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The Like A Dragon Yakuza Special with FlavorfulVT
12 Plays2 days ago
Tony is joined by FlavorfulVT for a long special episode of the TGL Podcast! The two talk all things Yakuza, from what got them into the franchise, to their thoughts on all the games in series, the good and the bad, and where the franchises future might take them, as well as making some small predicitons for Stranger Than Heaven. They also recap April Fools in Gaming for 2026, recap all the gaming news from the past 2 weeks, and talk about upcoming game releases in the next 2 weeks!
Follow Tony: https://www.twitch.tv/tonysgamelounge
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@TonysGameLounge
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Follow Flavorful: https://x.com/FlavorfulVT
Twitch: https://www.twitch.tv/flavorfulvt
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This Weeks Episode was Edited by Mike: https://www.instagram.com/heyitsmikeye/
Join the Official Tony's Game Lounge Discord: https://discord.gg/xXyvjaCsXp
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Transcript
Introduction and Podcast Overview
00:00:00
Speaker
Disclaimer, all views expressed on this podcast represent the host and his guest and not the companies or agencies they are associated with.
00:00:11
Speaker
Welcome to Tony's Game Lounge, a bi-weekly podcast that covers everything in the world of video games, TCG, tabletop, and more. Here's your host, Tony 14.
Guest Introduction and Casual Banter
00:00:21
Speaker
Hello, everybody, and welcome back to another brand new episode of the Tony's Game Lounge podcast.
00:00:27
Speaker
I am your host, as always, Tony 14, and joining us, returning from the last season, he taught us a lot of things about schizo-core games and can't shut up about 1999.
00:00:40
Speaker
It's flavorful VT. Hey, how's it going? Oh, you guys doing good. Are you flavorful? Oh, man. I just i'm I'm absolutely radiant.
00:00:52
Speaker
Tony radiant. Excellent. Incredible. We love to see
April Fool's Gaming Recap
00:00:56
Speaker
that. I can I can see it through my screen, even though I just see a voice line. I can see it glowing even brighter than normal. Well, that's i mean, part of that's just because I don't get out in the sun nearly enough. got that yeah I got that LED tan, you know what I'm saying?
00:01:12
Speaker
ah um um' If only. ah Yeah, I feel that. Except mine's very much. I wish it was. ah Mine's a bit of a darker LED tan, except it's a. Oh, God. Because there's it's it's there's the fluorescent light bulbs, which are the brighter ones and better.
00:01:30
Speaker
I mean, where are the other ones called again? Halogens. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I miss I miss the warm glow of halogen bulbs. ah Yeah, that's what I've got here in in my room.
00:01:44
Speaker
One of those burnt out, though, so it's a little darker than normal. I just replaced all the light bulbs in my place with LEDs, and it just I'm like, i this is this is not my home.
00:01:56
Speaker
It's too weird. I can't get used to it. Yeah, no, that's fair. Well, welcome back, Flav. ah You get to join us in a yearly thing that we get to do on the first episode of April.
00:02:07
Speaker
Well, the first April episode of the of the of the year where we recap all of the gaming April fools, or not all of them, but a good chunk. of them because there's so much that happens on April Fool's. Sometimes it's just posts.
00:02:20
Speaker
Sometimes they people do things in their games. And we get to recap all of those. You ready to go through and hear everything that happened? Absolutely. I'm excited. There is one thing. I didn't include it because I wasn't sure who you were going to get as a guest, but I did bring up Reverse 1999. They did something for April Fool's. Do you know what it was? And do you want to share that real quick? Because it's not on the list.
00:02:44
Speaker
I remember I signed on that day don't remember what it was actually. Well, he gets that. We'll get through some of these first ones. First off, Rift of the Necrodancer. They released a trailer. I'm assuming one of their employees named Marlin. They're adding Rift of the Marlin Dancer. It's going to come out in 2027.
00:03:06
Speaker
And you just play as this dude named Marlin. Real dude. Just a JPEG of him doing everything that Cadence does. ah I remember what the thing was. All right. What did Reverse 1999 do?
00:03:17
Speaker
So they have, um there's ah there's a little mascot character in the game called a Cardbuncle, which is ah ah a carbuncle, a little little little carbuncle, but with a cardboard helmet.
00:03:27
Speaker
And he's got this perpetual look of horror on his face. Okay. And so they announced that you could you could roll for Cardbuncle. He's the first seven-star character in the game. Oh!
00:03:39
Speaker
Yeah, incredible and everybody was like, why didn't they just make this real? Like, I wish they'd actually done it. Yeah, they could absolutely could have. They absolutely could have. And they should have Konami. They tweeted out that they'd be releasing a five foot body pillow of Silent Hill 2's protagonist, James.
00:03:54
Speaker
And that they should have as well. They would have made they should have done that as well. Yeah. ah But to be fair, I think you can get it through like unofficial sources. Oh, I'm sure. Yeah. Yeah. Bugsnax and I loved what they did ah the developers of Bugsnax they released a trailer for that time I got reincarnated as a Bunger which was just they took the fourth opening of Full Metal Alchemist Brotherhood period by chemistry and every word was Bunger that's the only kind of isekai I want to be watching honestly
00:04:29
Speaker
It was very funny. is probably my favorite opening of Full Metal Alchemist Brotherhood. Still haven't watched the show, but I've seen all the openings because, you know, I'm a fucking J-Rock music man who likes anime songs.
00:04:44
Speaker
But it's very funny. If you want to get your daily dose of Bunger, just go listen to that. Control Resonant tweeted release date. Yeah, they tweeted their release date for the game, ah but it was actually just a picture of some dates behind bars.
00:05:00
Speaker
The funniest of ah April Fool's jokes, Owlbrick, made by Owlcat Games. This is a console for CRPGs that they made a video for.
00:05:11
Speaker
Sega and I gotta give props to Sega they made their logo 3% more blue and they also released official Sanic Sanic t-shirts for April 1st and only April 1st so I think you could have actually ordered that if you did let us know how they are and their quality Atari made a website called Bubsy Paws which is just Bubsy's feet on a website it's just a website full of Bubsy the cat's paws man, this Gooner stuff's getting out of control. Come on.
00:05:46
Speaker
IGN. i Because I know that there were like reports of talks ah and like real talks about a ah that PlayStation is making going to make like an AI controller that could help you play your games and stuff.
00:05:59
Speaker
Well, IGN made a video for a fake PS5 products called the Playmo, which would play your games for you. Really leaning into to those alleged rumors and whatnot. So yeah.
00:06:12
Speaker
Pretty funny there. And it actually does spark a debate of like, if it does become real, would we get it? I'm going to answer that. I would, but only for two specific reasons.
00:06:23
Speaker
And the first is to have it play nine rounds of fucking Pac-Man so I can get the trophy in Pac-Man world repack. Because I am not good at I, I, know I'm not good enough. I tried. I have tried. i can't do it.
00:06:38
Speaker
I am not a God gamer. Like I say, I am for that. I cannot play Pac-Man for the life of me. So I would absolutely like to see my helpful controller buddy.
00:06:50
Speaker
AI play Pac-Man for me. And that would really be the only thing I ever use it for. Final Fantasy fourteen they released an episode of Party Chat with a Moogle and Namazoo mascot.
00:07:00
Speaker
Like IRL mascot. um However, they only spoke in the sounds that the Moogles and the Namazoo's make, so nobody knows what was said, if there even was a message. It was just Moogle sounds and Namazoo sounds. Yes, yes.
00:07:14
Speaker
For Honor released Mirror Mode, which mirrored everything in the game for of the day. All the maps, controls, I think, were mirrored. a lot Everything was basically mirrored for the day. We're very funny.
00:07:26
Speaker
CD Projekt Red announced the Roach controller for Witcher 3, which stands for Ride on my Controller Horse. It is a hobby horse controller. that they were going to release to make it your horse riding experience, which are three more immersive as they put repo announced Pico, which was, Hey, what if we made peak, but in the repo engine payday three released a new non payday character game mode. It was just a trailer for it. Uh, not actual gameplay power wash simulator to announced that they're working on a dating SIM called to date. The dirt is coming to the Wii console on October sixty seven
00:08:07
Speaker
Donald Glover, Yoshi, a mascot of Yoshi, and Yoshinobu Yamamoto of the Dodgers did the Spider-Man pointing meme because they're all Yoshi. Arxis announced Guilty Bear, the brand new bear fighting game that they're apparently working on.
