Yakuza 5

Game Title: Yakuza 5
Released: January 28, 2021
Game Length: 66 Hours
Grade: B+

Five Times the Fun

Five Characters: If they managed to pair up four people for Yakuza 4, then surely they can follow the trend and squeeze in a fifth member for Yakuza 5. The thing you should know before starting this version is that this game is massive. Ask any number of people who have played it and there is a good chance they will mention how long it took them to complete the game. There are 4 chapters in each of the 4 parts of the story and the finale. I played a total of 91 hours and even then I only managed to come out with a 54% completion rate. Imagine what it would have taken me if I decided to hammer out everything on the completion list. The game retains three characters from the previous one - Kiryu, Saejima, and Akiyama. There is a fourth story revolving around Haruka's rise to stardom, and the fifth person up to the plate is a professional batter by the name of Shinada. The game segments each character in a way where you must start each person from scratch without sharing things with each member. This includes weapons, armor, equipment, levels, abilities, cash, and training.

Five Cities: Before you advance the fourth chapter from each part into the next segment, it is a good idea to make sure you complete everything that is available to the character you are currently using. Not only does each character have their own set of substories to explore self-contained in their own area, but no other character is able to access parts of the city they are in. So you will only be able to have Kiryu to visit Nagasugai, Fukuoka, Saejima in Tsukimino, Sapporo, and Shinada in Kineicho, Nagoya. There is this weird shared system when it comes to Haruka and Akiyama in Sotenbori, Osaka. There will be multiple opportunities to explore Kamurocho, Tokyo with all five members (although only the four bros will be able to be switched before the conclusion). This means that you should fulfill the wishes of the real-life traveling chef named Tatsuya Kawagoe by picking out three pre-determined restaurants to unlock the ability to gain a second health bar with added buffs whenever you chow down at any of the 568 food items available on the food menu. That alone is an undertaking. Considering I only ate when I needed to, there were only 137 food items marked off my list. Don't forget to snap 5 photographs of important landmarks around the city for the busy tourists. A large "Photograph" prompt will appear on the screen to let you know when to use your camera.

Global Circumstances

Abilities: While playing through each of the five members of this game, you will come across systems that parallel among all of them. For example, when it comes to gaining a Revelation like in Yakuza 4, you must fulfill one substory and then you can "Look" at a specific event and automatically learn a new ability once posting about it on Mack's blog. This can occur only once for each person. Sadly, Kiryu's revelation is probably the most disgusting revelation I have seen yet. Another thing you should do is invest some money in the IF-8 project. This will allow each person to participate in a virtual 2D street battle where enemies appear on the screen as giant face-less mannequins in two cities, one for their set city and a collective boss fight in Kamurocho. This will increase your heat gauge.

There is also one giant notice you should be aware of while playing the game: You can only reach level 20 in your primary city. You will not be able to learn all your abilities until the finale. For some odd reason, they forced everyone's hand by initializing this "breakthrough" system when Kiryu meets his old master in Kamurocho. Once the Dojo opens, each person can participate in an excruciating difficult fight with both Komakis. The only way I managed to complete the fight was to go in Saejima-style with 8 pistols and shoot down the martial artists. Once you do this with each character, you can then finish leveling them up to 25. Yes, even Haruka will learn something from initializing a dance battle with the old master.

Weapon Dealer: Weapons can be fun. Weapons can be deadly. Weapons can get expensive. The thing about Kamiyama Works is that you have to invest a set amount of cash to unlock tiers of weapons. Not only that, but you also have to level up your weapon skill for each character (except Haruka who cannot wield weapons) in order to use weapons . If all the stars on a weapon are filled, then you are able to use it. Oh, but we are not done! You also have to invest items to unlock certain types. The only way to know what you need is to look at the empty list from the weapon dealer. The second part is figuring out where to get these items. Most of these items will naturally fall in your lap if you do missions, substories, or collect sparkles in each city.

Sometimes the system fools you by requiring a previously tiered weapon. The worst offender in this case involves the series of swords when you exchange Nameless Katana for a Sakura Storm, which is required for Photon MG, then morphs into the Photon PG, and finally provides you with the Dragon Slayer. Total cost: 291,000 yen. Invest that along with 80,000 yen and out pops the Modified Dragon Slayer. The good news is when it comes to repairing them, most weapons are relatively cheap usually costing around 2,000 to 20,000 yen price range. The bad news is that the repair bill is the same regardless of whether you used the item once or thirty times.

