Yakuza Kiwami 2 (2017)

It's my first review on this site.

I did not actually finish entirely this game, although I've marked it as finished.

Reason: the game is great (4 stars without a doubt) but the final battle involves some serious bad treatment from the developers. So, I'm hitting Riu. I'm beating him really bad, I don't even need to use healing items. Then, suddenly, I have to quickly press some random key. And surprise, if you don't hit it, it doesn't matter that your life is full, that I have so many healing items in my inventory that I could survive battling an entire army. You simply lose. And have to start over again. Spend another 5 minutes just to get to the point where you don't press the correct key and you lose. This is in some way a lack of respect from the developers and I refuse to be treated like this, so I decided to quit.

4 starts though. Good game in general. A bit repetitive though.

Yakuza is easily one of the best adventure from a third-person persecutive type games that I've played. There is a certain formula at work in these games by Sega since Shenmue. I thought the story was better than Yakuzo 0, and enjoyed the ending. I had mixed feelings on the fighting and thought Yakuza 0 had a a cooler (but more grindy) upgrade system and moves unlocked in a more natural way. However in this game it was overall easier to get powerful really quickly and I prefer that. You can also really exploit combat (bicycles are the best weapons, and those neon signs are great too) by spamming swing objects.

It was well worth playing and I find little fault with it despite it not being that different from Yakuza 0. (And I think ALL theese games take place in the same 2 maps.) I found it worth playing through because of it's different and (what I felt) to be a slightly better story.

It's a decent Yakuza experience, probably the best one yet for me. The environment now reacts to your actions; you can grab the enemy and start spinning and throwing it, and he can break the window of the store and fly in, where you will eventually continue the fight, making the combat system more fun and realistic, but if you get into a fight inside a store or restaurant, you will not be served not only in that store but also in nearby ones for quite some time. Kiryu now gets new additional animations when walking or running into something: check your watches or look behind you, which looks cool, plus you are walking by default instead of running, which encourages you to walk more and explore the city, as i eventually did. Because the number of loading screens has been reduced to a bare minimum, locations now feel more seamless; you can now walk into more stores or cafés without any loading screens appearing, or you can cut through stores from one street to another, making the game more immersive, which I really enjoy. The new HUD design is more minimalistic and clean, and it reminds me of the PSP system design. Sometimes there is not enough music in some places, like before the fight with NPCs or walking around the city, and I wish there was more music coming from the shops, but overall I like the changes in the tunes; the jazz tunes during secondary tasks suit the game's tone well. I don't like how, in the video store for adults, they don't show us the videos themselves, but in Zero, they do, and this is the game's biggest flaw for me.

In terms of emotions, the final chapter outperformed the entire game; it has the best production and most intense situations of any Yakuza game I've played. Of course, a plot-driven story with “unexpected” plot twists revealing every 5 minutes new “Dr. Evil” characters looks comical, but the motivation of Ryuji Goda and his dialogue with Kiryu (verbal and nonverbal) outweigh all cons, and the music is just superbly selected. The atmosphere created by the duel with Ryuji is reminiscent of the final fight in MGS4. All the anime checkboxes are checked: a romantic plot, an understandable antagonist who shares many similarities with the main hero, a detective-driven plot, coolly directed fights, cool fight music, literally “shōnen” (or whatever it's called), but such impressions are only from the last chapter;

Summarizing the entire game: it is a good Yakuza, but it's the same Yakuza you've already played.

Right off the bat, the story started off strong, from the amazing finale in Yakuza 1. However, it quickly became cheesy, very melodramatic, convoluted, and overall repetitive. Towards the end of the game the villain, Ryuji Goda, does pick up the pathos a little bit and elevate it. I just wish the game was more about him and less about all the other "villain" characters and gangs. It was also amazing for Kiryu to finally get a romance storyline, it didn't feel forced at all and was pretty sweet. The environment and city were amazing in this installment as it felt more modernized and detailed. The leveling up system was a huge improvement in my opinion compared to the other games. However, the playstyle and gameplay were insanely repetitive and growing very stale for me. I am definitely a fan of the series and plan to check out the rest, however, I doubt any will top Yakuza 0 which had insanely good gameplay, story, and characters.