00:08:24
Speaker
Overwatch added Underwatch as a separate game mode, and you can still play that in arcade in arcade mode in the game currently, I believe. Or it's like it's leaving soon, but you can still play that. It's a bunch of Overwatch always does like a bunch of like funny gag reworks to all their characters every April Fool's. And they made it a separate game mode ah this time around. So you can still play it for
Week in Review: Major Game Stories
00:08:47
Speaker
a bit longer than April Fool's.
00:08:49
Speaker
Dragon Ball Legends announced a new character you can pull for. It's Farmer Goku. So now now you can get Goku in Farmattire. Uma Musume made an Uma version of the opening for Midori no Maki Bao, baul which is an old horse racing anime.
00:09:06
Speaker
ah So instead of the horses, it's just the Uma girls. Dave the Diver and real fishing v Real VR Fishing announced a collaboration coming June 2026. But this one actually might be real, apparently. yeah I saw that. And they just decided releasing this one and this day would be funny.
00:09:26
Speaker
But it turns out this one might be real, so stay tuned for potentially more info on that later in the year. Peak added kicking to replace helping people up, so instead of reaching out your hand to pull somebody up, you would kick instead, and it uses up all your stamina in your stamina bar to do that.
00:09:44
Speaker
it's though It's the best update that they've added to it was. And then ah near it announced ah near cosmic horror, a new game or a new title that they're working on. Unsure if it's real or not, but from the sounds of things, it's not, but they did announce a new near project.
00:10:03
Speaker
Yeah, it's it turns it turns out it it is fake. And I love that ah Square Enix joke. The April Fool's joke for the year is, hey, we're going to be releasing releasing a game that somebody actually wants to fucking play.
00:10:16
Speaker
Yeah. Just kidding. April Fool's. Just kidding. Play Final Fantasy XIV. Go look at the Moogle over there. but But that was a small recap of some of the things that happened this April Fool's.
00:10:29
Speaker
Some cool things. I got to play the Peak Update, ah actually, because it was a fellow a friend of the podcast and Drusk's anniversary on April 1st. So we played some Peak.
00:10:40
Speaker
it was pretty The kicking was pretty funny, but the map that day sucked ass. ah you You know what? Not a bad April Fool's. A pretty tame April Fool's all in all this year. Yeah, nothing nothing to world ending, think.
00:10:59
Speaker
Unfortunately, you know, we would love, we we would have loved to see some world ending news on April fools. It would have been, it would have just spiced it up. You got spice up the holiday guys. Give us new meaning to doom scrolling.
00:11:13
Speaker
I don't know. ah Well, that that was April Fools. And now we can talk about all the other shit that happened ah in the last two weeks. ah Here is what happened in the week in review.
00:11:25
Speaker
Recapping the major stories of video games and the world of tabletop, looking over recent releases and reports from the Game Lounge crew, it's the week in review. Starting off some of the major game releases that happened these past two weeks.
00:11:38
Speaker
ah Beyond Words is out now. ah This is that brand new roguelike Scrabble game made by the creators of TimeSplitters. Which is a very weird sentence to say ah with the shift with the jump of ah genres and style of games.
00:11:59
Speaker
GoldenEye, TimeSplitters, and Roguelike Scrabble. Yeah, I played the demo for it back in Steam Next Fest. It's pretty fun. So I would say go check that out. Pokemon Champions launched through a very...
00:12:12
Speaker
Not great reception with only certain Pokemon being allowed to be brought into the game through Pokemon Home and also just a lot of issues with the online and other things. So it had a ah rocky launch.
00:12:28
Speaker
Darwin's Paradox launched as well. People of Note, Legacy of King Descendants, and I Am Jesus Christ. I actually played and completed I Am Jesus Christ on ah Easter Sunday.
00:12:40
Speaker
How is it? It's surprisingly charming. You'd expect it would be a lot worse than it is. It's very basic. But you can tell that the the people who made it put some effort into it. And it's really nice to play a game that just runs really well now. you know just It's well made for just being like the Gospels, right? Yeah. Like it is just the story of, you know, and then the depth. death and the resurrection, like theby meeting the apostle apostles and all the the whole book thing, the whole Bible thing, the the whole book. Yes. The Bible, the Bible. It, it does remind me an awful lot of like oblivion.
00:13:20
Speaker
oh That's okay. It looks kind of like what like ah the Elder Scrolls Oblivion looks like. It just like but slightly better looking. Huh?
00:13:32
Speaker
Yeah. Wow. Yeah. I wasn't upset with like eight. took me about eight hours, 12 bucks. Can't complain. You know what? Fair. Fair. ah And it's ah currently only on Steam, but I can't wait to see its console release. Because, hey, you know what? If they add that to PlayStation Plus, I'm not a religious guy, but a Platinum's a Platinum.
00:13:53
Speaker
Yeah, there you go. Oh, it doesn't have achievements, huh? oh Oh, God. Yeah, it doesn't have achievements. I was a little bummed about that myself. I'm like, dude, I 100%ed this game Yeah, you okay, you know no, no. I am Jesus Christ developers. Hello.
00:14:09
Speaker
I'm sure you weren't expecting a message from me, Tony Game Lounge. ah Add achievements, please. i i just it but It makes games cooler, if you didn't know. it makes them camp with the kids.
00:14:22
Speaker
Let us pray achievements.
00:14:27
Speaker
ah So yeah, those are some of the games that came out this past two weeks. Moving on to video game news. a Quick start because today, the day of recording, was the Triple I Initiative 2026 showcase.
00:14:38
Speaker
So i we quickly skimmed through that got ah and just some things to let you guys know of. First, Super Battle Golf is coming to consoles in the summer. PS5, Series X, and Switch 2.
00:14:50
Speaker
Dead as Disco enters early access on May 5th. This is that rhythm game that lets you import your own songs and fight and do combat to those. we got We're getting a new Don't Starve game. Don't Starve Elsewhere was announced.
00:15:05
Speaker
And a big one, Sledding Game enters early access April 30th for $7.99
00:15:15
Speaker
I just have to say, with the triple-I initiative thing, um my favorite devs, the devs from A Thousand Times Resist, which I talked about in length yes last time I was on, they announced their new game, Prove You're Human.
00:15:29
Speaker
Ooh! Which is looking to be some extra deep schizocore. So... Very cool. I would um vo recommend go checking out the showcase. It's about 45 minutes of game trailers, and then ah it continues with like some dev interviews after that.
00:15:47
Speaker
um So please go check that out, as I was not able to grab everything from that showcase in time for this episode. So please go check it out. It's a got a lot of cool indie games. I think I saw another We Were Here was announced.
00:15:58
Speaker
as well as a bunch of other things. So if you want to first look at some really cool looking indie games, please go check out that showcase. some zombie game news, Undead Labs dropped a major positive update on the long-awaited next State of Decay game, revealing that players will be getting their hands on State of Decay 3 with the launch of Alpha Playtests coming in a May.
00:16:23
Speaker
And now I've never played a State of Decay game, but the stuff that we've seen... For State of Decay 3, all those a cup like a year or so ago looked cool. And it looks like this is going to ah looks like a really cool zombie game with everything that I've seen. And I would like to try it once I see more stuff for it.
00:16:42
Speaker
Resident Evil and the Evil Within creator Shinji Mikami's new studio Unbound Inc. has joined Shift Up, the developer behind Stellar Blades and Goddess of Victory, Miike. The two companies announced their partnership in a video that offers strong hints about Mikami's next game.
00:16:58
Speaker
It's the Pokemon news. Home support has arrived for Legends ZA and I can now officially say that I've completed my living decks. Woo. Finally, after so many years, I added Hoopa to my living decks, finally getting me the shiny Magearna reward that you get for completing it.
00:17:21
Speaker
Thank God it's done. Now I just gotta wait for winds and waves to come out to do more, but that's easy work compared to what I've had to wait through.
00:17:34
Speaker
Also in Pokemon news, Pacopia and Ikea collaborated with Ikea making a dream island. You can go visit. The furniture company posted a detailed breakdown of the event on its official website as part of IKEA's 20th anniversary in Japan, including Pokemon themed rooms with actual IKEA furniture that will be on showcase in select stores.