Weapons: There's quite a bit of new things to learn when it comes to weapons. Don't expect to get anything past weapon rank 5 by the time you reach level 20 on any character. Certain weapons can have special abilities, like how the spicy knife or spatula can instantly ignite people or how the warning sign provides you two hits that deal 99 damage per swing. Use the right non-equippable weapons and a quick slide of your mean eyes across the screen indicates you discovered one of 3 Weapon Revelations. Although you won't find many enemies using weapons, you can "store" what they have by pressing the Right Trigger once it is in your hand.

Each playable character has a unique way to attack people, so experiment between standard, heavy, and special attacks. One good change from Yakuza 5 predecessor is how durability doesn't immediately go down 10 points when pressing the circle button on your controller. One point from durability gets subtracted from your weapon only if it comes in contact with someone. There's also oodles of fun heat moves to check out. Just watch this video and you'll see yourself slicing through 4 enemies at once (6:52), riding a bicycle up a guy (8:43), or sticking two guys together with superglue (8:54). One last thing - you are unable to buy weapons if someone is following you around, so ditch the escort before approaching Kamiyama Works.

Trainers: There is a specific trainer for each person to visit for new abilities. Kiryu must fight with Sosuke Komaki, the grandson of his original master. He is incredibly difficult to fight with his ability to turn invulnerable for a few seconds unless you have some nice weapons on hand. Saejima fights some mystical sage of the mountain named Tendo. It was incredibly difficult to figure out what I needed to donate to the shrine to trigger his encounters. For example, "something gorgeous" was referencing a gold plate. Haruka learns how to be beautiful from Yoko. Finding out why your costume change is so hideous compared to your original outfit makes so much more sense when you learn everything you can from him/her. Akiyama visits his old pal Saigo from Yakuza 4 and re-learns urban warfare. This can be quite humorous when you find out that the hair on his head is a wig you can knock off during combat. He will panic and attempt to retrieve it off the ground. As an added bonus, using guns during his suicidal training will increase your weapon level. Ayanokoji will teach Shinada abilities only when Shinada gives him some advice on how to get a date first by changing his appearance, style, and attitude. No surprise his date was just using him. He reverts back to his normal self in the end.

Cabaret Club

Setup: The entire concept of hanging out with a girl at the club has been completely revolutionized. For starters, you must visit the designated Men's Entertainment Booth (MEB) before entering a Cabaret Club. The man there will take you out on a little stroll while giving you some intel regarding the woman you are about to be paired with. After learning about all the useless facts like the woman's blood type and what month they were born in, the greeter at the door will seat you at a nearby booth with the lady. Instead of wearing a spectacular outfit with some nice jewelry that woos the gal in previous renditions, you should check to see if you have some nice cologne "equipped" on your person. Don't wear anything else! Even a locker key detector is considered repulsive to your hostess. Because the game uncaringly defaults to the most expensive drink first, scroll down past the Champagne Tower and order whatever cheap drink you fancy. I highly recommend ordering the Gacha Drink for one of several useful things you can use like french cologne for the man who came in empty-handed, mystery stones to build the rarest weapons, or a platinum membership card that gives you a discount on the cover charge if you are scrapped for cash.

Choices: The fun part comes when the game offers you a chance to decide on where the conversation goes next. You can sit back and order some food, maybe even watch it be fed to you. There's plenty of things to talk about around town, or you can ask her a series of questions. Some gals will be happy to receive a present or be asked out on a date. The difference here is that most of these conversations can branch in many different ways. You might be prompted to ask about her "likes" to which you would need to specify whether you meant food, hobbies, or maybe even a television program. Gossiping can be enlightening or backfire if it doesn't cater to the gal's interests. The hostess will provide you with a series of "story" conversations, but these are all limited in scope. Some chatting moments require you to reach a certain relationship level, while other topics will only be mentioned once. I have had these type of conversations repeat for every girl! Breaks the immersion quite a bit if you ask me. Unfortunately because of the culture, most of the conversations will end up including something about arranged marriages, the girl's age, and their dialect. These girls are sensitive about those type of things.