You have to be a fan of these games and the world and story to play this. Either you started at Zero and are here for more or you have no business playing because why would you start here?! There is too much history and it really needs that context for all the emotional payoff.

This is the first one if you play in numerical order to use a new engine. It changes the way combat works for the better and it looks GORGEOUS!

I have numerous issues with open-world games but a very big one is that it is empty and there is nothing to do. I love these maps. I love that they are the EXACT same every game. Three games in I know these places inside and out, but as time and storefronts and such change, it feels like home.

This game really looks great and the kissing is weirdly realistic, like, the detail in this game is wild! I have no idea how it will be to go into 3 after this but I am very invested in the stories and most importantly the characters of this world! So I am going to stop writing and start playing... Yakuza 3.

Overall pretty enjoyable experience. Having only played 0 and Kiwami 1 so far, Kiwami 2 is leagues better than Kiwami 1 but worse than 0. Going to cut short of writing a review because if you played Yakuza 0 or Yakuza Kiwami, Yakuza Kiwami 2 is kind of the same thing (in a good way).

The good stuff is mostly in the first half where the drama is tense, the side stories are hilarious (albeit not as involved as Yakuza 0) and the action is goofy dumb fun with a lot of physics effects. Cabaret club is back with some nice nods to Yakuza 0's cabaret club plot. The Majima Construction minigame is OK. It's an RTS defense game. It's honestly a bit mindless, there isn't much thinking involved other than to use abilities once in awhile and top off any characters low on health.

The bad parts of the game is towards the end where the story meanders into a confusing mess. The game has plot twists for the sake of plot twists. It over complicates the story and there is little pay off. The story boils down to two men having a fight to the death because they both have dragon tattoos and need to prove who is the stronger dragon.

Strangely enough, I found the Majima Saga plot much more enjoyable. It's fairly short lasting about 2 hrs but there's some heartwarming moments when Majima reunites with Makoto from Yakuza 0.

This is my 3rd Yakuza game, so far and... Well, also the worst one. The biggest issue is that Kiwami 2 is A LOT like 0 and Kiwami 1. The good and bad things are utterly similar.

A few things are still as good as before, though. Kamurocho and Sotenbori are still great places to "live" for a while, the soundtrack is amazing, the graphics are beautiful, the battle system is much simpler now, mini-games are still fun and the new characters fit perfectly with the series' story.

There were 3 things that I LOVED about Kiwami 2: The first few chapters, the sidequests and Majima's 3 extra chapters!

. The story is pretty inconsistent and even boring, at times, but DAMN! The first 5 or 6 chapters are intense, well paced and FUN!

. The other Yakuza games I played had GREAT sidequests, but this one takes the cake! If you want a glimpse of how creative these optional stories are, just search for the 'Be My Baby' substories and thank me later. . Majima's 3 chapters are pure joy and simplicity. It gives an "ending" to Majima's events that took place in 0, packs a very good short story and let's you play as the Mad Dog himself, which felt awesome.

But here's the thing. There are 2 major flaws that kept me from liking it too much...

. The game is VERY similar to past entries. By this point, I know how Yakuza games work, but that doesn't mean that the games need to be almost the same.

. Story themes were similar, mini-games are the same, some sidequests were just repeats and even some plot twists felt EXTREMELY predictable because past games did the SAME thing. The whole plot starts great, but just loses itself in the middle and never picks up again. There are at least 3 chapters that were pure filler. The pacing is bloody terrible! And I won't even say anything about the final chapters' 100 plot twists. It was just too forced.

. The fighting system still needs a lot of work. It's not good at all. Bosses and mini-bosses can still overwhelm Kiryu with ease. The flow of every fight feels broken. Just actually hitting a full combo in a major enemy is a chore. It's unnecessarily janky and brutal. This mess could be solved with a dedicated dodge button, a lock-on system that actually works and a consistent defense mechanic, but at this point, it's a lost cause.

