Yeah, so stop me if you've heard this one before. When Judgment came out, I bought it and it sat on my shelf until it was time to play for the podcast. I had really good intentions of playing it when it did come out. And I just never got there because I'm a monster and a serial game buyer. But yeah, I have a very similar history with the Yakuza series as Brian does. We've been on a lot of the same podcasts. He probably already knew that. ...
The Cane and Rinse videogame podcast
00:51:53 - 00:52:45
system can really make the game a lot tougher. And maybe we should kind of move on to the combat of the game. Yep, for sure. Talking about it. Um, so James, of course, this is your first time playing a Yakuza style game. Uh, if you play as Yagami, he feels more like on the athletic side of characters, like the likes of Akiyama and that, uh, that one cup from Yakuza four as well, right? A lighter character that, uh, that that's quick on their feet and moves around a lot and does a lot of quick kicks. Akiyama has…
Listen to this moment
00:51:53 - 00:52:45
In Context
... really interesting. It's, it's a very, everything seems very interconnected, but I found that, yeah, if you maybe are not as diligently focused on making money at all times, that whole interconnected system can really make the game a lot tougher. And maybe we should kind of move on to the combat of the game. Yep, for sure. Talking about it. Um, so James, of course, this is your first time playing a Yakuza style game. Uh, if you play as Yagami, he feels more like on the athletic side of characters, like the likes of Akiyama and that, uh, that one cup from Yakuza four as well, right? A lighter character that, uh, that that's quick on their feet and moves around a lot and does a lot of quick kicks. Akiyama has this whole thing of where he can run up on walls. Uh, and also later when you unlock the moves, like run up on, uh, enemies and sort of like, uh, yeah, uh, hop and skip over them and then, you know, link that into a melee attack or a throw or something. So you kind of want to move around with them a whole lot. Um, I was playing on, on base PS4, uh, the, the PS4 disc and, uh, ...
25 more quotes about Yakuza from this episode
01:05:06 - 01:08:01
they at least try out things like that. I also feel this is one of the most accessible entries in the universe because both because it's a fresh start and is comparatively short emphasis on the comparative. So kind of the question I have for you all being people who are much more familiar with the Yakuza series than me is, is this actually a good I know Kiwami or no zero is often listed as no just start at zero mechanically. It's very modern up to date and it's a great place to start for the series. Is judgment…
01:42:44 - 01:45:01
from people involved. It's just what happens. We see the outcome of OK. Before we get on to our summaries, we have one more piece of feedback I'd like to cover, which was from Alex Dohler on Patreon, who says, I think judgment is my favorite Yakuza game. I came to the series relatively late with the release of Yakuza 0 on PS4 and really enjoyed it. ...
01:53:54 - 01:58:22
... Let's see. So last but certainly not least, Leah, would you like to close us out? So sometimes I feel a little disingenuous talking about how much I love the Yakuza series because there are things in it that I don't love. Brian mentioned they don't handle female characters well at all like ever like in any of these games. And I mean, I will readily acknowledge that these games are not perfect. They are also not going to resonate with everyone,
00:39:37 - 00:41:42
Hamura was fantastic. Um, he, he had big, and I'm not sure if Leah and Mikiel will agree with this. He, he had big kuzu energy to me for me, not cause it's zero. Oh, Mikiel hasn't played zero. Excuse me. No, no, that's the one I can tell you completely, which, which automatically drew me to him. Cause kuzu is one of my favorite characters in Yakuza zero, but um, but he's a real bad guy, you know, but he's just such a good, such a well realized bad guy. And I felt very similarly about Hamura this time. And a lot…
00:03:47 - 00:04:55
... So Ryu Gagotoku Studio, RGG Studio, also known as or also abbreviated to, they are fair to say predominantly known for the Yakuza game series. Again, Yakuza, the name in the West, by and large, Ryu Gagotoku is the name of the game in Japan, like a dragon being the translation from that. So again, you might have heard of like a dragon or a Yakuza. ...