Outside the Club: Things get really interested if the hostess accepts your proposal to a night out on the town. Instead of being offered a list of things to do, you will now be able to walk with her, even hold her hand, to wherever you want to go. Be careful because you can still get into fights as you wander around. This might all sound familiar because it is exactly like Haruka's Trust mechanism that was implemented in the Yakuza Kiwami 2 game. She will keep up with you if you run and no longer shout at you if you get too far ahead. As with any escort, a yellow marker will show her location on the mini-map. If you run by a gaming establishment, she will want to play a game with you. A restaurant might make her hungry. If she sees the Le Marche billboard, you can guarantee your wallet will be of great use to her. Talking with her at any time will provide you with the option to end the date. There is just one problem I have to bring up here. Your relationship bar will "halt" two times: maximum of Rank C and Rank A. You will then need to run around a lot before receiving the girl's phone call inviting you to her story event before your relationship bar can increase again. Do it right and you will be presented with "the truth" of the girl's situation. I'll let you know ahead of time - it generally isn't pretty. There is a huge issue with the camera shaking all over the place while zoomed in on your gal too.

Part 1: Kazuma Kiryu

Job: To help support all the kids from the orphanage, Kiryu decides to hide his yakuza ties by changing his name and applying for a job in another city. So out of all the things to do, he decides to become a... Taxi Driver. Now this might sound boring at first, but there is a lot more to this section of the game than you think. There are actually three different parts. The first part involves the standard Taxi Missions where you take a customer from point A to point B while following all the guidelines from your boss. This includes waiting at stop lights, avoiding pedestrians, flashing your turn signal with the directional pad, coming to a complete stop at stop signs, and conversing with your passenger. Yes, you can honk your horn too. Make sure you drive on the left side of the street and avoid bumping into boundaries! The other half of the missions are completely conversational missions where you only have to worry about what to say to the passenger in a friendly chat on the way to their destination.

Once you do a series of missions, you are able to trick out your car with all kinds of fun upgrades including tires, color schemes, pattern designs, and throw on some famous tunes from Sega's own library of video arcade games like Magical Sound Shower from OutRun or Let's Go Away from Daytona. These cosmetic changes to your Taxi will be shown during the main campaign. When you are ready, you can take on the main missions in a race on the highway in Need for Speed fashion without ever worrying about repairing damage to your car no matter how many times you smash against the wall... or other moving objects that get in your way. Once you complete a mission, make sure you visit the ATM to withdraw your pay. If you ever fail a mission, you will be able to retry it or purposely end it if you wish - I'm looking at you "Tail that Car" mission.

Bonus: Did you ever wonder what it takes to run a food stand? Kiryu gets recruited to cook Tatsuya Noodles for a large crowd of people. All you must do is "serve" the noodles at the right temperature. This is pretty easy at first when you only have to focus on one customer at a time. Things can get a bit tense when you have four people all yelling for their order at the same time.

Sparkles: Remember when you went around Kamurocho and picked up trash in Yakuza 4? Well for some reason, Kiryu will be assigned to help out the community this time by picking up little sparkles all around town. You will have more than enough to complete the task at hand since these things are everywhere! Sadly, you won't get any rewards for picking up more than the satisfactory level. And the rewards you do get aren't that exciting either.

Hostess: The first cabaret girl you meet goes by the name of Riku. She seemed pretty interesting to talk to despite being so energetic and impulsive. All of her discussion points were positive, and the hostess definitely took an interest in whatever Kiryu had to say. Her goal is to start some sort of western-style restaurant business serving beef stew with her future husband. However, she does have a tendency to be annoyed over silly matters. There was one time where I chose not to respond to her sigh. Yeah, I guess the game didn't like that since I was thrown into a perpetual loop until I asked what was wrong.

Substories: The most important substory you should do here revolves around an eerily similar story from Yakuza Kiwami. Help out a little girl protecting a hurt puppy and you will be given Beads of Good Fortune. This lovely item will remove all encounters from the city and can be used for other characters when you are able to switch in the final part of the game. But make sure you do enough to level up your character and beat down three Victory Road Qualifier bosses before wearing such a powerful accessory to later enroll Kiryu to matches in the Coliseum. Other stories include dealing with Yuya's midlife crisis, hauling a food cart across town, starring in another play, and being dragged into another mixer. I only managed to get 3 out of 5 complex college questions answered in that one particular substory. You can be nice and send money to the kids through the ATM but please do be aware that you don't exactly get anything in return no matter how much you donate to the orphanage.

Suggested Mini-Games: I would have suggested going to the Pachinko Parlor if it had one. If you recall from my previous post, Sega removed it from the PC Remastered Edition. Instead, the only thing you can do in this boring town is visit Bee (yes that is the name of the place) and play a round of Darts. Throwing darts has been made much easier than the previous games and you are given the added bonus of customizing your own throwing device with their own set of bonus stats. These darts can later be used by other characters as well.