00:17:56
Speaker
i fit I rolled credits on Pocopia. It's a good game, but God damn it. Does my OCD not like that game? Oh my god, my OCD has so many issues with that game.
00:18:10
Speaker
i like there's too much Terraforming that in like building that want to do that's just like I can't I can't physically like bring myself to like there's just too much I can't I so I just rolled credits like I'm done.
00:18:26
Speaker
I did it. I saw the ending. I'm done. I'm okay. I'm good. Sometimes you gotta know when to walk away. ah Yeah. And Pocopia is one of those for me.
00:18:38
Speaker
ah In Nintendo news, Bob-omb Blast was added into Mario Kart World finally. So now you can do but one of everybody's favorite battle modes in the game.
00:18:52
Speaker
In an interview with Screen Rant, Jack Black has now gone on record to say that he'd love to participate in any live-action Yakuza adaptation. No. No, stick Jack. OK, look, I got nothing against the guy, but I have serious Jack Black fatigue lately.
00:19:10
Speaker
You don't need to be in every fucking movie, my dude. And also we've had we have a live action Yakuza film it's directed by Takashi Miike, one of my personal favorite directors. It's wonderful. You can watch the whole thing on YouTube, actually. That's the ah that's yeah the one of the two, the 2000s one, right? Yep.
00:19:28
Speaker
Yep. Yep. Yeah, and then also Sega did also release a three-part miniseries as well, a live-action miniseries that recaps Kiwami, or it recaps 1 and 2, or like 0, 1 and 2. It recaps the first two games or first three games at the time. Yeah, something like that. They just released that.
00:19:50
Speaker
And then there is also that... ah Oh, God. Amazon Prime Yakuza series. That was not good. Yeah, I heard it was not good. Yeah.
00:20:01
Speaker
So you you got all of those that you could go check out instead. People online are saying, well, Jack Black could play Gondawara. ah you know, the baby diaper patriarch of the Tojo clan. Have him play Haruka. Then I'll watch it. ah I was going to say, look, if they really wanted to, they could have Jack Black play Miracle Johnson. They could. i havent beat no no, no, no. He's got to be Amon.
00:20:31
Speaker
Jack Black plays it mod. Yeah, there it is. That's how you do it. There it is. That's how you do it. Sega, hire these men.
00:20:44
Speaker
ah Microsoft announced that its annual Xbox Game Showcase will take place Sunday, June 7th. The initial live stream will be followed by a deep dive into Gears of War E-Day, the new Gears game from the Coalition.
00:21:00
Speaker
ah Are you a Gears guy at all, ah Flavorful? Did you play the Gears 4 games? i missed I missed out on Gears. I kind of stopped being a console gamer right like right during the Xbox 360's release window era. Oh, okay.
00:21:15
Speaker
Yeah, I ended up, I got really, really addicted to StarCraft Brood War. there's a a long Yeah, stayed and staying up all night to catch GOM TV streams of the ah the ah Korean Star League series.
00:21:28
Speaker
So, yeah. Okay, okay. oh Well, I'm going to jump ahead to a story here because you said that. According to a recent job listing, Blizzard is cooking up a new game in an engine and a genre that none of its releases have used before. The studio is looking for a lead designer innovation to run development on a AAA open world shooter without a name currently.
00:21:52
Speaker
People are theorizing that a new StarCraft might be in the works. So this ah having heard this news a little while back to I was thinking they have somewhat of the bones of this was and ah a game that never got released by Blizzard called Starcraft Ghost.
00:22:09
Speaker
o Where you played as as a ghost um and you did like infiltration, exfiltration missions. You had your cloaking and the, you know, sniper rifle, that kind of stuff. And it it was almost complete.
00:22:24
Speaker
um And they shit canned it. um And I don't believe they ever gave reasons to why they said no, but it was supposed to release for PC in the original Xbox. Oh.
00:22:35
Speaker
And with their with their um having more experience in the shooter space, you know, as of obviously of as the last couple of years with Overwatch, they could, fingers crossed, make something fun and interesting. They could also Blizzard it. Yep.
00:22:53
Speaker
They absolutely could. So that's the coin toss. But we'll keep an eye on that because I do know so people love StarCraft. Mm-hmm. A new gaming subscription service was announced called IndiePass.
00:23:06
Speaker
It's set to launch April 13th with 70 games. However, reception for this is not great. ah Mostly for two reasons. As one, the model for profit on the platform is...
00:23:18
Speaker
a little weird to say the least. And it's, it promotes games that like keep you in a like long gameplay loop. Cause it's like the more a game is played, the more profit the devs make.
00:23:29
Speaker
And of the 70 games, like none of them are like very recognizable that granted, obviously like it's a bunch of like new indie games, taking a chance on a service platform like this.
00:23:40
Speaker
um But I would just maybe try to release your games elsewhere, honestly. um But we'll see how this goes. If it launches, how long it stays around for.
00:23:50
Speaker
ah Maybe it'll work. Maybe it won't. Who knows? A YouTuber, the gaming historian, ah is moving on from making videos. he However, he did leave a parting gift as a ton of ancient Nintendo court documents can now be browsed on the Internet Archive that he uploaded that he found.
00:24:13
Speaker
God save the Internet Archive. It's so wonderful. It is. It absolutely is. Take two interactive as seemingly laid off its head of artificial intelligence alongside an unspecified portion of its AI team.
00:24:27
Speaker
Just two months after CEO Strauss Zelnick said the Grand Theft Auto six publisher was actively embracing generative AI. i don't think they're doing that anymore.
00:24:40
Speaker
Probably not. maybe they probably They're probably walking that one back. Yeah. Yeah. a French consumer group UFC K. Oh, God, it's French.
00:24:51
Speaker
i I like I might be Canadian, but I'm not French Canadian. UFC K. Croissier. Croissant. Croissant.
00:25:02
Speaker
Croissant. It's amazing. They have all of the same letters that we do, but they only pronounce like four of them. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, um with support from the Stop Killing Games initiative, they have filed a lawsuit against Ubisoft over the 2024 shutdown of Racing Game The Crew. So Ubisoft, who just finished a lawsuit, losing a lawsuit in California about the crew getting shut down back in 2024, are now defacing it again in Europe.
00:25:30
Speaker
It couldn't have happened to a better developer. Love to see that. Hey, you know what? At this at this point, Ubisoft should just reinstate the servers for the crew.
00:25:42
Speaker
At this point, they should just do that. do it Crew Resurgence, Crew 1 remake, remastered, re-release, however you want to frame it. I know they don't want to surrender because of the implications, but just just give up, guys. just Just bring it back. Look, look, Expedition 33 already gave you a lot of L's. Oh, L of the wallopin'. So like, just, just, just, just throw in the towel, man. Just re-release the crew at this point.
00:26:18
Speaker
Save yourselves the headache. ah Two and a half months into the filming of Amazon's big budget Tomb Raider TV show, the star and ah new Lara Croft's Sophie Turner has suffered an on-set injury that has paused production currently.
00:26:34
Speaker
Hey, hope for a fast recovery and hope that wasn't anything too major because... I know that yeah we haven't seen a lot of Tomb Raider stuff in a little while. I know that we they announced us some new Tomb Raider games coming in a year or two, a year or so.
00:26:49
Speaker
ah But, you know, I know that people like Tomb Raider, so don't want to see more delays on that stuff. I know Montreal has imposed another round of layoffs announcing that 124 employees have been put out of work.
00:27:04
Speaker
Longtime studio head, David and Foss. He has also left the studio saying it's, ah although that one's unclear as whether that was, ah he resigned or was part of the layoffs. In McDonald's news, McDonald's has introduced pro gamer menu with an arch shaped device that will keep you from going AFK while you eat.
00:27:27
Speaker
But it's only available in Turkey. We never get any of the cool fast food stuff here. We don't. we We really don't. And I'm like, I'm was surprised that they're like, oh, yes, pro gamers only in Turkey.
00:27:42
Speaker
When I think of pro gamers, I think Istanbul, gamer capital of the world. Oh, yeah, absolutely. um But you know what we did get? i don't know if you saw this. We talked about this last week on the podcast.