01:13:49 - 01:16:00
... No, um, no, the, the, the reality is, is that, um, like these, this sequence in when it happened in this game, I automatically went to my Yakuza place is like, wow, this is meant to make me feel uncomfortable. And somehow they misunderstand women again in this series. Like it's okay, guys. She's totally into it. And, and it just, it's one of those sections that, and, and, and there's a, in my opinion, for, for my, only my opinion, there, there's a, a worst section involving her that we'll talk about up in a…
00:08:24 - 00:09:20
go through and I'll save myself for last because I'm going to have not that much to say about my history with the game, I don't think, but I'm sure the three of you do. So Brian, would you like to kick us off with how you came to play this game? Sure. My history with the Yakuza franchise has been, I've said that here multiple times, but I was particularly excited for Judgment because Judgment would have been the first new release from RGG since I had gotten into the Yakuza franchise. So I was pretty pumped for…
01:49:46 - 01:51:38
to me, even looking at the extended period of time that I've played this game over. But I also have my particular hang-ups about it and maybe the sort of tougher combat I would have enjoyed if the underlying systems were more like that of anything leading up to Yakuza 6, which always just when I put these side-by-side now, this Yakuza 6 and the games that came before it, just had a more precise and a more snappy feel overall in the combat. A more exacting positioning than the sort of more wildly running about to…
01:24:34 - 01:25:13
he's done it. He's done it. You know, like it's a, it's a real, like a, this illusion of, of what's possible, you know, kind of guided by emotion as opposed to the facts and the reality of it. And, and the fact that we're talking about this story in a game with a character named Ask Ketchum is why Yakuza is like on kind of unlike anything else, right? Because like in conclusion, Yakuza, but they get like, but I mean, but this is like, like these layers to this, to this, to this conspiracy and cover up and who's…
00:31:10 - 00:31:55
with a, an English dub or a translation on often it's kind of been missed because of the way the games were released and because of the need to, to have a, uh, a cheaper way of porting them and getting them over into other territories. Um, I believe I'm right in saying this is the first of RGG studios games since the original Yakuza in the Yakuza series. Um, the exception to that is fist of the north star, which is obviously not in the series, but is a game they made there in the very first Yakuza on PS2, it had…
00:17:47 - 00:18:51
relevant are playing Shenmue and Shenmue 2 back in back probably around that 15 years ago mark, to be honest. And hearing that, at that time, that series kind of gone left behind finished, but maybe Yakuza was where a lot of people were getting their sort of Shenmue fix from. And I hear that sort of like when I hear people talk about that tends to be pendulum swing, some people will say yes, that's the case, others will then kind of push back quite hard against that and say that they are very different games,…
00:22:09 - 00:22:52
... And the first piece of feedback we have was from Patreon. It's from Veronica Jane who says, "Yakuza Kiwami was my first introduction to Yakuza/Like A Dragon, but Judgment is the game that made me go, 'Okay, I actually need to track down and play everything else in this series.' What's the one thing better than being a hard fighting ex-Yakuza boss with a heart of gold?" Being a broke ass hard fighting ex-lawyer detective with a heart of gold. Just don't think too hard about the age difference between Yagami and…
01:09:51 - 01:10:56
a narrative through line that doesn't have any crazy thing in it that makes me go like and like there's no no maybe some of the double switches that we see kind of the end of some of the other games. Like this game is that this game story is relatively reserved in the context of Yakuza games. So I'm just saying that I'm laughing because you're right. I know I would have I would have to like sit down with like a chart to say if I would if I think this is like the most in that direction or the least maybe. But…
00:34:22 - 00:34:55
... But then, um, Velkir chronicles has more of a European kind of setting. So I was leaning more towards the English voice up there here. For some, like for the Yakuza series in particular, like I couldn't play Yakuza game in English because that's not Kirikou. I, I, I would have a problem doing that specifically. I, I'm sure that the, uh, the English dub in, um, in judgment is good. And if I played that, I wouldn't have that kind of, um, uh, weird feeling because it's not characters I'm already familiar with, but,…
01:28:32 - 01:29:07
little and I suppose they are since the next game involves being a high seas pirate. That's, that's in reference to a game that was released in February of this year. But yeah, it speaks to the breadth of Yakuza related spinoffs and games and how far they're willing to kind of push that stuff. Yeah, so that kind of leads us into talking about what I think probably are kind of, is kind of the backbone of, of this game, which is the immense cast of characters. ...