Part 2: Taiga Saejima

Job: Saejima will go through the entire song-and-dance sequence of breaking out of prison all over again like he did in Yakuza 4. The difference this time around is that you will end up taking a little detour on your thrilling ride through the snow, pick a fight with a legendary bear, and be rescued by some mysterious hunter that has been ostracized by the local village. Yes, this is perhaps the first time you actually see it snow in a Yakuza game! In order to survive through the blizzard that has trapped you inside this little community, Saejima will have to become a winter hunter to track down food from the mountain. Although it doesn't take long to explore the entire area up the mountain, there will be a number of missions that will require the help of your sorry muscles to trek up the same path several times. Instead of using the standard weapon system, you go out with a rifle and fire two rounds into the wild before needing to reload. These exhibitions can take between 10 to 45 minutes depending on how many animals you want to trap or shoot at before hauling your frozen butt back down. One good caveat of the whole thing is that you can actually earn quite a bit of yen trading what you get to the local supplier.

Story: Saejima's story consists of several different locations. He'll start with a little chat with Majima inside Kamurocho. Don't bother trying to do anything since most of the stores will be "closed for cleaning." There's some weird development that occurs between you and your roommates. One of them will create these virtual imagination sequences where you attend a Cabaret Club and fight off some Chinese Mafia. You escape and find yourself trapped in a village in the mountains. Then eventually you make it to "the city that snows" as I like to call it. There is this brief sequence where you get to dress-up in a Santa or Detective outfit. You find out why Baba has been so distant to you lately. You don't have to worry about the police chasing you down. A small five-second cutscene plays out with Saejima carefully walking around them. The game doesn't play fair when you are forced to win a pool match or pay 50,000 yen. Of course I paid the money. Then there is that weird question from the Ministry of Health regarding how many homeless people there were in 2012 (which I found out later gets answered by a guy down the street). Then when you get around to seeing Saejima's extra abilities, you wouldn't want to switch to any other character. On top of not being interrupted while in heat mode, Saejima also gains a dragon ability to smash the ground like the Hulk and tear down giant poles within the environment. So awesome.

Hostess: Saejima's first experience with Kaguya is an interesting one. It starts with you using your imagination for a fellow inmate as he tells you his experience going in with 10 million yen. None of this contributes to the actual event. So go wild in using your imaginary money on the Champagne Tower and take your gal out on a date as soon as possible. When you are able to meet her in real life, you'll have to come to terms to the ditzy "old" lady who complains about being old (despite being only 26 years old), over-indulges on way too many things for one person, and is worried about being stuck in an arranged marriage. When it comes to story time, you find out she lies about her age to get an audition, forgets what time it is, and manipulates Saejima into staying with her after-the-fact. If it was me, she would definitely be considered a liability I'd not so easily forgive.

Bonus: A guy up by the snow sculptures will recruit Saejima for Winter Combat. Yes, you will be throwing snowballs at other people arena-style. The fun part about this is its setup as a FPS. Snowballs can be picked up at the corners of the arena and thrown at anyone. You earn points for hitting a target and lose points if you are hit. There's a few extended abilities like throwing all your snowballs at one time or rolling your body across the snow. It starts off pretty easy when its 1v1 and gets more difficult when its a Free-for-All between 4 people.

Sparkles: This time around you get to pick-up map fragments. You can collect five pieces of any one map in order to receive a picture of where the item can be found. It is kind of ironic that I collected 20 pieces without ever completing one treasure map. They give off some pretty snazzy weapons like Super Spicy Knife, Wolf Maw, and Purgatory Rod.

Substories: There is one interesting story where you face-off against some "Santa Hunters" while wearing a full-blown Santa outfit. There was a very difficult one where you have to answer a series of questions about how the snow sculptures are faced out in the field. The rest of them are pretty standard. You get a repeat of the Little Match Girl, try out an experimental warmer, and fight a bear loose from the zoo.

Part 3: Haruka Sawamura

Main Story: When the story first introduces a lady that is interested in training 15 year-old Haruka as some sort of idol prodigy, I knew I wasn't going to like it. I fail to see how both Kiryu and Haruka could agree to this, but that might be my personal bias talking. I don't approve of the strict regimen these people enforce on young girls just to act innocent and cute in front of a live audience. A lady shouldn't be showy, dance around like some sort of praised singer, and pretend to be having fun. I think Persona 4 represented this best by showing how emotionally drained Rise Kujikawa was from being in the spotlight all the time. To add insult to injury, you must compete with two teenage girls who develop "punchable faces" as they try to stir up teenage drama in the Princess League competition. It reminds me of the ridiculousness of the movie Step Up.