00:27:55
Speaker
ah A guy, some random guy on the internet made a new gotcha game, free to play, no money involved whatsoever, web-based, called McGotchaPawn.
00:28:07
Speaker
Have you seen this, Laborful? I've not heard of this. No, I have not. But I'm looking it up right now. So basically is a website where you open up Happy Meals and inside the Happy Meals, you collect the toys from the Happy Meals. They'll also have like a burger, fries, milk, chicken nuggets, or the apple slices that you would find in the Happy Meals.
00:28:27
Speaker
ah You can interact with those like eat them. But you're collecting all of the Happy Meals toys. and There's over like 2,300 collect. All across the ages. This is wonderful. This is wonderful news. i know what I'm all the rest of this week. And you can trade in ah your repeat prizes into a ah like the insert three. And you get one of like the CSGO spinning wheels to get a new toy as well.
00:28:58
Speaker
That's wonderful. It's very funny. And I like, oh, considering also, I think the last time you were on our, uh, in the bonus level, we were talking about ah video game, happy meal toys. We were like,
00:29:11
Speaker
it works out that this came out and they're like, Oh, I just got to tell Flav about this. This is absolutely hilarious. It's so good. Overwatch revealed new hero, Sierra, a brand new DPS character. Uh, they are, she is slated to join Overwatch with the launch of its second season, which will begin on April fourteen And Double Dragon and Kunio-kun, or the River City series creator, Yoshihisa Kishimoto has passed away at the age of 64. It was announced by his son on ah X or Blue Sky. It was one of the two. I think it was X. ah Rest in peace, you legend developer.
00:29:52
Speaker
In some ongoing game news, starting off with FF14, the brand new Tomestone event, the Moogle Tomestone event is on until the release of 7.5, which is of April when will release.
00:30:07
Speaker
We also got brand new Mog Station items ah for FanFest. Included are the Final Fantasy VII Hardy Daytona motorcycle, the Red 13 Minion, the Walkway emote, and some new glam and orchestrians.
00:30:24
Speaker
In Fortnite Epic Games news, Dr. Doofinchmertz and Perry the Platypus were added into Fortnite. And Perry the Platypus is buff and humanoid standing.
00:30:37
Speaker
It's a little offsetting, but it's not the worst thing I've seen come from Fortnite. Well, they did also add in the those brain rot characters. Oh, they did. Which went over about as well as you'd expect.
00:30:54
Speaker
Cappuccino Bambi. Oh, God. Yeah. Tun tun tun tun sahur. I know that one, unfortunately. Yeah, they're like, I believe the the Cappuccino one is the worst ranked like out of all of the characters they've ever introduced in Fortnite. there I guess there are sites that track that.
00:31:16
Speaker
My God. Yeah, how popular Fortnite characters are. And and the ah the other one is not doing, as I think, like eighth from last. So kind of incredible. What you think about it?
00:31:30
Speaker
Very funny. In TCG news, starting with Pokemon Mega Evolution Chaos Rising drops May twenty second In Yu-Gi-Oh! Rarity Collection 5 is out now. Chaos Origins drops to June 5th, as does the Battle of Legend Glorious Gallery.
00:31:45
Speaker
In Magic the Gathering, Secrets of Strixhaven launches at the end of the month on April 24th. Marvel Super Heroes comes out June 26th. The Hobbit comes out August 14th, worldwide release.
00:31:58
Speaker
Reality Fracture on October 2nd and Star Trek on November 20th.
00:32:04
Speaker
In Lorcanum releases, Wilds Unknown comes out May 15th, and then Attack of the Vines sometime in quarter three, and Coco and Moor in quarter four. And in the Digimon TCG, Dual Revolution comes May 15th, and the Data Squad and Beat Break starter decks come out May 15th as well.
00:32:24
Speaker
And in some tabletop news, the Octopath Traveler TTRPG rulebook is being published in English this October. ah So you can play through that new tabletop RPG.
00:32:35
Speaker
And Dropout CEO Sam Raich announced that the company will be launching a Kickstarter next month, May 5th, for Game Changer Home Edition. And that is everything in the week in review. Any final thoughts on any of the stories there, Vlave?
00:32:52
Speaker
I mean, losing a losing another person ah in the you know legend in the games industry always sucks. I feel like i'm at this point, I'm two for two with with ah with legends dying on my appearances. So I don't know if that's like bad luck on my part or just circumstances of an aging ah aging ah game creation demographic.
00:33:16
Speaker
well we'll We'll find out the third time you're on. Yeah. If it's circumstantial or not. yeah if it's not if it's If it's you come on and it's not circumstantial, that i i feel like I feel like we just have to not have you on the podcast anymore. We got to stop these people from dropping dead. Jesus.
00:33:32
Speaker
I have but really bad luck with all elderly Japanese men dying right before I come around to save silly things on the internet. ah Sorry, guys. ahll work I'll work on that one.
00:33:44
Speaker
Well, with that, it's time for us to now move on to the games that are coming out very soon. Here's what should be on your radar from April 13th to 24th. From AAA titles, indie hits, hidden gems, and hot pieces of garbage, here are the games coming out that should be on your radar. And starting off on the 13th, Before I Go comes out on the PS5 Series X Switch and PC.
00:34:06
Speaker
On the 14th, Dosa Dives, One Last Meal comes to the PS5 Series X, Switch It 1 and 2, and PC. Hades 2 gets its console release on the Series X and PS5. Last Flag comes to the PC as well as We Gotta Go. And Replaced comes to the Series X and PC.
00:34:24
Speaker
No releases on the 15th, but on the 16th, Cthulhu, the cosmic abyss comes to PS5 series X and PC Arab on shadow. Legacy comes to the PS5 series X ground zero PS5 series X and PC mouse. He I for hire comes to the PS5 series X switch one and two and PC.
00:34:44
Speaker
Opus Prism Peak comes the Switch 1 and 2 in PC. Syntopia comes to the PC. The Day I Became a Bird comes to the PS5 Switch in PC. And Tamadachi Life, Living the Dream, comes to the Switch.
00:34:58
Speaker
On the 17th, Generation Exile comes to the PC. And Pragmata releases for the PS5, Series X, Switch 2, and PC. No releases on the 20th, but on the 21st, Albion Online comes to the Series X. And the Vampire Crawlers releases on the PlayStation 5, Series X, Switch, and PC.
00:35:18
Speaker
On the 22nd, Masters of Albion releases on the PC. And Tides of Tomorrow comes to the PS5, Series X, and PC. On the 23rd, Dragon is Dead comes to the PS5, Series X, and Switch.
00:35:30
Speaker
Kill PS5, Series X, and PC. Outbound releases as well for the PS5 Series X, Switch 1 and 2, and PC. And Sunny Strike 5 comes to the PS5 Series X and PC. And lastly on the 24th, Little Nightmares VR, Altered Echoes, The Quest 2 and 3, PSVR 2, and PC VR.
00:35:53
Speaker
And that is all the releases. ah got a lot of the major releases coming out. There's a couple to cover here. It's a stacked month. It is. It's a April is when we start to see all the releases coming through.
00:36:07
Speaker
and starting off first off, guys, shout out Hades to love Hades to a lot. Uh, honestly, one of my favorite roguelites, one of my favorite games of all time, honestly, uh, just with the sheer amount of hours I have in that game compared to the first one. Uh, I played it in early access. I played it when it officially came out on PC.
00:36:28
Speaker
I'm not going to getting it right away on PlayStation five because I'm going to probably hold off platinum Hades one first. And then if I then when I've done that, I'll apply the Hades two because I will platinum that game.
00:36:40
Speaker
I love Hades two. I will platinum that goddamn game. Hell yeah. I do. I do have one minor bone to pick with your list. Oh, Moomin troll winter's warmth is not on it.
00:36:54
Speaker
Oh, that's right. a new Moomin game. What is April 27th? Moomin is no it's it's a cartoon series. It's a ah Norwegian a cartoon series ah where the characters, the Moomins, they're like, how?
