Yakuza: Like A Dragon is a great franchise reboot for newcomers to enjoy

Farewell, Kazuma Kiryu. Hello, Ichiban Kasuga!

Yakuza: Like A Dragon is the seventh game in the Yakuza series, but it’s a special one. Legendary protagonist Kazuma Kiryu has departed the series, after his story was told to completion in Yakuza 6: The Song of Life. To continue the series, Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio decided a soft-reboot was in order and gave Yakuza 7 an entirely new protagonist in a new open-world setting. There’s a lot of newness going on here, but fans of the franchise need not be worried - this is as classic a Yakuza game as they come. 

This soft-reboot acts as a great jumping on point for newcomers to the Yakuza series, and its earnest story, memorable characters and winding story cement it as one of the greatest RPGs released this year. 

Brand-new coat of paint, same ol’ Yakuza

Yakuza: Like A Dragon starts in a pretty tragic place. We step into the shoes of the series’ new protagonist - Ichiban Kasuga, an optimistic, goofy and utterly loyal member of the Tojo clan’s Arakawa family. After taking the fall for a crime he didn’t commit to protect his boss, Arakawa, he gets imprisoned for a long eighteen years. When he finally gets released in 2019, however, he realises that things have changed. 

Arakawa has sold out his entire clan, and allowed another to take its place in Kamurocho. Upon confronting his former boss for answers, Arakawa simply levels a gun at him - and takes the shot. Betrayed and confused, Ichiban wakes up in Yokohama and has to adapt to his new life as ex-Yakuza member - with no old friends or alliances to turn to, in a strange new place. 

This is just the beginning of the game, but it does so much to endear you to Ichiban. The game first takes you on a tour through all the Yakuza family members he holds so dearly, which makes it hurt so much more when all of them betray him. Despite his tragic origins however, Ichiban has a lovably sunny disposition, shown off in his enthusiasm about the smallest of things - such as running a business into the ground with the help of a chicken. He has a strong moral compass, and doesn’t hesitate to point out right from wrong, even to his friends.

He’s also a massive fan of Dragon Quest, which is a surprisingly plot-relevant tidbit, as it contextualises the game’s turn-based combat. We'll get to that in a bit.

Yokohama is a city of dreams, and Ichiban’s a big dreamer

If this is your first Yakuza game, you might be struck by how much the game flat-out refuses to take itself seriously. Sure, the main story unfolds like a gritty crime drama where Ichiban seeks answers from those who betrayed him - but the world you explore in Yokohama and the colourful cast of characters rarely meet the same tone. This includes your companions, of course. In Dragon Quest-like style, Ichiban quickly assembles a party of his closest friends throughout his adventures, and their bonds tighten as the story goes by. 

The Yakuza series is known for its strong characters, and Like A Dragon continues that tradition. The companions you meet come from all walks of life, somehow roped into Ichiban’s dealings with the various crime families in Yokohama. I’ve played the game with both English and Japanese voice acting - and can confirm that both are pretty great, with really strong performances bringing these characters to life. Ichiban’s bonds can also literally level up whenever you head into a bar called Survive, and have a conversation with your partymembers. Though the story does plenty to flesh them out, this optional side-activity lets you get to know them better. 

Hands-down, my favourite part of this game is how effortlessly it can leap from being dramatic to ridiculous in a matter of seconds. You could be in the middle of an intense boss battle - and then summon a violent crawfish to help you out. A sidequest once had Ichiban follow the sounds of crying babies - only to end up in an altercation with adult men wearing diapers. I will admit, though: I was a little disappointed with Yokohama. It’s a little too big, and I remember missions that would ping-pong Ichiban and his party back and forth across the map. It gets tiresome, holding down R2 and sprinting for minutes at a time. There’s fast travel too of course, but I had enough loading screens to deal with as is. 

The sidequests are definitely worth doing, though. Their rewards might often be disappointing, but there are a lot of heartfelt moments to be found in the smallest substories. The main story, when it’s not meandering down long detours, is pretty interesting - portraying the Yakuza as they grapple with politics in these modern times, and Ichiban’s discomfort with that change.