Due to her physique and age, you won't be able to play baseball, go into cabaret clubs, or drink alcohol. Instead, you participate in dance battles with the local kids and handshake events for your agency. Then there is the matter with her wardrobe I'd like to discuss. Her original outfit was ok, but what she changes into mid-way through the concert is horrendous. There comes a point where you think you might be able to wear clothes when you go shopping with your mentor, but you don't end up wearing them in the end. Of course if I ignored all the negative points above, I must say that I enjoyed Haruka's job system and how she reacted as things unfolded during story events.

Job: Haruka is a 16 year-old girl whose so purpose in life is to become a pop idol star. I'm going to tell you right now that there is a ton of things you can do. There is a "schedule" task board that has story missions where you simply watch events unfold or compete in the Princess League, publicity events where you build-up your fan base by dancing or shaking people's hands, press events that poses all sorts of questions for fun, TV for general city activities, and side missions that increase your overall agency level. Some of the TV Events don't feel like something that would be interesting to do at first, but they can be very rewarding if you manage to succeed (sometimes giving you 30,000 yen). The "Fishing Show" actually provides you with one of each individual type of bait to use.

Unfortunately, there are a lot of questionable events that I avoided like the Air Hockey event where you stare at your opponents breast like the Ping Pong mini-game from Yakuza 4, the gossip article that is merely out to smear your name through the mud, and the pool event since there is no way I'd be able to pull that off a win on a live video stream. The UFO Catcher event was fun, but I didn't get to keep what I managed to claw up out of the machine. Make sure to visit the ATM to withdraw your pay.

Bonus: There will be a sad man who loses his counterpart in a Comedy Team bit. Since you are the closest person, he chooses you to join him for three separate sessions. I must tell you in advance that this mini-game is extremely difficult. Lots of people have given up on this part of the game. Not only do you have to come up with the correct retort to whatever the comedian says, but you also need to reply at the right time. Considering that the reward is rather weak, I suggest giving the first session three tries before moving on to something else.

Sparkles: Without the ability to use or exchange weapons, I wondered if it was wise to collect the locker keys scattered all over town. I can honestly say that I am glad I checked the guide for this gal. It is safe to collect locker keys since they are shared with all characters. It is actually more beneficial to do this with Haruka since her inventory and collected yen will not be provided to the other characters in the finale. This means don't open the locker cabinets. So go all out spending 70,000 yen on that locker key detector from the Pawn Shop and go search for them without worrying about thugs stopping you at every corner. Invest your spare cash into the IF8 machine or buying up those ridiculous food items that can cost you up to 30,000 yen.

Substories: What's funny about Haruka's substories is that the majority of them relate to other events. So there will be a few related to how Haruka doesn't have any friends in school. There's a fun little grammar event that a hostess recalls later on from the Cabaret Club that Akiyama visits. The Gourmet Reporter will ask you to tell him how some food tastes on camera. A takoyaki stand recruits her for a handshake event. The "female" IF8 machine is a hoot since it allows Haruka to use her magic wand to smack or shoot missiles at enemies while forming a magic barrier when hit. As much as I think most of Haruka's encounters are pretty entertaining, there are a few that were kind of bewildering. There is a time where a bunch of fans will want you to autograph their name correctly on a picture of you. There's this weird event where you must track down a paparazzi in first-person mode. Let's not forget how ridiculously wrong it was with that one conversation with the plump girl on the bridge. Watching the revelation moment afterwards didn't make things any better either.

Part 3 1/2: Shun Akiyama

Unique Situation: The problem with Akiyama is that he barely has anything going for him. He's supposed to be some high-dollar moneylender, but you can barely scrounge up a few thousand yen to your name. It isn't like he has some important job to attend to as he lounges around on those office couches of his. So the only thing you can do is open up those lockers using the keys Haruka found and hope for the best as you move around the city completing your normal activities. Because Akiyama's contribution to the story is limited, there isn't going to be much to worry about except fighting a man the size of a giant boar with only the items you retrieved from the locker compartments.

Hostess: If you do end up with a little bit of cash before completing Part 3 (perhaps while fishing), Akiyama can visit Honoka at the Carabet Club. She is a well-rounded individual who tries very hard to be a newscaster. The problem is that everything about her isn't really that cute. She establishes a unique flair from the bush style of her hair, believing that a person's blood type determines one's personality, and has a problem when it comes to keeping her accent in check. Although she works very hard for a 21-year-old, it becomes abundantly clear that the girl didn't really interest me.