00:37:15
Speaker
sheep dog things it's very adorable and the first game Snufkin Melody of Moomin Valley came out last year and was ridiculously good oh the coziest I know okay no i have seen this thing but I just googled it i I have seen this thing I didn't know what they were man the moment oh yes so cool um if if this winter's warmth the demo is out you can play it um It's ah especially for like I grew up with Moomin stuff. I know especially like any of our Scandinavian listeners will if they didn't know that there are Moomin games. Now you do and you should play them because they're great.
00:38:00
Speaker
Good to know. ah Moving on to the 16th mouse PI for hire. The new ah boomer shooter where you are in a good old Oh, God. What? Like, rubble an animation yeah, this looks it's been on my wish list for forever.
00:38:19
Speaker
ma i am very excited to get that. The 16th is also a stacked day because you also got Tamodachi Life living the dream. i am. I was a guy I played. I picked up Tamodachi Life on the 3DS on a whim back in college on my way to work because I'm like, oh, you know what? I'm going to need something to do. It was a cheap.
00:38:41
Speaker
bar It was in the bargain bin or like it was like on sale at ah EB Games or GameStop because EB Games is the Canadian GameStop. We used to have EB Games in the States too, actually.
00:38:54
Speaker
Oh. I think it depended on like what states you were in of which ones more like ops or which ones had EB Games. Anyway, I loved the original Tomodachi Life on the 3DS. One of my favorite games of all time.
00:39:08
Speaker
And I played the demo for living the dream. And I am, i am so, you have like no idea. Like mentally I am like, I want it to be the 16th already. Can it be the 16th already? I want to play this game.
00:39:22
Speaker
I Nintendo, here is my wallet. I'm going to pre-order the game this weekend. Well, actually you guys listening this on the Monday. So I'm going crazy because there's a longer gap between when you guys are listening to this So when we're actually recording this, right I am, i I have, I am, but Nintendo, I will bark.
00:39:44
Speaker
but ah Guys on the 16th, after I've done my final fantasy dailies, I will be starting an early stream as I will be making the entire game lounge crew in Tamodachi life.
00:40:00
Speaker
ah And we will just be playing that game like all day on stream. um So look forward to that. We're going to make mellow. We're going to make the trash man. We're going to make carrots and slave. Both of them will be ah made in the game. Everybody that is a part of the game. I'm screw will get a me made for them that day.
00:40:22
Speaker
And if they, and to the game, I'm screw members who do listen to the podcast, I'll be making an announcement, but I'll just say this. Y'all will hop in the VC if you want to and can help me make you in game.
00:40:35
Speaker
So that's what we're doing on the 16th. Look forward to that. The excitement is palpable. It is. It very much is. I'm just i'm just i'm super excited for that game. I am so excited.
00:40:50
Speaker
ah Also, I forgot to mention this in the news. They announced the release date for the new Rhythm Heaven game. It's coming out ah July 2nd, I think is what they said. it was it was June or July 2nd. think it's July 2nd because that's a Thursday compared to a Tuesday in June.
00:41:09
Speaker
It's one of those two dates. Look it up on Twitter. They announced it like today. We're on Thursday. ah Also, Pragmatov releases as well. Capcom's new a big title.
00:41:23
Speaker
um That's been... People are excited for that. ah I'm not super crazy for... I'm not playing it, but I know that a lot of people will be.
00:41:34
Speaker
um ah On the 21st, Vampire Crawlers, the unofficial sequel to Vampire Survivors. I say unofficial because it's not like Vampire Survivors 2, but it is it's the same people who did Vampire Survivors. It is a card.
00:41:54
Speaker
It's a deck built. It's a deck. I got a freaking. Let me grab the Google ai it's a deck bill It's a deck building card battler dungeon crawler.
00:42:07
Speaker
Yes. Deck building dungeon crawling roguelike. And it's in the vampire survivors universe. Dang. Look at, look at them breaking the mold. Another deck building roguelike. Haven't played one of those this year, last year or the year before or the year before that.
00:42:28
Speaker
Yeah. Uh, I will say this. I love vampire survivors. I've been playing it on my off time on my switch. Cause it's like, it just, it's a great game for the switch, honestly. Um, and I'd like, I've actually further than I've ever played. Cause I played it originally on, cause it was a free game on Epic. Um,
00:42:44
Speaker
I remember that. It was during the year that I played like over 150 games or whatever. It was like during that year that I played it. So I played it for like three hours. I'm like, oh this was fun.
00:42:54
Speaker
I have now played it for more than that. And i ah just unlocked the yellow sign And for those who know how to unlock the yellow sign, I don't know how I did it, but it's just, I was just playing one of the maps.
00:43:08
Speaker
These eyeballs started surrounding me. Everything was swirling and all of a sudden I'm somewhere else. I'm like, what the fuck happened? I thought my game crashed, but no, they pulled some wacky shit out of that. It was wild. I love that game so much. One of my favorite, another one of my favorite roguelikes of all time.
00:43:29
Speaker
Honestly. Also, Masters of Albion releases. This is the new Peter Molyneux game where you play as a god hand and you look over a ah small town that you help ah build and thrive and you can fight the monsters that attack it by fucking zapping them with lightning.
00:43:47
Speaker
ah little It's a new god sim that you should go check out. that ah with We saw a little gameplay demo before. It looks really cool. ah On the 23rd, Outbound has been a game on my wish list for a while as well.
00:44:02
Speaker
This is an RV survival crafting game. i don't know. I don't know but how much of a crafting element it'll have, but it's an RV survival game. You have an RV. You drive around or not an RV. You have a little motor van, a big van.
00:44:17
Speaker
it's ah it's like ah It's like a Volkswagen bus. There's a couple you can choose from. I actually played ah all the way through the demo with Mama Carrots. um And I'm really excited to to play it. I think it's up to four players.
00:44:31
Speaker
And the the survival aspect of it is very light. like You have health and stamina, and you can like you have to you you have to eat. You have like a hunger meter. um But it's it's mostly just really a casual like drive around, explore, craft stuff kind of situation. Very, very much on the cozier end of the survival spectrum.
00:44:54
Speaker
Yeah, I'm going to be grabbing it for PlayStation because I think this is a cool game to platinum. ah And I've been on like a platinum kick this year. Well, yeah we we all know it's not about beating the games. It's about showing everyone online that you did.
00:45:10
Speaker
Yeah, it really is. i gotta fill my ego somehow. And Platinum Trophies are that. Like, it's... I don't know what it is. Like, this year... Like, for the past, like, couple years for video games for me, I've had... It's been, like...
00:45:26
Speaker
Oh God, what was it? yeah When did I start? When did I release that first video? So two years ago, it was the year of the backlog where I like basically emptied out like all of my Steam and Epic Games backlogs on top of playing all the new games that came out that I wanted to play.
00:45:44
Speaker
Last year was a much more chill year. where but will we still played a hundred games. And then this year seems to be the year of my PlayStation backlog. Cause I went back and platinumed a bunch of games that i wanted to platinum.
00:45:58
Speaker
Uh, I have platinum to more games this year in the first like month for first four months that I did with like all the games I played last year. I have more platinum trophies. Uh,
00:46:13
Speaker
which is very crazy to say. um But yes, those are all the cool games that are coming out. And also everything else that was on the list as well. um So let us know, let ah go check those out. See what's, see what is a interest in peaks, your interest for you. ah Cause there's some cool stuff on there. Cause I gotta say, ah i might also check out the day I became a bird.
00:46:36
Speaker
That one looks, that one
Yakuza Series Deep Dive
00:46:39
Speaker
looks interesting. I'm on the fence about it, but it's it's so interesting. I'm pulling up the Steve page for it because, oh, that is an art style.
00:46:49
Speaker
Yeah, it's it. It looks like I don't know. It's just very like that movie. Frank, do you know the movie Frank with the dude who has the where's the big helmet? the I don't. Hmm.
00:47:06
Speaker
but I don't watch a lot of movies. So movies are usually never a great thing to help me. It's okay. Here we go. A playable in this playable bedtime story. Follow Frank through a little done. You play as Frank as well.
00:47:24
Speaker
ah Follow Frank through a slice of his life, biking to school, running around the park, completing puzzles, making memories, and discovering newfound feelings in his classmate Sylvia. Help Frank learn more about her, uncover her interests, and ultimately hatch a plan to catch her eye.
