I haven’t played many of the yakuza games. I have all of the main ones (aside from 6, judgement and ishin), but I have never played them. I was a couple chapters into zero, but I stopped and got burnt out. This game is a master piece. The ending genuinely brought tears to my eyes and don’t know much about the prior story.

In this yakuza game, there is only two styles. If my knowledge from playing zero is consistent, there’s usually more. However this isn’t to say they aren’t varied. The agent style and all of its gadgets are absolutely amazing and allow for some great combinations. The yakuza style is also great and has that impact. Due to having only two styles, it’s extremely easy to swap to a different style. This allows for an amazing chain of heavy yakuza attacks and utilising the agents gadgets. This honestly makes this one of the most creative combat I have seen in gaming. This really links back to a core ideal that is shown throughout the game that combat its self is art. The fact that the combat parallels so well with the story itself is amazing.

The story of Like a dragon gaiden: the man who erased his name is not your typical mob story. It’s intricate, it shows the dynamics of honour and what it truly means for someone to go underground and lose everything that had meaning to them. It also shows that there are two ways to go about it. You can rise up and keep on going or you can just give up. I don’t want to go into too many details to avoid spoilers, but the ending was perfect seeing Kiryu cry at the sight of morning glory orphanage kids visiting his grave and sending him a message on the camera is just so endearing to see that such a stoic figure can such deep and intricate emotion.

The minigames, as with any yakuza game, are heavily prevalent. Every game is fun. I will admit, I didn’t try nearly enough, but the karaoke was amazing and the pool was fun. Not to mention the cabaret clubs were… fun to say the least ;) . All of these things packed into the small map is amazing and really makes it feel so good. Speaking of the small area, I actually got to memorise the place and I didn’t have to use the map at all at one point. I knew where ashibata park was and I knew where shokofuchu street was.

Like a dragon: gaiden is truly amazing. I am ashamed it didn’t win any awards this year, but that doesn’t change the testament that this is an amazing game. I am happy I played through it the way I have been doing prior games at just one game at a time. I truly must recommend this to anyone who wants to get into the yakuza/like a dragon series.