Substories: There's a couple rewards that I suggest grabbing from places around town. You get Fitness Gear from learning how to haggle from a crazy old woman and you get a buff to fishing through the Angler's Hook that you get from the man on the bridge. Otherwise, there are plenty of casino cheat items you can earn. Sadly, you won't be able to use any of them until you unlock the casino in the final area. There are a couple of fun substories where you try to outperform someone in a dance battle. The one substory that negatively stood out to me was the character by the name of Maya role playing as a princess from Strawberry Kingdom. My first complaint was that limiting your time to read and choose a certain cue card in just 5 seconds was way too fast for me, especially since I was ill-prepared going in. My second complaint contributed to how the moral of the story in the end was to endure doing something you don't want to do when it comes to bringing joy to others. That is not how I wanted it to go.

Part 4: Tatsuo Shinada

Story: I love Shinada's character. He has a passion about baseball and a "civilian" approach to life. He gives a compelling introduction to the series. The thing I don't like is how he became this sleazy rapscallion who has debt up to his eyeballs. He barely makes it through life writing up questionable articles about women in the adult industry. He has a very brass attitude that I find appalling. However, the crux of the story really isn't about him... at least not on a personal level. Part 4 was all about the people that helped him get through life on a daily basis.

Because he is a completely new character to the Yakuza series, the developers established a whole new battle style with mixed results. He grabs people differently than any other character and establishes dominance with the help of his unique weapon-fighting style. The biggest change is how much he benefits from using weapons. He'll gain a few weak weapons that never break and strike enemies a few more times while swinging around long cylindrical objects. He will gain abilities that increase weapon durability and unique heat moves like his "dragon whirlwind" with spears. Though it seems that he carries a certain "respect" for bats. Anytime I tried picking up a bat to use, he'd shake his head and put it back down on the ground (which causes it to disappear from the area).

Job: Shinada is a new character who is living through some hard times. He lost his professional batting privileges and has been reduced to writing up articles. Thankfully, he can still earn a bit of yen challenging people over at the Batting Cage. This mini-game is structured very similar to how it played in the previous games with one major difference - you will need to press the correct button along with pressing it at the right time. The developers tried their hardest to expand the properties of the game by allowing you to obtain equipment and train abilities. Every time you do succeed in advancing the story or completing a mission, your stats will all level up as well.

Some of these missions are creative by asking you to purposely foul the ball or swing the bat with a blurry screen while you are drunk. Sadly, there isn't a single mission where you get to break any windows or aim at moving objects. Forget about my dream of "running bases" or becoming the pitcher. Oh, and if you think you can build-up your heat eye (slow ability) through your trainer, think again. My fourth task was to successfully play a game of 9-Ball Pool with an intermediate player. Let's just say that it was impossible to do when the AI sinks 90% of the balls, sometimes with a trick shot, leaving me out to pitifully watch from the sidelines as my pride comes barreling down to a halt. Only after finishing the game did I find out that you have to steady your pole and quickly end the round before they have a turn.

Bonus: I don't think anybody would have been able to guess what sort of new mini-game our washed-up man would participate this time around. They call it the Cochins Cup Classic. Yes, cochins... as in chickens. Think of it as the racing conception of Pocket Racers before they became popular in Yakuza 0. You get a chicken, increase their stats by giving one of four trainers items depending on what they like, and then watch them erratically perform against three other chickens. It's more thrilling to watch than you think. However, this mini-game has a huge flaw. Your chicken can only earn so many stats and can only perform well within a set number of races. This means that you have to breed a new chicken, and train, then breed it, then train it, over and over again. Let's not forget that most of their stats are randomly built depending on a few miscellaneous factors out of your control. After learning what was all involved, I threw my hands up and left.

Sparkles: Have you been running around the city without anything glowing in sight? Maybe you need to go down to the Prize Ticket booth in the far southeast corner of the map. Only after talking to the overly gumptious people at the booth and hearing about how their tickets flew away will you be able to start collecting them off the ground. There's about 40 you can get in the city. Of course, the whole city will help contribute some of these tickets to the fair if you spend some yen at their establishment. You will want the rewards. The problem? There is no way in knowing what you will get since the game randomly spits out rewards. I'd get 10 consolation prizes of pocket tissues and then win a gravity converter. I'd do another 15 and then win a cherry tree branch. I never managed to win a small motor, Marlin, or the grand prize of a pearl. Though, I am happy that they give you a snowman hammer after turning in 20 tickets.