00:47:40
Speaker
Come along for a warm, nostalgic return to childhood. This is one for ah for the hopeful romantics. Let your hearts flutter, spread your wings, and soar. ah Maybe go check that out. That's a. Maybe I might check that out.
00:47:58
Speaker
It's got a really cute art style. Yeah, a room it's very ah children's picture book. Yes. Yeah, it absolutely is. I might go check that out. It's on PlayStation. They'll see how much it costs.
00:48:12
Speaker
If it's got achievements, you know, your boy's getting it. yeah You know it. All right. Oh, with that, it's time for us to now dive into our main topic of the day, guys.
00:48:23
Speaker
It's a long one. It's a big one. Oh, we're talking all things Yakuza this week in the Game Lounge. Conversations of past and future games, the state of the gaming industry, how big decisions affect gamers and anything else that's important to us. Here's what's going down this week in the Game Lounge.
00:48:41
Speaker
And here we are, the Yakuza special. For those who want some context of why we're talking Yakuza, I believe it was like at the end of the last episode we had Flavon. ah We briefly brought up Yakuza. It's like, oh, we're both into this. let's It was it was a very, you know, I love finding fellow Yakuza enthusiasts, ah enjoyers.
00:49:04
Speaker
And, you know, figured we should get that Yakuza special going. So we're talking everything about the franchise, especially with Kiwami 3's recent release and ah controversies.
00:49:16
Speaker
ah The Stranger Than Heaven ah getting its first like trailer, but only to that it's like, oh, we're going to be doing a deep dive later on and everything. i figured let's talk everything Yakuza today. So, Vlave, starting with our first question, what was it that got you into Yakuza?
00:49:35
Speaker
It was actually just circumstance. It was just the luck of the draw. i was ah you know a younger a younger flavorful looking through a bin of ah discounted PS2 games.
00:49:50
Speaker
And one of them just happened to be OG Yakuza. And it was like... I picked it up with another, i' like, I think it got like Odin Sphere at the same time. And I was like, oh, cool. Like, cause I had heard in passing of the series and all I had heard was like, oh, it's like, it's kind of like Grand Theft Auto, but Japanese.
00:50:10
Speaker
Right. Which is how, how everybody described PS2 era games is like, it's kind of like Grand Theft Auto, but Japanese. And for, I think I picked it up for like six bucks.
00:50:22
Speaker
Oh, that's a deal. Yeah. And I was like, cool. So and I played it hit and I was like, this is not like Grand Theft Auto. No, it is not at all. It has like fixed camera angles and stuff. and i'm like, this is like like, what does this remind me of?
00:50:39
Speaker
And it reminded me of Shenmue.
00:50:43
Speaker
And it's the same, you know, Yakuza was supposed to be a Shenmue. however you pronounce that game's name. Yeah. It was supposed to be one of those games, but sort of just ended up being like, oh, well, we'll just spin it off, make it its own thing.
00:50:59
Speaker
This many years later, it's now Shenmue is functionally dead. And Yakuza seems to be just kicking along just fine. Yeah. well that's ah The only games I haven't played like of the mainline games are the original one and two.
00:51:14
Speaker
um the original for the first one i from what i understand from the western release of it okay was there like an option for a language in the first one like me englishabism was it just English english english it was just English yeah yeah and I know that the original English dub is very it's something and Mark Hamill is there Mark Hamill is part of the yes yeah it is something It is something.
00:51:46
Speaker
ah So from there, then that's what got you into it. And then you played the rest chronologically or I played, I played the first one and then I sort of got, ah you know, just what like, I wasn't involved with the series for quite a while until well, until zero, uh, like,
00:52:08
Speaker
made it to PC because I had stopped playing games on console for the most part. Yeah. So when I played zero, cause I was like, Oh hell yeah. Like, cool. I remember Yakuza. I had a great time with the original back when I was a kid, loved zero, ah emulated two and played OG two and then played the Kiwamis. And the only one, the only ones that I haven't played in mainline or, um, Kiwami three, which just came out.
00:52:37
Speaker
um And I haven't played Kenzan because we haven't had a we haven't had a Western release of western release of that. or And I haven't played Dead Souls. yeah And I haven't played the PSP ones and the MMO.
00:52:53
Speaker
because Yeah, the yeah MMO is no longer operational. Yeah. Yeah. So. Yeah, so I got it to Yakuza originally. It was thanks to the video game Dunkey's Yakuza Zero video.
00:53:08
Speaker
ah As I saw that, I'm like, oh, that was interesting. I need out the game right away. And then I remember Achievement Hunter, I believe, played Yakuza Kiwami 1.
00:53:21
Speaker
And in one of the compilation videos of like, so like just like, cause I think they did like a live stream for it. And it's like, Oh, they did highlights for that stream.
00:53:31
Speaker
And I remember seeing this stuff, the Majima everywhere system and everywhere like that. I'm like, this looks interesting. And it's like, I kind of see bit more gameplay for that.
00:53:43
Speaker
And then I think a clip of like, I think it was like little Karibo. ah he was talking about the Yakuza series as well. And I'm like, okay, maybe I should, maybe I should check this out.
00:53:57
Speaker
And so I go to the PlayStation store because this was before I had my PC. I was like basically just the PlayStation and Nintendo gamer. ah Cause that's all I had for video game consoles.
00:54:11
Speaker
So I lock boot up the PS4, go to the PlayStation store and look up Yakuza. And there are two games available. Kiwami 1 and 0. And 0 was like 70 bucks at the time, and Kiwami 1 was like half the price.
00:54:24
Speaker
So I'm like, well, we'll get Kiwami 1 right now to play that and try out. Loved it. Absolutely enjoyed every minute playing that game.
00:54:35
Speaker
ah And then I got zero and I became hooked on the franchise and I played it like the perfect time where it was like a couple months after I had finished zero Kiwami to release.
00:54:48
Speaker
And i played that as like, oh, there's also Yakuza six on there too now as well. I'm like, I can't play six yet because I think that they'll maybe make like a Kiwami three or whatever.
00:55:02
Speaker
But they just released the three, four and five collection HD. And I'm like, oh, yeah, play that. And basically the rest is history. I've been playing every release in the West since ah that.
00:55:15
Speaker
And that's what got me into the franchise. Nice. It's it's very. well it so It's very fun. It's ah so it's just fun to go punch things.
00:55:30
Speaker
It is. And I found that like there when you when you like Yakuza as a series, when you like the RGG games, you're in deep. Yeah. Because they do not skimp on giving you all kinds of stuff to do.
00:55:45
Speaker
I mean, if you want to, let's just any of the let's zero, for example, which I still think is the best introduction to the series for somebody who hasn't played. If you want to do everything in that game, you're in there for a good couple hundred hours.
00:55:59
Speaker
Yes. There is so much like the main story is it's what is one thing and the story. Fantastic. So, so good. The store overarching story from game to game of like the crossover for everything is very good.
00:56:14
Speaker
ah Like, yes, it's going to have its highs and lows. Obviously, all big stories do. Yakuza 3. We'll get to Yakuza 3. We'll be we' be going through every game like individually ah here. But ah boy, oh boy, ah is there a lot to say about 3. But um but Highs and lows of the story, highs and lows of gameplay, highs and lows of the mini games and other things that are brought in.
00:56:41
Speaker
Before we get on going into each game individually, Flav, a quick character question for you. ah Who are your favorite characters and their combat styles to play as in the Yakuza franchise?
00:56:56
Speaker
And who are just your favorite characters like overall in the series? Oh, man. so ah I have to... i Everyone and in the in the main office in Lost Judgment, Saori and Yagami and Kaito, those three, like being able to play as... like Judgment and Lost Judgment really stand out to me as my favorite combat in all of the all of the games.
00:57:30
Speaker
Well, 100% agree with you. laws Lost judgment more for me than judgment because yeah ah they just improved it even further, honestly, from the first one.
00:57:40
Speaker
um But absolutely, 100% agree with you for that. Yeah, I just like... the all just just Oh, just so... Jumping off of a wall to dropkick somebody...
00:57:54
Speaker
as you're like running by them to just get somewhere else, so satisfying. It is. um I also really like Shun's combat. Shunaki on this combat. Oh, yes. Yeah. Yeah. akiaba Yeah. yeah um And then Kiryu in the in Gaiden.
