Game Journal / Review: Yakuza

THIS POST CONSISTS ENTIRELY OF GAMEPLAY AND STORY SPOILERS FOR YAKUZA

Mechanics
Whew. I'm beat. Twenty five and a half hours of virtual brawling gets pretty repetitive. The game added some new moves, but many of them weren't really that new. Countering with blocks gave way to countering with punches, gave way to countering with throws. Same move, different buttons. Yawn.

In the end, Yakuza's fighting was more about the fun of clobbering a guy with a milk crate than precision. The game did have precision moves, but they worked inconsistently. I specifically remember trying to practice countering against a medium sized enemy. Block counters worked fine, but punch and throw counters never worked once. Considering I could pull them off with some regularity against other foes, I came to the conclusion that the mechanic was simply broken. Little things like this, combined with the awkwardness of the facing mechanic that often saw the hero punching air, caused me to stop taking the fighting very seriously.

I don't hold the occasional wonkiness of the fighting against the game. I think that was the right way for them to go. It looked cool when you clobbered a guy with a milk crate. Once in a while people on gaming sites will lament how games are too easy these days and how it used to be a real challenge to finish a game. But tuning a game that well's a huge effort and just doesn't pay. Most people don't read challenging books, and most people don't play hard games.

I always make games hard on myself, regardless, trying to take no hits or setting little bonus achievements for myself. Can I do special moves with all the weapons? What happens if I do a special move next to the flaming barrel? How much can I make these three thugs in an alleyway resemble pinballs by bouncing them off the walls? (not actual pinballs, but remarkable facsimiles) How many can I take down without using any healing items? Some might say that the game doesn't deserve the credit when the player makes the fun. There's some truth to that. But the game provides the sandbox that lets players play. Grand Theft Auto gives you traffic and a rocket launcher. Yakuza gives you thugs and umbrellas. Hilarity ensues.

Atmosphere
As I mentioned before, Chapter Four was the highlight. I ran all over and did everything. There were still plenty of crazy things that happened in the game. The girl that came on to me and turned out to be a guy was definitely a weird one. And my self-appointed sidekick definitely made more trouble. At one point he got in trouble with a Yakuza over a woman and some money, I think. I didn't really care. The Yakuza seemed very reasonable, so when sidekick asked me to clobber the guy, I said, "Nah. This is none of my business" and walked away. Situations and choices like that are so rare in games. I continue to be grateful to the designers of Yakuza for providing them.

The overall story of the game was crime melodrama. I try to take the ridiculousness of the genre conventions in stride, but sometimes they gets the better of me. You see, for all the pretensions to being hard boiled, nobody ever gets hurt or killed unless it's to serve the story (or to keep them on the sidelines while you do all the work). This is supposed to give those moments where people are hurt or killed added importance, but it feels so contrived. Plus it makes everything outside of cut scenes a joke. Everybody threatens death, but after you beat them up they give you loot and apologize. It's less hard boiled and more Bugsy Malone.

The characterization and voice work were pretty standard for a dubbed game. The culture gap makes some of the characters' reactions and decisions confusing. And to match the mouths, they screw up the rhythm of half the lines, making it impossible for the characters to seem anything but wooden. I know some of the voice actors on the game (Eliza Dushku, John DiMaggio, and Mark Hamill) can do good work in better environs. But I'll be glad to play Yakuza 2 in Japanese with subtitles.

Final Score
All that said, I'm a little torn about what to score the game. As a fighting game it was a three out five, diverting but too much loading to be a true joy. Actually, the load times are interesting. There was a loading screen before every fight. In another game, that might have been enough to get me to stop playing as I hate waiting for the fun I paid for. But the loading screens in Yakuza are accompanied by the name and family symbol of who was being fought along with uptempo rock or funk to set the mood. It made the loading screen like when a wrestler walks in and their theme song plays. It gave me a target and psyched me up, making the many many loading screens much more bearable.

As an experience the game was a four. Virtual Tokyo was cool. The many characters, situations, behaviors, and choices presented impressed the heck out of me. It might even be a five, but I'm not going to forgive how many times I had to hobble my way around Tokyo with Haruka in tow. I wouldn't play those parts again unless you paid me. Handsomely.

Overall I'll say the game was a four because it's something special that shouldn't be missed. Turn it down to easy and enjoy hitting people with milk crates in a strange land. :)