Hostess: Lady Shion was a very interesting lady that I wanted to learn more about. This lady that Shinada meets at the cabaret club is very attractive and pristine. However, her actions were meticulously pruned by her rich parents. Because of this, she will do things that might be damaging or embarrassing to her character if it means keeping the reputation of the family name at a satisfactory level. This includes marrying a man on the merits of his financial standing alone. Her "rich standing" as a half-French, half-Japanese woman causes a bit of a disconnect when she discusses things like how much she travels to various locations that are seen in movies around the world, owns a car, and doesn't take an interest in other people's affairs. Sadly when things boil down to the end of her story, you find out that all of it was a lie. Their family actually lost everything in the stock market. I do not take pity on a woman who flaunts something she never had in the first place.

Substories: There are some fantastic stories mixed in with the sea of bland events. There's this neat little mini-game where you have to order certain pages that fell on the ground for a writer. Then there is the incredibly mind-numbing experience where you have to calculate the change for customers at the local convenient store since, I guess, the cash register doesn't do math for you. There's the Lady Gaga body double "Daddy Papa" that you will need to charm on a night on the town. My personal favorite is the Revelation you get watching a man go all samurai against a flying ball. Other stories involve following a man Assassin Creed style, chasing after runners, and feeding a starving man. There is this weird encounter with a woman who would "appreciate a vitamin water" only she refuses to drink any vitamin water you buy from the convenient store. In this case, a simple stamina bottle will work. Oh, and they just had to include a weird business transaction with men in loincloths for some reason.

One For All Finale

Story: Once I saw the word "finale," all I wanted to do was get to the point where you could switch between all the characters. Unfortunately, I shouldn't have been so hasty. This is the moment where you should take Kiryu to his old master to open up the Dojo for everyone's "breakthrough" to level 25. Then you get back Haruka and make friends with T-Set. Then you get this very lengthy showdown through the completed Kamurachi Hills. Make sure to bring enough weapons! Unlike Yakuza Kiwami 2, there are barely anything you can grab and use against your foes here. I only recall just a couple of stooges carrying guns during the whole encounter. Purgatory might be locked off from the bathroom stall, but the sewer entrance is still available. Akiyama gets shown off four cases of 500 million yen which is surprisingly small when the series shows off a vault of 10 billion yen or stacks of 100 billion yen out in the open. There are several moments where you team up with a partner and are able to choose which member to play during a sequence.

Coliseum: I'm going to come out and say that I don't like how they organized the coliseum in this game. It only becomes available in the finale and is locked behind defeating three Victory Road qualifiers for each character. This can get difficult when its hard to distinguish them on the street. None of your equipment can be used. Your secondary health bar and buffs are disabled. A series of tournaments are locked until you reach a certain level with the tournament on that character. This requires you to complete the available tournaments several times over. The Weapon Master GP will ask you which weapon you want to use throughout the tournament from their basic stock. Choose your weapon carefully. Weapons like your general spear can be brutally inefficient when something like your standard brass knuckles can finish the tournament in under 10 minutes. Street Fight GP practically hands you every non-equippable weapon to use on your opponent. Twin Dragon GP will pair you up with your Victory Road friend in a series of team matches. I had my fun with Kiryu's ability to throw certain guys down on the ground once they tried grabbing him and Saejima's unstoppable heat bar madness. At least all the tournament points are pooled, allowing you to retrieve the items necessary to upgrade your weapons.

Gambling: Alright! Now is the time to go in and use all your cheat items. You can go to the Gambling Hall and press your luck in the standard games of Cee-Lo, Cho-Han, Koi-Koi, and Oicho-Kabu. But realize that you won't be getting any usable items from these halls. So you might as well go try out Baccarat, Blackjack, Poker, and Roulette. It is very easy to come out with 30 million yen by bidding the maximum amount while using the items. Just be aware that you will need to obtain their platinum plates and sell them to the Pawn Shop. I secretly think they are in league with one another.

Substories: If you manage to bring each of the four hostesses to S Rank (something I failed to do), then you can get Akiyama to open his doors to Club Elise and hire a fifth hostess that Kiryu can come and visit. If you managed to complete all the chef quests, Cafe Alps will be able to open their doors with an extra item on the menu. Nearly every person gains some sort of final substory in this city. There is also this fun, unmarked side quest where you collect unique souveniers from all over Japan.

Mini-Games

Fishing: There are two types of fishing. The first type is carried from Yakuza 3 where you throw your line into the sea and reel in your catch. The second one is from Yakuza 4 where you fish in various rivers by simply watching your bobber go up and down. You will see a fisherman standing by a marked location to show you where this is possible. The difference this time around is you must use non-plastic wrapped food items.

