to be confused with a game like Grand Theft Auto, there isn't any driving in this game. It's mostly on foot (like Yakuza members drive as much as someone would expect?!), which is often the biggest misconception about this game being released around this time, competing with other open world games. This is mostly set in a district in a city, not a city.

Being a Sega game, given their history at the time and some of their pass games. I do like how some mechanics from Shenmue appear in this game. Ideas like entering a store and purchasing items and its battle system. It's that with a different premise unlike Shenmue, so it is nice to see those again, alive and active in another game. I think movies fans of the Yakuza genre which have spawned over the decades prior to this games release, may enjoy the presentation found in this game, much more. When I played this game, because I mostly was into Sega games, I hadn't noticed until I looked at Yakuza films and seen their presentation which sometimes appears in this game, so I could see why the game has such a presentation for this game.

Considering it's been a very long time since this game release and the game having a remake, Kiwami, I say off the bat, that you're not really missing out much. The game is great but prices for the original game pre-owned aren't getting any cheaper unless you really want to see the original game on its original hardware, I ended up playing the PlayStation 2 version, so they aren't easy to obtain as you'll think. The game was a great start which is surprising to see it become a series spawning so many games.

I am plowing through my second run of the fourth installment of this franchise, yet the first game will always hold a dear place in my heart. This is not Grand Theft Auto. The morality of the protagonist is impeccable, and the worst you could do is refuse to help in a side mission. You play a man who took the fall for his best friend and spent ten years in prison, and since you supposedly killed your own boss, every yakuza hates you. This is unfortunately the most irritating aspect of the first title. Every encounter-able character in the street will pick a fight with you (a problem addressed in the sequels). Go to a convenience store to buy that household item which will turn your weapon into something more, and you'll get into two fights along the way. Try to make your way back to a save point and you'll have to beat the crap out of three new sets of punks. What saves this from becoming entirely unbearable is that your set of moves develops as you smash more faces to the ground, and you rarely run out of environmental weapons or the chance to pull a cinematic special move: you seldom get bored of beating people up. While you're not beating people up, you're running from place to place in town, and unfortunately, this second aspect is equally mortally flawed by slow loads--as many load times as street corners, and space distorting camera angles which will make you run into a street (after a prolonged load time hiccup) and back where you came from (meaning another prolonged load time to put you back where you started) by simply holding the directional stick in the same direction because the fixed camera angle will have done an unexpected 180 on you.

Those are the only two things I can complain about the game, which I still think deserves its 10. Once you beat it, get hold of the sequel which is twice as long and takes place in Osaka half the time. Beat that and buy a Playstation 3 to play the third game (not the swashbuckling spin off), which is half set in Okinawa. The fourth game is entirely set in the original city, with the addition of rooftops and underground levels. I love the series, and every installment. Since the playstation 3 games did away with the fixed camera, I doubt I'll be playing this game again, but I still give it a 10 for hooking me in so bad I did all of the above.