Yakuza Kiwami 2 is an action-adventure game originally released for PS4 and PC in 2018-19, while XBONE will soon to be released in 2020 along with other two titles like Yakuza 0 and Yakuza Kiwami.
It was developed by Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio and published by SEGA as it is a remake of the original 2006's PS2 title and also a follow-up to 2017's Yakuza Kiwami.
In the last 2 or 3 years ago I've already covered these two games such as Yakuza 0 and Yakuza Kiwami as I really managed to enjoy these hard-hitting action which are the strongest line-up of the beloved series.
I expecting Ryu Ga Gotoku doing a same thing with the another remake which is Yakuza Kiwami 2 which I am looking forward to see another crazy Yakuza action such as the exciting story, the badass characters, the city exploration, the minigames, the busy side quests, the brawling combat, and more to offer.
I finally had a copy of this game for nearly £20 during the awesomeness of Black Friday sales from Amazon so I can able to play it on my lovely PS4.
After managing to beat the whole game for a week, I was satisfied to see how amazing the Yakuza Kiwami 2 had played on the PS4 is because it's not the only being the finest sequel of the franchise, but it is the most refreshing treatment of the original PS2 title featuring improved graphics enhancement based on Yakuza 6 engine, adding new gameplay features, and better story elements is the reason why the game is so much worthy to pick up and play it on your modern gaming PCs and consoles.
I also labelled this game as being one of the better remake of all Yakuza games that did not disappoint the fans of the series will able to enjoy themselves in full modern HDs or 4K for sure.
So without go further do, let's start the review.
Presentation
This game takes place in year after the event of the first game. The game starts out with Kazuma Kiryu, the former Yakuza member of Tojo Clan, and his niece Haruka are living happily in peaceful life until the chairman of Tojo Clan Yukio Terada who appears at the funeral site as he pleaded for his help due to conflict war between the Tojo and the Osaka-based Omi Alliance.
After Terada being horribly murdered by assassins from a rival organization such as the Omi Alliance which led Kiryu set his quest to recruit with the new chairman as well as preventing the war between the Yakuza's organisation conflicting with the Dragon Of Kansai known as Ryuji Goda that is been liked to funeral shootouts.
The story in the game is being well written which involves the huge conflict between the rivalry of the two clans where Omi Alliance had made the crime against the Tojo Clan which I think the way the story had written in the game is quite remarkable for its gangster like drama did fit the game's presentation well.
I also learned the further storyplot which introduced some new characters such as Detective Kaoru Sayama who agreed to help Kiryu's quest to stop the Omi threat in exchange for information on the Tojo, as she believes they are connected to her parents disappearance as a child.
Then you have Jiro Kawara, a former partner of Detective Makoto Date, shares his back story with the event of 1980 massacre that happened in Kamurocho. He joins up with Date for mission to investigate bombing of the Kazama family offices which the attack was led by the Korean mobs called Jingweon Mafia.
I finding these further storyline started to get very interesting with many of family history, the back story, the mysteries, and many things in the game that the developers did such a amazing job on the plot development.
The character Kazuma Kiryu is still totally badass which really nails it well on whole Yakuza games is the reason why I liked him so much with his personally and energised brawler that really keeps up his character development.
I also find Kaoru Sayama is pretty good for her career as the talented Police Detective, but for her side it is very nice to make connections between her and Kiryu are slowly to get to know each other as the story progress through which I think it is very good to have friendship between the officer and ex-yakuza.
Then you have a trouble-making asshole villain named Ryuji Goda just likes to piss off the clan members of the Tojo Family which you can see his arrogant attitude on his grin face making a threat against innocent and thinks he is a toughest of his clan is the reason he is one of the baddest bad guys in Yakuza series.
The game also had a returning characters from the previous game including crackpot himself Goro Majima, who is now working on his construction business, always made me laugh a lot in whole game, so yeah what you know it's Majima guys because everyone loves his comedic personality.
