There isn't really a lot to love about Yakuza 3 but I do want to start by saying that the story for this game is great. Despite all the problems that I'm about to list off, I was still pretty excited to get around to this game every week just to see what was going to happen next. I don't know what the gaming equivalent of a "page turner" is but this game is exactly that. Even when the plot is doing some absolutely insane nonsense such as, without spoiling anything, a show down at a rodeo it's equal parts awesome spectacle and gripping narative. Despite the stories strengths though there is some issues with pacing where Kiryu, having left Tokyo to start an orphanage in Okinawa, must spend large amounts of time within the main story doing stuff with and for the kids he's looking after. I know WHY the pacing is like that but it's still a bunch of boring bullshit. But when it comes to the plot, the positives far FAR outweigh the negatives.
But then there's the rest of the fucking game and holy fuck is it BAD. The most obvious thing is the combat because you have to spend a lot of time doing it and it's almost never fun at any point. Yakuza 1 and 2, at least in their original PS2 forms, had pretty stiff combat so I'm not going to begrudge the game for that but the enemies are CONSTANTLY blocking every attack you ever do. I was also playing on hard mode so my incoming damage was pretty high which made dealing with groups an absolute nightmare and the absolute worst part of all this is that no matter how much I upgraded Kiryu's skills, it never got any easier. The blocking problem could sort of been circumvented by just grabbing dudes constantly but when you are against enemies that can't be grabbed the combat is just absolutely unbearable. Eventually you will learn a combo where you do a sort of overhead smash after a 3 punch combo which, even if blocked, will do a very VERY small amount of damage, so most encounters devolved into just spamming that combo until you win which takes a long ass time and is not fun even a little bit. One thing to point out though is that the final boss just sort of forgets to block at all and ends up being a complete pushover. Your random street goons will throw up guards so strong that even a bicycle to the forearms won't make them flinch but the head honcho of a Yakuza family seems to be completely oblivious to the idea of self preservation.
Aside from fighting in the main story though you can also fight and blunder your way through a number of side stories, none of which are particularly interesting and most are overly short and completely forgetable with rewards that are almost never worth it. There are side stories from the first two Yakuza games that have stayed with me long after I finished and there are side stories in the later Yakuza games that I'm aware of just because the fans like to gush about them but there is basically NOTHING in Yakuza 3 worth talking about. If there is a good one in there somewhere and it's just slipped my mind then I'd love to hear about it because I'm wracking my brains and got nothing.
The mini games are also very ass, most of which controlling like complete garbage or just being unfun to play. The worst offender being darts which is basically impossible to control in any way. I think I would have better luck scoring at real darts with 2 broken hands and a blindfold on than trying to play Yakuza 3 darts normally. The best mini-game is Karaoke because its just a bare bones rhythm game that the devs basically couldn't fuck up. Even the things that should be easy, like the gambling are annoying because the menus feel so stiff. It's really hard to describe just how shitty it is but just navigating through slow menus to double down in blackjack feels shitty.
Then there are a bunch of non mini game side activities which are all stupid as fuck. For example you can do these things called revelations where you see some funny sequence of events that Kiryu will snap pictures off on his phone via QTE. Then you get 3 prompts and if you choose the right one Kiryu will become inspired and write a blog post on his piece of shit gara-kei which will then allow him to learn a new move. It's fine but if you mess up the prompt at the end you fail the revelation and must leave the area for a while for it to come back and then watch the whole silly animation again. It's funny the first time but when you messed up the prompts twice and are watching the same "tee hee isn't this very silly" chain of events for the third time it's just annoying. The worst side activity though in this regard is a chase game where you must avoid bystanders and shoulder ram a guy until he runs out of stamina and if you take too long you run out of stamina and the guy gets away. The problem comes from the fact that judging depth is basically impossible so unless you're sprinting right up the guys butthole you're probably going to miss and the margin for error in these games are very small. You do it a few times as part of main story missions but the game was so proud of this inclusion that it becomes a full on mini-game all by itself near the end and I think I'd have more fun swallowing nails.
Also in 2022 this is sort of a non-issue but I want to write about it anyway, that this entry in the series on PS3 was the point where I stopped playing the franchise because I was pretty upset about cut content. There are a few things cut from the original release but the worst of which was the removal of Shogi and Mahjong. Not only did the PS2 version of Yakuza 2 have both shogi and mahjong, but they even came with extra manuals in the box with explinations on how to play but then Yakuza 3 rolls around and all that shit is just gone. As someone who is a huge enjoyer of Japanese mahjong I was so mad about its exclusion that I didn't play a single Yakuza game until I started up the series again with Kiwami 1 last year. Like I said though, Yakuza 3 Remastered on steam puts all this cut content back in, so no fear if you're buying it today, but the fact it happened at all its unforgivable.
There are a few things to really love about Yakuza 3, for sure, but it's all wrapped in such a thick layer of complete and total bullshit that it's really hard to recommend to people. If you're playing through the series like I am and want to experience everything the franchise has to offer then I guess you will have ot just grin and bare it but if you're just a casual fan of it then just skip it. Watch the cutscenes on YouTube and save yourself a bunch of stress.
Hi, I am a big fan;)
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