Yakuza Kiwami 2.
Yakuza 1 and 2 were both originally ps2 games, with Yakuza 1 actually having an English dub. Did you guys know Mark Hammill plays Gojo Majima? Nobody does, not even Mark remembers doing it. Anyway Yakuza 1 sold like shit in the west so they didn't bother with a dub for the next 5 games. But additionally Yakuza 1 and 2 got HD upgrades on the PS3 in a double box collection. Then somewhere around 2017 with Yakuza 0 the series hit a huge revitalization in the West, which spurred the team to remake the original games onto a modern system with these Kiwami's.
However, while Kiwami 1 used the same engine as Yakuza 0 the team had made a brand new engine for Yakuza 6 called the Dragon Engine which they used for Kiwami 2. As a result, Kiwami 2 is one of the most modern and polished games in the franchise.
Once again we take on the shoes on Kazama Kiryu the only Yakuza ever to join, get fired, rejoin, become a chairman, retire, rejoin, retire, rejoin, retire, etc etc. Anyway the game opens with Kiryu retired and trying to settle into a life where he can raise Haruka , the little girl from the first game, in peace. However the man he put in charge of his spot in the Tojo clan has problems and comes begging for his help. This is the game where the Omi Alliance gets introduced as sort of the big bad group of all Yakuza. The Omi Alliance is an entity who's members will constantly reoccur as villains throughout the series and they're always trying to start Yakuza wars for some reason, even though by all accounts it would be a bad move for them as it would surely result in the destruction of Yakuza as a whole in Japan.
I never really understood the plot point of warring Yakuza families because to me it always spelled certain police attention and certain dismantling of the Yakuza entirely, or at least the families involved with the war. Nevertheless it's constantly the looming threat, maybe because it does spell the end of the Tojo clan and that's what the Omi wants so they can spread their influence through the territory in the power vacuum that would result.
Kiryu is asked for help by the Chairman and he refuses, but Kiryu is never allowed to refuse so the Chairman is shot. Wait what? One other thing that's consistent throughout the series is the sheer number of double and even triple crosses that occur in ever game. It's such a formula that you can basically assume that the non-threatening guy you meet in the beginning of the game will be the final boss and the bad guy all along.
One thing I really like about all the Yakuza game though, is the consistency. Unlike a series like Final Fantasy or Dragonquest, Yakuza games absolutely continue the plots of the games before them. After 8 games it's crazy just how much of a throughline they've managed to keep in the series. The downside to this of course is the sheer number of characters and events that get called back throughout the games and unless you are keeping notes or have an insane memory, you'll never remember everything. Especially considering that some characters that return are nothing more than tiny characters from side-stories.
Let's talk combat and the dragon engine. Yakuza 6 and Kiwami 2 introduce a new type of leveling system but it also eliminates stances. So in the trade of not having different fighting styles, you instead get a more streamlines fighting style which you can adjust based on how you level Kiryu up. You are giving experience points in 5 areas, Tech, Body, Mind, Chrisma, and Soul. Each of these gains exp by doing different things, from fighting to even eating meals at restaurants. The type of activity you do will grant you different levels of the experiences. You can use this experience in the menus to do a wide variety of things not just your fighting skills, but also things like making you better at the mini games.
Fighting with Kiryu in combat is fast and is easily the most responsive combat in the series. Kiryu snaps in response to your button presses which removes this sort of lag between combos and button queuing which trying to pull off specific moves. This is something that will come up in other games soon. But with the Dragon Engine Kiryu is faster and smoother to control than ever and it feels really great. The heat moves are also huge in variety and always fun to watch what crazy situational ones you can pull off. Making friends around town will add to heat moves and you might trigger ones that cause your friends to toss Kiryu some insane help to bash people's faces in.
Additionally with this there are quite a few moments in the game where you will be fighting with an AI partner for story reasons, and almost all the Heat moves you do while they're with you will include them and again the variety in these moves is impressively thought out.
The combat is fantastic and it is easily my favorite combat in the series thusfar.
Kiwami 2 also showcases a point in which the Yakuza games gain a distinct formula towards the side content. Basically in addition to the main story there are loads of sub stories to do with people around the city, these are usually same one-shot events that involve a fight, or smaller mini game and none of them take too long to complete. The interesting thing about these little substories is that they don't skimp out on the writing, as each one always feels unique and interesting for what it is. These are also often where the insane things you see in Yakuza clips tend to come from, like fighting a bunch of Yakuza in diapers. These side stories tend to be there to add a bit of light hearted humor to contrast the seriousness of the main plot and I couldn't tell you specifically why they do this, but they go a long way to add fun to these games to the point where I even consider the sub stories as main parts of playing through these games.
Then there are side-stories of which there are typically two in each game. These are much bigger mini-games complete with entire archs of storylines that get reveal with each mission. In Kiwami 2 the first game is Majima construction, which acts a sort of tower defense kind of game where you place various employees at points to battle income waves of rival construction forces trying to take your jobs. You can hire people to join you around the city, as well as attract people by winning battles in the mini-game itself. Units can be invested in to level them up and increase ranking to make them more effective in battles. And it's a pretty decent game with a decent story behind it.
The other game is a cabaret game. Where Kiryu becomes the defacto manager of a struggling club and he's gotta turn it into the best club via a secret tournament of cabaret club battles. Basically this game sort of expands on the cabaret club game from Yakuza 0 where you match girls with the best customer to match that customer's taste. While the girl is there you will have to be on top of handling requests they make for the table, which requires you to memorize a small number of hand signals that each correspond to a different need at the table. On top of that you have a limited number of girls and each table requires the girls to be there for a specific number of time, which means that as things ramp up you'll have more tables than girls unless you manage and pay attention to duration of tables (they'll stay either long or short) and plan carefully so that a new table arrives just when another table ends. Oh but there is even more than that, because the girls have stress levels and need to sit idle to reduce this stress as a stressed girl isn't entertaining. This stress increases if you stick a girl with a table that doesn't want her, or specifically requested another one of your girls. Top that off with the tournament taking place where the rival club will do shit to sabotage you, which you'll have to work around. Everything is done in a 3 minute time limit, and the winner is the club that makes the most money within that time frame.
The cabaret game is a lot of fun and I lost hours of playtime to it. The main story isn't all that long so that helps.
All told Kiwami 2 is one of my favorite games to play, but it isn't great in terms of story. Kiwami 2 is a strange set up game which builds up the Omi Alliance but by the end everything gets kind of settled and nothing really sticks for future games. The outcome of this really sets up Diago as Chairman of the tojo in Kiryu's place as Diago is built up to be a much better leader for the clan overall. Diago's position as Tojo Chairman becomes a sticking point in later games.
The next three games in the series are the Playstation 3 era games and this is the hard part....