00:58:14
Speaker
Yeah. the man who sold was it the man who sold his name was raised his name. The I thought it was going to be really gimmicky with all the like the the spy gadget stuff, but it ah casting drone swarm and watching everything around get beat to shit by a thousand drones is really hilarious. Yeah, it absolutely. Yes. smoking exploding cigarettes and throwing them on somebody so they can't get back up hilarious who Spider-Man tech yes oh god it's so funny it's so crazy that they were able to make that work
00:58:50
Speaker
how they By all means, it shouldn't have. because When I started the game, I was like, okay, this is some weird gimmicky bowl, right? But then you start, like get once you get into it, and you've like you're starting to max out some of that stuff. It's like, yeah, like this is cool. Yeah. ah No, I out ah legit i kind of agree with you with like all those spots. My one addition, and I know it's a very controversial addition,
00:59:19
Speaker
I ah ah actually know it's not really controversial. I like Seijima in five. i like his yeah more tanky style in five over what it was in four. i feel like more powerful in five. Yeah.
00:59:32
Speaker
Yeah. Seijima is like a great extension of ah I don't know. Like I reminded me a little bit of curious beast mode. Yes. Yes. I felt like a better ball mode. Yeah. If ah it's better be. Yeah. Seijima's better beast mode is is awesome for sure.
00:59:49
Speaker
Yeah, no, absolutely. that's That's the only one I would add on to that list ah personally. Character-wise for myself, i could... the Yeah, the whole office of Lost Judgment. ah it's they they have The Judgment games have such a great cast.
01:00:07
Speaker
Honestly, honestly i would just say like the entire like original cast of Judgment One is fantastic as well. Absolutely. Absolutely. The characters, it it it really has, I love the standard Yakuza story. Yes. taking that and doing a like detective, almost a procedural drama, like a law and order situation. Yeah.
01:00:31
Speaker
It just works so well. but It does. And it's a shame that it's like we're most likely never going to get a third one because of issues that ah it was like a dispute between like the action. It was it was the it was the agency that he was working for Johnny's that um initially didn't even want. They were like, no, you can't put that game on ah PC because people rip the models and we own the likeness of this of of this actor. However, Johnny's as a company doesn't exist anymore.
01:01:04
Speaker
Oh, they got got in a ah some money laundering shit and some allegations of ah adult misconduct, let's say.
01:01:14
Speaker
oh so they it could happen. It's it's still it is on the table. So what I would I wouldn't say no to a third judgment game. I'd love it. I think having a third one and then calling it ah having it there as a trilogy would be good.
01:01:30
Speaker
Yes. Yeah, we definitely could. Because I think, well, when we actually talk about the games, we'll talk about the story and stuff. So we'll I'll save that for a later. Yeah. ah Yes. yeah Because we we have a lot to talk about, folks. Okay.
01:01:42
Speaker
Moving on to the games individually. individually We're going to start off with the main series. um ah Let's start with zero. where the The point where a lot of Yakuza players will tell you, start there.
01:01:56
Speaker
And for, I mean, just for good reason. For good reason. It's polished. It is. Yeah, it is. It's runs on the same. runs on the same drag. The, the dragon engine version that five ran on. It was just more polished.
01:02:12
Speaker
m And then they polished it a little bit more with Kalani one eventually, like it just does, ah but, but zero still feels very nice. Zero is, it's just a,
01:02:26
Speaker
As far like Pound for... it Like it's not... I wouldn't i won't necessarily say it's my favorite Yakuza game, but I think Pound for Pound, it is the best Yakuza game. i
01:02:39
Speaker
And it does have the best mini game of any. It does have like some of the best mini games. I will agree with you there. It has pocket circuit and that's all. Look, pocket circuit is really. When you know what you're doing in pocket circuit, pocket circuit is very fun.
01:02:54
Speaker
It's so hype. It's so hype. There's not. You can spend ah like tens of hours just pocket circuit racing. I did. I spent I did like an 18 hour stream. Nothing but pocket circuit. Oh, wow.
01:03:06
Speaker
Yeah. That was was a while ago, but it was like, it was, I love it. So Yakuza 0, I guess we'll put a spoiler warning because obviously we will be talking about key points to the story in all the games.
01:03:19
Speaker
So this is your spoiler warning. We were pretty good on spoilers kind of beforehand, but here's the official spoiler warning now, folks. So if you do not want to hear anything, skip ahead to the bonus level ah because this is all we're fucking talking about today. Yeah.
01:03:36
Speaker
pretty much zero ah it's story arguably it i mean ah it is like the best like starting story to get into a franchise ever I think it's I mean that's a that's a pretty strong claim to make out of any franchise ever but it is definitely like it because its functioning as a prequel it opens up you're in the empty lot and you shoot a guy or like you it looks like it's presumed you it it's presumed you shoot a man yeah And then you go and you hand the money to a deck like you're like, oh shit, what kind of world? what What are we in?
01:04:11
Speaker
And it's the Money is everywhere. the but The setting. Dude, boom era Japan ands it in Kamurocho as a setting. oh it's so good.
01:04:24
Speaker
You like and once you start because money is everything in in money is literally everything. Money is the biggest. It is everything you need. and it's your experience points. It's your items. It's your equipment.
01:04:40
Speaker
It is everything. And is that's I will say that is like the only like. I would say that's my also like as cool as everything. It's also like my con that money is everything as well. Because when you lose fights, certain specific fights to specific NPCs in that game. oh the, uh, yeah. Mr. Shakedown. Mr. Shakedown. Who are these bigger enemies? They're bigger than Kiryu. And Kiryu is a big guy.
01:05:07
Speaker
Yeah, these guys are for for ah for a Japanese dude in the 80s, I think he's like canonically like over six feet tall, isn't he? Yeah, he's got yeah these guys are like bat like think and NBA players in height and NFL players in width. yeah ah These guys are bigger. They hit hard.
01:05:24
Speaker
ah You don't do a lot of damage to them unless you're doing hate heat actions, but then then you got to fucking time out your heat. that They were going to fight the more you progress and fight them because it gets stronger every time until you like hit their cap because they do have a cap.
01:05:38
Speaker
ah But they are like the number one way on how to make money fast. well yeah But they're also the number one way on how to lose money fast. What I see, I love that the money, the money is everything being a game mechanic and also a story motif. Considering it's it's not just like, so oh oh, we just didn't want to we didn't want to separate money from experience points.
01:05:59
Speaker
right It's central to the themes of the game. It's central to it's boom era Japan, baby. Make that dough. Make that dough. Get that land deed that's worth so much money for developing a certain big tower in the later games. Yeah, the big tower. The big tower. The Millennium Tower. Spoiler, this is the Millennium Tower. It's the Millennium Tower. It's getting blown up. Zero came out after five.
01:06:34
Speaker
Yeah. So it was everybody knows the Millennium Tower. It's like, oh, this is how it came to be. Yeah. It's um also it's got the best depiction of Majima. My boy. OG Majima before Mad Dog is just like I relate so much to him just when all the shitty jobs I had.
01:06:54
Speaker
the choice He does have like one of the best. He I think has like the best minigame though with the cabaret club. Oh, the cabaret club is so good. Yeah, the cabaret club is like one of the best pieces of side content RGG has made.
01:07:09
Speaker
Yeah, and it's a shame that we've only really seen it. Why three times like that? I think twice like that specifically.
01:07:21
Speaker
Yeah, twice like that. ah which is the best form of the cabaret club. It's i about the other kind up later, but it's because, yeah, you get invested and yeah. And the story is usually pretty good to go along with it. Doing doing the, as you work your way up the chain, beating more and more successful clubs.
01:07:42
Speaker
If you're a person of culture, you might recognize some of the girls from certain videos on the internet. Yeah. Yeah, we haven't talked about ah just if anybody doesn't know ah Japanese adult video actresses feature very prominently in the Akaza series.
01:07:59
Speaker
Very prominently. Usually they are usually cabaret girls. Yeah. Sometimes they might be featured in a side quest. ah
01:08:10
Speaker
but A lot of the girls, if I'm remembering correctly, in Zero, the girls a lot of the girls themselves have their own side stories. changed Yes, every every girl has... like ah Usually, whenever there's a cabaret club in a game, every girl has one sub-story that you would do once you reach ma max affection or yeah max hearts or whatever, max level in the mid-game mode or...
