i actually got women

Now I know this game has had a lot of controversies surrounding it, and while they shouldn't be ignored, and the people at SEGA and RGG Studio deserve most, if not all, of the backlash for it, this review is not about that but more focused on the game itself. And note this is at least only for Kiwami 3, not dark ties. Got to spend a couple hundred hours to 100% the main game first!

Spoiler Free Review For the Kiwami 3 Side. This Is coming from someone who has obtained all possible achievements from this half of the game and it took me around 35 Hrs: Lots of side content that personally feels like it's just there to bloat playtime. The points needed to buy upgrades should have made the minigames and side content optional. But now you have to do some in order to get stronger, which sucks. Combat personally feels mixed coming off Kiwami 2. And every enemy has a MAX of two health bars. They just give them more defense, so your damage is always inconsistent. And do note it crashed once for me at the finale so there could be a chance for some technical issues.


Spoiler warning from here on out, so if you still want to play Yakuza Kiwami 3, then don't read past here.

EDIT1: Later on into chapter 2.

EDIT2: Post-game after beating Jo Amon.

Now onto the actual review: As a new fan of the Yakuza series and as someone who hasn't played the original Yakuza 3 and tries to 100% the games. But so far in my 7-hour playthrough, I keep asking myself, "𝘸𝘩𝘺 𝘥𝘰𝘯'𝘵 𝘐 𝘫𝘶𝘴𝘵 𝘥𝘰𝘸𝘯𝘭𝘰𝘢𝘥 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘰𝘳𝘪𝘨𝘪𝘯𝘢𝘭 𝘺𝘢𝘬𝘶𝘻𝘢 3?" The game only has 31 substories in it, which feels insane compared to the original that has 101. The Kiwami games are supposed to add content to the game while keeping the original story intact, making it the "definitive" version of the game to play. And speaking about keeping the story intact. The fact they changed the ending of the game while delisting the original Yakuza 3 is such a greedy corporate decision. It's like they know the original is better, and that's why they are putting it behind the bundle now so new players have to play this garbage game (well, subjectively garbage; there is worse out there, but in terms of a Yakuza game, this is close to the bottom of the barrel).

The upgrades just seem annoying to get, and that's coming from a completist. Comparing this to Kiwami 2 (since it's the last game I played and they are both remakes on the Dragon Engine), the upgrades make you go out of your way to do side content that in probably every other game is not needed for progression. And I'm not sure if you have to do every task to upgrade yourself fully, but the amount you have to do is crazy. Especially as you weed out all the easy tasks and the upgrades require more points. It wouldn't even surprise me if you need to complete the "training journal" or whatever it's called to max yourself out since the game feels like it just wants you to waste your time, which kind of sucks as it just makes me want to play a different game in the franchise or even just the older game in general. And for the "extreme" remake of Yakuza 3, it seems counterintuitive since this is clearly the version of the game they want you to play. (Maybe with all the time you'll waste, you will cross over the two-hour mark, so they keep the sale.)

EDIT1: Played further ahead into chapter 2 and unlocked and finished the training (yes, it was hell doing the final exam this early without many upgrades, but it's funny having tiger drop this early), and it helps a little bit. The moves you learn are a bit meh, and the lessons themselves are okay, but the number of points you can get is very nice. Still nowhere close to enough to obtain the full skill tree, and you still need to do side content to fully finish the skill tree and training dojo, but at least it makes it so I'm less likely to play mahjong! (Edit 2: It stayed like this till the end. You will need around 30K points if I recall correctly to max yourself out.

Combat-wise, to me it's just meh. I have not played Lost Judgment yet, which people say is on par with or even better than 0's combat, so I don't know the best the franchise has to offer. Yet it just feels bland to me. The 2 heat bars make it feel like the heat moves are being left behind and slowly phased out, with LAD:PYIH apparently only having 1 heat bar. There feel like there are few heat moves in general, especially compared to the other games where you had loads unlocked from the start. And I'm not a fan of being warned when I'm going to get shot by some dude, as it makes the gun guys feel pointless since I know when they will attack.

EDIT 1: The biker gang is alright, but I feel like it will become annoying to grind. It just feels like repetitive long battles, and as of chapter 2, it seems like it's going to be the main way to get money, which in turn means stat upgrades. Still need to play more of it fully to give an actual meaningful take of it as of right now. It's meh. *The colosseum is the money maker in this; this complaint came from trying to max my stats as early as possible.

EDIT 2: As I said before, every boss enemy that you will encounter will have a max of two health bars. The final boss of the Heisei Girls storyline has two health bars, and even Mine has two health bars. Hell, even Jo Amon has two health bars. So what they do instead is they increase some sort of defense stat, making it so that you will have to hit them more to deal more damage. This personally caused for me a great sense of inconsistency between bosses. Sometimes I would obliterate them in a minute, and then in the later game it would take an insane amount of time. I know this seems like a small non-issue to some people, and admittedly, I can agree to some extent, but my problem lies with the fact that practically every game before it has had more than two health bars. Hell, even Yakuza 3 had three health bars for mine after looking up the fight. It makes no sense why they made this decision, but it just annoyed me personally and could annoy others as well.

Won't really make a point on the story. Might do it once I progress more, but it just sucks that they change the ending so that mine doesn't die and just vanishes (thanks, TikTok, for spoiling that; at least I know the ending is going to be trash). Why change the story to an already existing game? It is already baffling to me. Yea, some people may not have liked 3's story, but why change it in such a way that even more people would hate it?

Also don't buy the deluxe DLC or any DLC for that matter. Basically all just cosmetics or OP characters. Which the characters might help you sludge through this game faster.

EDIT2: Beat the storyline, and yeah, they were fine. According to a friend who also bought this game (may God rest his wallet), the storyline is still baby easy, which is no surprise considering how easy this game's combat is.

Overall I greatly don't recommend the YAKUZA KIWAMI 3 side of the game. And I can't even suggest getting the old version unless you want to buy a bundle. The best thing to do is either buy a physical copy of the old game or emulate it. This is not worth the money when you're just playing the shell of an already existing game.

Also, it sucks how they announced they're not going to make any more Kiwami games. If done right, they are amazing remakes of older games that can benefit from the modern engine and technology. Imagine a Kiwami 0 or a remake of your favorite PS3 game. Reoiled and repainted for a modern audience while still having that classic feel of the thing you loved. If only they still cared about the franchise.

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Dark Ties

I ran out of words for dark ties so I'm going to leave this. Story is strong is some places. Decent ending. Combat alright. It's short. upgrades locked by chores. Still not worth the price. Leave it.