UFO Catcher: There are actually two types of UFO Catchers. If you want to keep your sanity, I would suggest only doing the original claw version. However, you can try your wits to push a solid rod through a tiny hole to collect the lovely Hatsune Miku Figure. I think it took me a total of 12 tries before I was able to express my joy with my arms high up in the air. Each city has different rewards, so make sure you press your luck with each character. Not only is there a wide-range of plushies, but there is also figurines (inside or out of boxes) to collect.

PrintScreen: Although this is meant to be a fun little activity to take your picture in the spur of the moment, there is an actual mini-game hidden behind-the-scenes. You must press each button at exactly the right time so that you preform the perfect pose once it snaps your photo. Do it successfully and it will be added to your completion list.

Others: The goal of Taiko no Tatsujin, also known as "the drum game" in my imagination, is simply to complete all three songs on both difficulties. There are two arcade games: Virtua Fighter 2 returns for another round (with the added bonus of seeing the move sets of each character when pressing select) and a most interesting take on defending your station through Gunrhein. Karaoke now has music videos. You can bring a date to sing as you excitedly wave your arms around like a moron in the background. Bowling plays really well. Golf and the Batting Cage are there for added fun. You can also try your hand at any that might have been listed above in this post.

Miscellaneous Notes

Unnecessary Scenes: Normally, I can tolerate the occasional weirdness of someone dressed up as a dominatrix or a man that is only wearing a loincloth. But I felt like there were a ton of scenes in this game that just made me cringe hard to the point of looking away. There is a scene where I had to stand by and watch as a man agonizes over losing half his arm. A woman removes the only garment she was wearing and presses against Kiryu (without him giving any sort of reaction). I did not particularly enjoy the addition of scraping a man's face across the pavement. In Part 2, they play a part that demonstrates what a psychopath can do when there is no one there to stop him that they could have toned down a bit. There is a parallel example of Saejima in the Coliseum, only this time the man beats the boxer to a pulp (almost to the point of killing him). There are several moments where they highlight the dark sides of the adult entertainment "Red Light" sector by demeaning and trash-talking all women that live in the city regardless if they actually perform that kind of work. There is an entire scene where you watch a man prepare for battle as he does push-ups completely naked and watch as he stands up and faces out the window with a good view of his entire backside.

Settings: It's that time again where I write down every other little thing I have in my notes. Clown Bob must be out on vacation since now you will be accepting your promotional gifts and completion items from any convenience store. Some items and equipment can now be purchased directly from your cellphone and delivered. A lot of the sound effects in the background carry a retro-feel directly pulled from old games like the coin flip whenever you pick up an item. Battles are a little bit more advanced now that thugs can pull out their cellphone to call in for reinforcements or get too scared to carry on and simply run away. You can also avoid getting their attention in the first place by simply walking by them, even if it is directly in front of them. Chase sequences now allow you to use the beer bottle as a weapon on top of throwing it as well as no longer requiring button prompts when struggling to capture. You cannot adjust the mini-map. Every time you start the game, you will be introduced to a fortune text that somehow modifies your chances of getting good things from gambling events. Restaurants also include the option to "look around" for little advertisements. It is much easier to hit enemies that are on the ground with various weapons. You must use a crosswalk when it comes to getting your chicken character to the other side of the street. Your character will take a few steps towards a locker key to grab it. If you try conversing with a character without being directly in front of him, you and the camera will side-step to correct the matter. Sorting through your inventory would have been much better if there was an added "weapons" filter over the general equipment window. You are unable to switch outfits, or switch between all five characters at any moment for that matter, until Premium Adventure Mode after the credits roll. Taxis and phone booths are spaced out a little too thin in areas that promote travel time.

Summary

Review: Yakuza 5 is an ambitious project where the developers expounded on the original split-character setup from the previous game by adding a large list of activities between five different characters. Outside the normal street battle system, they have included several side stories that will require you to drive a car, hunt down animals, and perform dance battles. They have added another layer of mini-games on top of the ones already established in the series where you cook noodles for guests, throw snowballs at people in an arena, and raise chickens. The main story will advance in a total of five different cities where eventually you have the option to team up with other members and choose which character to utilize in those sections of the game. Although the ridiculous events that unfold in the finale become almost incomprehensible, I thoroughly enjoyed how each subset properly developed a clever and motivating story by keeping the surprises limited without derailing the main plot. I would definitely recommend this game simply for the sheer number of fantastic off-the-wall things they present you with.

 

5-4-2021