Wait your turn

Yakuza: Like A Dragon stirred up some controversy a while back, when it was announced that the franchise would swap out its trademark beat ‘em up combat for turn-based battles. This change definitely works in the game’s favour at first, but it wears out its welcome very quickly. It’s not that the game’s combat isn’t great - I actually really dig parts of it, but the pacing of its combat scenarios is downright awful. 

So, here’s how it works: Ichiban’s overactive imagination turns your run-of-the-mill bad guys into fantastical creatures straight out of a Dragon Quest game. Drunks wield garbage can lids and umbrellas, and become ‘Knights of the Cask’. Buff dudes turn into ‘Beefcakes’, wielding dumbbells and wearing tank tops. These enemies are called Sujimon, and you can document them in a Sujidex - reporting to an old professor once you’re done. I’ll leave you to connect the dots on that reference, but I do love how much enemy variety there is here compared to older Yakuza games. 

When you get into a fight with these weirdos, the game brings up a Persona 5-like combat menu, and you’ll have to deal with buffs, status effects, strengths, weaknesses and special attacks - standard JRPG fare. The combat system is built so that it feels as close to normal Yakuza fights as possible. Enemies still move around the environment dynamically, and your attacks can be blocked by someone if you move past them. You have the option of timing a block whenever they attack to reduce damage taken, and all of the party’s most powerful attacks involve quicktime events too. Even in auto-battle mode, you’ll need to keep your hands on the controller. 

Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio clearly put a lot of thought into this game’s combat design, and they should be commended for that - but I still ended up hating it just eight or so hours into the game. Why? Because you’re fighting people. All. The. Damn. Time. The pacing of combat is atrocious. If I have to cross a long road in Yokohama to get to an objective, there’s a chance that my sprinting will be interrupted every five seconds by a gang of enemies - which will throw me into a five-minute combat sequence. Once I get out of it and continue on my way, boom! Another gang of enemies. 

Yeah, combat isn’t great

You know how every once in a while in a Pokemon game, you’d see big grassy areas filled with wild Pokemon in your way? And you’d go through them knowing you were going to have to deal with all these annoying random encounters, but at least you’d be out of them eventually? Well, Yokohama is one big grassy area. There is very little respite from these combat encounters, especially so in the game’s main story. It’ll often take you through long, byzantine dungeons filled with enemies - and by the end, you would come out exhausted not because of the challenge of combat, but by the sheer repetition of it all. It doesn’t help that these dungeons look boring, too. 

The worst part is that you have to actively seek out all of these combat encounters, and skip by as few of them as you can. Why? To grind out levels, of course. At first, combat might pose no threat (I died very, very few times in the first half of the game), but there are big difficulty spikes that might get you later on. Your party members can also apply for different ‘jobs’, which gives them different roles in combat, and access to different weapons. This needs to be finetuned, too. 

You start every job at Level 1, as jobs have a levelling system of their own. This means you lose a whole bunch of stats for your character every time you switch to a new job - but you need to do so to gain different abilities. You can’t even change your job on the fly to prepare for tough encounters. To do that, you need to go to a specific building in Yokohama and talk to an NPC. Why is this even a thing? There’s also the fact that some jobs are clearly better than others in combat, which makes experimentation not seem worthwhile. 

These turn-based battles can also be a little janky. Certain area-of-effect attacks work best when enemies are grouped up together, making things irritating when they’re shuffling around all the time. The camera acts strangely when enemies attack - especially if it doesn't have enough space to pull back. That creates situations where enemies rev up to attack, and you mistime the block button because the game decided to show you a random wall instead. Pathfinding issues also impact combat, with allies taking ages to figure out their way around obstacles and then striking when it’s too late. 

Verdict

Despite all the flaws of Yakuza: Like A Dragon’s combat system, I found myself getting pulled back to Yokohama time upon time again to spend more time with Ichiban Kasuga and his friends. If Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio was trying to give the Yakuza series a new face, they’ve knocked it out of the park with this earnest, lovable goof. The people Ichiban surrounds himself with are memorable too, and Yokohama is filled with lots of strange stories to engage with. The main story is filled with just enough twists and high-stakes drama to keep you chipping away at it for 70 to 80 hours.

If you can get through all of the combat encounters without breaking your controller, that is. 

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