01:38:10 - 01:38:45
Like he is that character. He's going to, to, to, to ring all of those bells. I think they do a pretty decent job actually of showing why he ended up going to those lengths, why he ended up crossing those lines that even other Yakuza, even members of his clan, certainly Yagami and Kaito don't think he should have gone that far. But you see that he was just trying to hold the family together. They give him that motivation. They, they obviously go some way towards a redemption for him. And I think it worked pretty…
00:36:11 - 00:36:45
say. And so I'd be more comfortable doing that. And for some reason, this game probably should have fallen into the former category, but I started with the English dub and was, was happy with what I was hearing, was never kind of taken out of it. Again, I think, um, like you said, Leah, if I had been used to playing the Yakuza games in Japanese would have kind of made sense to carry on doing that with this one, but that's not a history that I have with these. So, um, from my point of view, I really liked, uh, a…
00:49:37 - 00:50:11
can imagine. Yeah. Yeah. And so I'll also say that there is a, um, if you have, if you are playing on console, at least I don't, I don't know if, um, this is the same for PC or not, but if you have any Yakuza saves on your console, you get some bonuses, one of which is cash. So it's, it's, uh, I just looked it up because I couldn't remember how much it was. It's 50,000 yen, which, um, you know, is not late game. That's decent. Yeah. It's not late game that much, but if you are just starting out, like you're…
01:46:26 - 01:47:01
not not doing this stuff not getting involved. And that's that's probably sadly enough to make me think, you know what, I'm probably not going to play the sequel and I'm probably not going to start playing Yakuza games because it felt like a lot of distraction and stuff that I wasn't interested in doing now having said that I completely get why that stuff's in there. It makes a great distraction from a pretty intense story. And it gives people who want to be able to do that loads of extra stuff to do as Brian,…
00:26:50 - 00:27:23
... And especially, I mean, it's becoming more common, but I mean, this was 2018. So like they maybe didn't have this all locked down quite yet. But I think that the Yakuza series as a whole does a pretty good job with this, especially as the games have gone on. And this is a good example of that. The character animations and like the facial detail and like the body detail on all of the main characters in these games has been some of the most impressive stuff I've seen in video games, like full stop, like it's just,…
00:43:33 - 00:44:07
reputation is through your friendship stuff. Um, so they're, they're connected at the very least. Um, so you, um, and I actually, this is, um, it's kind of different from the way that the Yakuza games up to this point have done their side mission stuff. Um, and it's, uh, I, I liked it. I, I thought that it was kind of, I did not, I think there's 50 different, um, characters that you can make friends with. And I did not get all of them. Um, if I had not been playing up against the time limit, I probably would…
00:46:15 - 00:46:47
... I maybe did once, but, um, but yeah, I, I was not crazy about the drone races. That was not really my thing, which is a shame because the slot car races in Yakuza, I got very into, but, um, yeah, I dunno, I dunno why not, why not drones, but, uh, yeah, I, I did think that the, uh, that the board game thing was kind of neat though. I, like, I didn't, it was all right. I played a couple of times to win some stuff, but that, that ends up being kind of your primary way of getting money in the end game because you…
01:30:43 - 01:31:19
I think he's great. He's, he is clearly kind of a, like a riff on Kiryu almost, but, but yeah, he, I, he's, he's just a loyal, nice dude, even though he's, you know, obviously a Yaku, an ex Yakuza. And yeah, he, he fits into the story very well as Yagami's kind of. And where Kiryu wears a permanent frown. Yeah. Kaito almost wears a permanent smile. ...
00:06:16 - 00:06:50
by platform. It's just that's the overall average and Metacritic's sort of headline number is 80. So we're not tickling top of the year's sort of gaming reviews, but strong. I think it's fair to say that feels to me like about where Yakuza games net out as well. I didn't go and review all of those beforehand, but I think that probably is in line with the series to some extent. User reviews, I would argue probably slightly higher even. ...
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