BACK WITH A VENGEANCE
Also for: Playstation 3, Windows, Windows Apps, Xbox One, Xbox Series
In its most ambitious entry yet, Yakuza is finally back to compete in the big leagues. With a solid story, fantastic characters, a staggering amount of
things to do and an abundance of maps, Yakuza 5 shows great
confidence in the direction the series is heading. Its success is hard-earned
through years of diligent learning. Ryu Ga Gotoku studio finally gets a good grasp on how to tackle multiple narratives. Each of
the initial four main story parts, out of five, has different protagonists.
They tell intriguing, mostly self-contained stories, and it's only when they come
together in the final act that the plot somewhat confounds me.
Up until that point, the game constantly reinvents itself, using building
blocks from previous entries and adding some new. Every part of the game has
its own flavor, as if colored by its particular leading guy's (or gal's)
personality and battle approach. Kazuma Kiryu, the series' main protagonist so
far, is the player character for the first part. His chapters are the easiest,
him being a fighting Tojo clan legend and all.
He has left his old life behind to work incognito as a taxi driver in
Nagasugai. Although some customers give him hell, he has kind colleagues and a
supportive boss. Whatever earnings he can spare, he transfers to the kids of
his beloved old seaside orphanage in Okinawa. But his tranquil life only
lasts for so long. After a work shift, word reaches him that his friend, Daigo
Dojima, who's the head of his old Yakuza clan, has disappeared. And it just so
happens that Kiryu was the last to see the Tojo chairman. His story deals with
that disappearance and leads Kiryu on a path that eventually converges with
the other protagonists' stories.
The main characters mostly consist of familiar faces. We have Taiga Saejima -
the wrongfully accused death row inmate - and altruistic loan shark Akiyama,
both great characters returning from Yakuza 4. Haruka, Kiryu's adoptive
daughter, is trying to become a pop idol. She has been a side character in the
series since the first game (not Yakuza 0), but this is her long
overdue breakthrough as a character. She has the most inventive and
interesting storyline, exploring the darker sides of show business. We also
have a fine new addition in Shinada, a retired professional baseball player.
He is let down by a mediocre, weapon-based fighting style, but his story
is great, adding a penniless working-class man's perspective on things.
Yakuza 5 might break the series' record for longest running time, but it's
still well-paced, restricting the side activities within each part to a
manageable size. Almost every character has their own elaborate side story
(with its own leveling mechanic), plus a dozen or more substories. Add to that tons of unique
as well as shared mini-games. They're all completely optional, but as usual,
they're so much bloody fun that the distractions feel like the game's heart and
soul.
Saejima's mountain-hunting side story drags on a bit, and the VR training
missions, which transfer the main game's fighting mechanics to a side-brawler, are horrendous. Apart from that, Yakuza 5 has some of my favorite side content
of the series. Kiryu's taxi missions are surprisingly fun (remind me to never
drive in Japan), and Shinada's baseball missions provide some great insights
into his sad backstory. But as a huge fan of previous entries' karaoke mini-games,
for me Haruka's pop idol storyline is where the game shines.
Naturally, the young girl doesn't fight. Instead she partakes in dance battles
and singing competitions. Over fully animated performances in the background,
you chime in through a rhythm-based mini-game that determines the outcome. She
also meets reporters, goes to fan conventions, and does some odd TV
appearances - anything that gets her media coverage and expands her fan base.
Her songs are great, as are the karaoke entries. Just listen to "Ring" and "Bakamitai" and tell me I'm wrong.
Every other character follows the traditional Yakuza mold with main story and
street brawling. I won't dwell on the fighting mechanic, because it's
identical to earlier games. The only tough battles belong to a few obscure
sidequests. Each character has his own combat style, with Akiyama's rush-inspired kicking being the most fun to play. Kiryu is a fighting connoisseur, capable to withstand everyone with his crazy amount of moves. Saejima's reliance on raw power over finesse makes him the most tedious fighter.
Since Shinada is a new
protagonist, his weapons-focused style is unprecedented (they later imported
bits of it to Majima's thug-style in Yakuza 0). A new weapon progression
system helps him a little. It increases your skills with weapon types you use,
and incites you to pick up makeshift arms like bikes, trashcans and traffic
cones off the sidewalks. Even though he's the weakest fighter, he's not dull to play
- it just means his fights are the most difficult. Interestingly, being a former baseball player, he refuses to wield a bat in combat out of respect for the equipment.
Out of the four combative protagonists, Shinada's story is also the most intriguing
and best told. It contains one affecting scene in which a person is deceived
by his friends. But instead of the expected argument, the victim responds with a heartbroken
stare, which we see from the point of view of the betrayer. In a game series often
overindulging in dialogue, the restrained effect of that scene
caught me off guard.
Ryu ga Gotoku studios has always had a knack for modeling cool, charismatic
characters, but here they also begin to truly shine with great, multifaceted
personalities. At its best, Yakuza storytelling is elevated through the
power of individual scenes rather than the overarching plot. A long,
free-roaming video game is not a particularly good format for traditional
narratives. I believe that's why the substories feel so essential to the
Yakuza experience. They are short, perfectly condensed to around ten minutes,
and still convey all the necessary emotions and provide some meaningful
gameplay.
In Yakuza 5, my favorite might just be Saejima's hilarious food delivery
substory. He's stuck in a snowy Sapporo around New Year's, when he stumbles
upon a food delivery guy who's slipped and injured his back. Saejima accepts
to deliver the food in his stead. The lazy customer is standing just about 50
meters (54 yards) away, looking straight at you. The street is so slippery
with ice, you have to slowly walk all the way to him. But the kicker is that
other pedestrians come sliding down the street on their backs, in full
speed, spinning like helpless bugs. They'll cause you to drop and spoil the
food unless you avoid them. I was crying with laughter throughout, but still
caught one passer-by yelling: "At least this is the right way home!"
Moments like these linger, as do individual scenes and even shots from the
main story. But no entry, apart from Yakuza 0, has an overarching plot that I
distinctly remember. I think I might have expressed it differently in the
past, but now I realize that a Yakuza game is exactly as good as the sum of
all its parts. Yakuza 5 has so many great parts it's an essential addition to any
gamer's resume.
Ryu Ga Gotoku studio seems to love inventing bizarre tales of urban life. This
time they all revolve around the central theme of dreams. Haruka, with her
life still ahead of her, represents everybody's hope of realizing the crushed dreams of their own past. The other four protagonists long to see her succeed where they couldn't. Her
story is perfectly placed smack-dab in the middle of the game, giving us a
respite from all the physical violence.
Although the Yakuza 5 I played is remastered, the visuals are uneven on a
technical level, and the invisible walls start showing their antiquated cracks.
But the game more than makes up for that through the high level of detail in
the environments. Aside from Yakuza Kiwami 2, this game might be the
most absorbing the series has ever been. The storefronts, streets and parks
are teeming with life. Just looking through hundreds of screenshots to accompany this review, I realize a lot of them tell a story of their own. People gossip about current affairs, and some of it
pertains to your story progress. This does not only help the cities come alive, it also refreshes your memory of past events.
Unfortunately, Yakuza 5 arrives near the end of the long-running Kazuma
Kiryu-saga. A lot of people will never experience it, because they'd have to
spend hundreds of hours getting there. Not all of the time leading up to it will be this absorbing.
But when you're struggling with the lesser entries in the middle, just
remember: Somewhere close to the end of the rainbow you'll find a game to
rival the masterpiece, Yakuza 0, that got your journey started.
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