The presentation in the game is still remarkable as the previous entry of the series filled with outstanding design of motion capture for it's character's lip sycing on facial animation and the movement of body language is surprisingly well done for its cinematic sequences. Like the Yakuza Kiwami it also fixes the confusing plot of the story which keeps the story much easier to follow is the reason why the remake version did lot better than what we had from the original PS2 title.
Overall, it has well written story, memorable characters, and great presentation design.
Gameplay
Similar to previous game, your goal is to complete the mission throughout the story scenario which can be marked with the pink symbols on the map screen.
You get to run around the city to discover places you want to go, while you may be encountered by groups of thugs which forcing you to fight them in beat em ups segments.
You have the health bar and heat power bar at the top-left corner which representing character's health and heat.
You have basic weak attack, harsh strong attack, and grabbing attack are mainly used for attacking on opponents. The weak attack are pretty much quicker to attack enemies, while the strong attack can also perform much of the heavy damage as you can make the amount of combos attack by mashing these two buttons in different combination which allows the character to perform more variety of moves depending on the stats of your character's fighting upgrades.
Grabbing the opponent which allows you to throw them into grounds or beat the shit of them with the bare fists while grabbing them.
You can also pick up these objects to attack them such as trash bins, bicycles, boxes, and other random stuff, while you can also use weapons such as swords, knives, and firearms which you can keep or equip them from the inventory options so these are the objects and weapons items are very useful for combat battles which really helps the player to kill the enemies much quicker.
After filling up your heat bar which allows you to perform much punishable moves on the sequences such as breaking their backbones against the wall, bashing their faces with traffic cones, busting their balls off on the lamp post, and pressing their jaws off so hard with the feet in brutal way which is the biggest highlight part of the gameplay style.
Defeating the opponents off or beating the missions will reward you with these coloured tokens which can be used for upgrading your character's ability such as player's strengths, styles, heat action, and social life which really helps improving your healths, defense, fighting moves, and some lifestyle stuff like digestion levels and hunger capacity which really motivates the player to boosting up the player's stats to become a better fighter, but I do find the cost of the later upgrades is way too tedious which takes very too long for me to gain enough tokens so I can able to afford these powerful fighting upgrades which really slows down the pacing of the length play, but don't get me wrong I do like the wide selection of fighting moves and ability to unlock which is very good for most of fighting part in the game.
Besides the story mission, you can also do the side-story depending on which area you went on.
There are 75 side-mission scenarios in this game such as tracking down fraudsters whereabouts, helping old lady dealing with group of thugs, buying tissues pack for sneezey musician with colds, retrieving the sharpest blades for chef, and many more interesting substories that really helps you keeping very busy to play it more than the hours.
You can visit any places in the city such as convenience store where you can purchase the variety of items that allows you to increase your health and heat bar which is handy for the later missions.
The restaurant or fast food is the place you can enjoy eating the amount of food and drinks which also rewards you just the same as defeating the opponents or beating the missions, but it is also extremely limited which you will need to keep an eye on hunger level which took time to digest slowly so use it wisely when ordering the food.
You can also drink amount of alcohol from the bar places, but it also makes you super drunk if drinking too much which makes you struggle to run around the city until it will slowly calm it down in another 5 or 10 mins.
There are two social minigames that you might able to enjoy such as Clan Creator in Majima Construction is kinda like castle defense game where you take control of Majima and his mens to defend his construction units in strategy RPGs style, while you need to level up several of employees to improve their constructing skills such as HP, attack, and defense.
There are Cabaret Club Grand Prix which is a simulator game where you need to help hostress throughout the tonight's shift as well as ranking up their status and earning more cash.
Besides these two minigames, there are plenty more minigames to play that keeps you entertained such as karaoke, golf center, darts, mahjong, and of course two classic SEGA's arcades such as Virtua Fighter 2 and Cyber-Troopers Virtual On which are the main best part of the game.