I did not like Kiwami 2 very much, unfortunately. I still love the world and characters of this series, but I can't shake the feeling that there are little to no development and novelty to things. There's a unique charm in its tales and gameplay, but it's not enough. It's pretty sad, since Yakuza 0 became one of my favorite games. I still want to try the other games of the franchise, but Kiwami 2 made me think about entirely dropping it. I can only recommend it if you REALLY want to play Yakuza.

my progression on this series has been 4 -> 5 -> 0 -> 6 -> kiwami -> kiwami 2, so this is apparently my sixth yakuza game in the past three years and two things have remained consistent: i find them incredibly endearing and i am always hesitant to "end" the game. if i had to draw some comparison, it would be that yakuza has felt most like a modern incarnation of a tv series to me than any other game series i have ever spent time with.

i am pretty sure the genre is very much love it or leave it for most folks, for me i find the sort of cheesy gangster noire it revels in to be incredibly fun to dive into every few months. the gameplay is fairly predictable and each newest version manages to improve upon rough mechanics from each prior version. each time i dive in, i feel like i spend more time digesting the story and the way the characters react to and engage with it and kiwami 2's story feels like something of a turning point for the series: a moment in the series's narrative that really dives into the way that kazama's choices set in motion the arc that kiryu eventually follows, down to the sort of heavy foreshadowing we see with him and haruka as we get lots of flashback scenes with him and kazama.

as far as "how good is this as a game" i think along the axis of 0, 6, and kiwami, it makes some nice inceremental improvements to the overall mechanics: fighting is the most seamless, the loads between missions are faster, the world feels incredibly alive, the sidequests are somewhat more involved. in my mind it is probably the sort of "remaster" treatment most people would love for any game in the ps2 era to receive. everything about the yakuza series is story-driven, so all mechanical improvements really elevate the central core of the game.

in terms of story, it sort of has it all in spades: romance, danger, honor, humor, intrigue—it's all there. the game is just bursting with so much (and notably, so much of what everyone has come to love about the series) that towards the end, i suspect that the tv-series analogy has the most parallels: you spend so much time driving the story forward, towards the end, it's sort of bittersweet letting go of the narrative. that said, it's not like there's any shortage of games in the series, there's more than enough to dive into, so really like any series, there are valid reasons to revisit any game.

lastly, i think that what shines here is the way that the city seems to react to you more than it has in any prior game: if your brawl smashes a window of a wild jackson, the employees will refuse to sell you a burger until some time has passed, special combos with minor characters around the city are available, and so on.

part of what makes yakuza special i think is that beyond the story, it acknowledges that you spend a lot of time in these game worlds and it goes to great lengths to make them fun and engaging places. you're rewarded the more you understand the streets of kamurocho and sotonbori because not only are there distinct things in each part of town, but often you'll spend time trying to make the best choices for how to get between them, or exploring them. the most recent entries in the series really just show how much that pays off in terms of making the world more engaging. not only is being better at navigation a reward in itself, it ends up being a a delight understanding the ins and outs of the city. it's a game that celebrates fandom by making the mundane exciting and a game that takes what would be b-plots in a tv season and turns them into sidequests. it's far from perfect, but it's nearly peerless in its execution.

Another stunningly consistent casserole of beat-em-up action, crime-riddled melodrama and outright silliness.

If you're as big a fan of Yakuza 0 as I am, then I think this game will hold a special place in your heart. It shares its key locations with the prequel, but rendered in higher fidelity thanks to the updated engine. And minigames like the updated Cabaret Club Grand Prix are a real treat to play.

I'll admit I felt a little disappointed by this entry's story as it meandered to its climax, but the conclusion more than made up for those misgivings as it had me on the edge of my seat. Similarly, I was put off by the sluggishness of the combat at first but grew to appreciate how dramatically improved Kiryu's handling felt as I unlocked more skill points and abilities.

It's really a credit to the Ryu Ga Gotoku team that I've played four entries this year (!!) and I'm still not tired of it. I'm so happy Sega decided to re-release the series so fans like me who missed it the first time around could easily experience it.