So far, I am very impressed with the overall game that offers many of awesome things such as story missions filled with non-stop brawling action featuring excellent fast-pacing gameplay and epic boss battles that I can able to enjoy the whole Yakuza universe, while the side-missions that really helps me motivating my overall experiences. It has two playable cities to explore around filled with restaurants, bars, clubs, streets, stores, and mini-games to visit, and of course having fun beating shit of these scummy thugs in the streets is what makes the game even fun to play in over 20 to 30 hours of play, so I am so happy to see the developers team could able to deliver this remake even far better than the original 2006 version for PS2.
Overall, it has fantastic story missions, cool side-quest, excellent brawling gameplay, and has two cities to explore.
Graphics
I got to say the graphics on this game is looking lot better than previous two Yakuza games which the game was running on the engine based on Yakuza 6.
The character animation for cinematic capture is looking far realistic with the use of facial figures and body movements which really feels like a real-life human beings even the dialogue and expressions are very well done for most part in the game and I also liked the improvements on the character animation for the in-game parts during the exploration and battle sequences.
Speaking of sequences, I got to love the gruesome parts on the finishing animation where I liked to see their faces get busted in slow-motion, while it has a bloody special effects on most of the cutscenes where these guys get splatted to death is definitely looked brutal for action-adventures genres.
The game hasn't made any changes in open-world design in regards of the series was mainly focused on the same location as many of Yakuza games, but don't get me wrong because I really liked the setting of the buildings and some open environments that keeps the game looked up to date especially with the use of lighting effects is also pretty looked decent for most part.
Overall, it has great character animation, nicely made large open-world environments, and many brutal sequences with the use of bloody special effects.
Music and Sounds
The original soundtrack in most part are actually just as brilliant as the previous entry that keeps you more pumped for crazy Yakuza action, while there are some darker tone music that fits well on the cinematic scenes for atmospheres and mood.
The sound effects are pretty sounds good for most part with crowded noises in the city and has sharp sounds on guns and knives effects while the Japanese voice cast still just did a perfect job as they did on the previous game that really keeps up well with their character role.
The English subtitles will help the western audiences to understand the game's main story in regarding the game can only speak in Japanese.
Overall, it has brilliant soundtrack, great sounds, and perfect voice for character role.
Special Features
The game did have new game plus for its replay values, the premium adventures is the game mode where you get to do whatever you want in the game during the exploration, and it has several of mini-games to play.
The game did have 3 new bonus chapters called Majima's Saga where you take control of Goro Majima mainly focused on his side story.
Overall, it a worthy content to this awesome game.
Advantages
Well written story
Great cast of characters
Excellent fast-paced gameplay
Great cinematic presentation
Fantastic story missions
Cool side-quest
Amazing graphics design
Brilliant Soundtrack
More features
Disadvantages
Over costing for later upgrades
Final Verdict
Presentation 9/10 - well written story, memorable characters, and great presentation design.
Gameplay 9/10 - fantastic story missions, cool side-quest, excellent brawling gameplay, and has two cities to explore.
Graphics 9/10 - brilliant soundtrack, great sounds, and perfect voice for character role.
Music and Sounds 9/10 - brilliant soundtrack, great sounds, and perfect voice for character role.
Special Features 9/10 - new game plus, premium adventures, mini-games, and Majima's Saga.
Overall 9/10 - Yakuza Kiwami 2 is not the only being a better sequel to the first game, but also a fantastic remake filled with graphics enhancement, overhaul gameplay mechanics, and adding story elements is the best way to address the issues that was previously found in the original PS2 version.
I did managed to enjoy many things that the game had to deliver with epic story presentation, selection of playable missions to choose, and encouraging players to explore around the city and fight like a true Yakuza gang is the reason why this game is highly recommended to all the fans of the series will able to enjoy the full remake of the original 2006's sequel.
I am hoping soon to get the copy of Yakuza 6 and of course definitely to get Yakuza Remastered Collection for further future.
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