01:08:35
Speaker
you're you're farm You're farming them girls for money. you buy them yeah And you get you get to play dress up with them. It's great. it's and and It's awesome. the There's ah the the theme for when you're customizing the girls and like dressing them up. The the song for that goes unnecessarily hard. It's so good.
01:08:54
Speaker
It's so good. Like, oh, you could just dump so much time. And that's what I think that's one of the things I just love most about the series as a whole is like you could just do the story.
01:09:06
Speaker
You do the story. You're through the story. And what? I don't know, like maybe 10 hours tops. Usually it's a 10 to 15, depending on the game. Usually. Yeah. Some are longer. Zero has one of the longer stories. Yes.
01:09:18
Speaker
Zero is definitely one. I think Zero the second longest story Aside from like... ah Like a Dragon and Infinite Wealth.
01:09:29
Speaker
Yeah. ah like this whole ever Like the Kiryu games. Yeah. I think Zero is the second longest story. Only second to five. I think it's the game that I'm looking at my Steam right now. It is the one that I have the most time in. Wow. Yeah. I have 130 hours. Wow. 18 of those are pocket circuit alone. Yeah, more than 18. Let's be real. um And i don't I only have 34 of the 55 achievements unlocked.
01:10:00
Speaker
Yeah, they're... Okay, that is one thing I will say. Another con I have of just like the early Yakuza games in general. The... EX mode that like when you like beat the game, you would like all those like fighting trials. Those those suck a little bit. They're hard. They're they're definitely not for the squeamish. They yeah they will. ah Once you when you're starting to hit ah Amon's o some ah Some of the Amon fights are are yeah frankly ridiculous. Amon fights are hard in general. yeah ah That motherfucker cheats. He does. He fucking cheats. yeah I also like how Majima has this like great grand ah side minigame.
01:10:48
Speaker
And then Kiryu with Zero is just, hey, go do some real estate. Yeah. the real The real estate minigame. I actually love the real estate minigame, though. It's not really much of a minigame. It's more of a go to the map, buy everything up, yeah assign some managers. find it You assign a chicken to be a manager. Shoutouts to Nugget.
01:11:11
Speaker
Shoutouts to Nugget. And then you just wait, and the money comes in. Yeah, it's pretty awesome. I mean, it is awesome, but it is just like the it's like, well, I gotta go do some things to progress the time, I guess.
01:11:26
Speaker
Yeah.
01:11:28
Speaker
It's really downside to curious curious side mode. Yeah, it's not. It's not as cool as running a cabaret. It's not. um
01:11:41
Speaker
Sub stories from zero. ah The miracle Johnson, one of the most like from the game. You have the entire pocket circuit series.
01:11:51
Speaker
Yep. And pocket circuit. Oh God. What's the name? Pocket circuit fighter fighter. That's the pocket circuit fighter. Who becomes a recurring character? He does cure you delivering a pizza when he was supposed to deliver a visa.
01:12:10
Speaker
Oh, the dude who is just perpetually trapped in the public toilet at the park next to Pocket yeah, was a staple for... That's like a staple throughout the series, I think. There's always somebody trapped in the toilet in every game. And that's the only reason you have pocket tissues. Yeah.
01:12:31
Speaker
I was disappointed. i forget what game I was playing, but there wasn't one of those stories. And I was like, that's... Why do I have... Why... Why do I have 18 things to pocket tissues? Yeah, no, exactly. If I can't give them somebody who needs toilet paper.
01:12:46
Speaker
Yeah. Overall, it's zero is great. I love I love zero. It's it it's it's like I said, it's got to be pound for pounds. like The the best, like if we're if we're trying to be object like objective about it, it's got to be the best one.
01:13:01
Speaker
Yeah. Moving on to original one and two. I can't speak much on OG one and two because they're the only ones I have not played. They're great. And I love them dearly, but they they've they have aged.
01:13:18
Speaker
isnt You have to remember, this game came out, ah like I think the the North American release was in 2006 for the first one. 2005 or 2006. It was around 2005, 2006. And it wasn't that much longer that the second game came out.
01:13:33
Speaker
Now, was the second game when it came to the West also just English, or was that when they... did Japanese for it starting there? the west i don't I honestly don't remember. I couldn't tell you if it if it did. because i When I played it, I emulated, which is well after eight its physical release.
01:13:54
Speaker
ah My copy was in Japanese, so I don't remember. yeah that one That one, I die just don't know. But they are...
01:14:05
Speaker
Much, kind of a lot darker than the series ended up being. The series never shied away from showing some harsh realities, at least in cutscenes. Because remember, here's here's a fun fact for all you not Yakuza knowers. If it doesn't happen in a cutscene, it's not canon. And even then...
01:14:27
Speaker
Who knows? Because they could retcon it. I guess we'll talk about that later. We'll get to that when we get to the... Yeah, to the... The fun part. The part where we start complaining like old men that we are. The old men will come out of us eventually. Yeah.
01:14:47
Speaker
We're like those like the like the old guy Muppets that sit in the balcony. I forget their names. Yeah. But, um... or The... jeff killey the The first two games were a lot darker in tone, a lot more um like there were some like with some side stories where you'd be like, well, this is kind of silly just to like break tension. But yeah I felt like on the whole, um especially with like um in OG Yakuza with like the fixed camera angles and the PS2's lack of fidelity granted back at that time that you're like, well, this game looks insane. This game looks so good.
01:15:22
Speaker
um And also that it was ah it was an M-rated game, which at the time, like especially coming out of Japan, something so grounded and mature was like, whoa, this is kind of out there. And I'm not surprised that it took a while for Yakuza to really like pop off in the West.
01:15:42
Speaker
Mostly Sega not doing the smartest business decisions in world. Like five almost killed Yakuza. And it wasn't until they did Zero that they saved the franchise. yeah zero Zero was a... Another reason why people like Zero Zero is what saved Yakuza.
01:16:02
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. And for good reason, because five is what we'll get there. We'll get there. I have a there i have an unpopular opinion about five, ah which we I'll share when we get there.
01:16:17
Speaker
ah But yeah, OG one and two. um We'll flip the coin here and go to Kiwami one and two, so that way I can actually chime in on this and talk about, because those I have played, and they're pretty faithful.
01:16:31
Speaker
From what I've gathered? they're but Obviously, aside from like added content, because, you know, there's some stuff that was removed. Yeah, there's some stuff that was removed, some stuff that was added. Obviously, big difference. Totally different engine, right? Yes. um but Looks different, plays different. um The older games are clunky.
01:16:55
Speaker
Combat is clunky in the first two. um Second one's better about it. but the first And the first one is old. It's old. and You can tell. um Whereas, you know, with the Majima Everywhere system pops up, me and Kiwami, to because we got to have we gotta have a goofy-ass Majima and everything now. Yeah. Now, I i didn't mind the Majima. Now, again, because Kiwami 1 was my first entry, I didn't mind Majima Everywhere system. I thought it was like, oh, funny, quirky man. And then I played Zero. I'm like, he's only funny quirky because it hides his real emotions. Yeah.
01:17:35
Speaker
he's Majima's character arc is I did everything I was told and still got dicked for it and I don't care anymore like yeah yeah yeah I love i love mojima maji i say marjmal like Majima Majima's probably my favorite character overall ah is he's a lot of people's favorite character overall like he is just the goat oh I had a chance they they released his boots ah And you could buy his snakeskin boots.
01:18:08
Speaker
And I had a chance to buy them and I was like, nah, I don't need a pair of boots. And i wake up in a cold sweat like multiple times a month regretting that decision.
01:18:20
Speaker
my god also pocket circuit reappears in kiwami which was great it continued the pocket fighter story which was even better of like i'm still here doing doing this kiryu i'm like oh that's a little sad want to help i want to help you yeah he just keeps gettingdding He just keeps getting older But Kieryusha doesn't Yeah The man who never ages The man who erased his age Yeah or i was you yeah i would Until until ah Something very Not good Until they're like oh grey hair Finally Until it's cancer for you to get grey hair Jesus Yeah yeah and then he and then he just Like just outlock off screen In between games it's like no you don't have Cancer anymore you're good
01:19:16
Speaker
they just so that's like They just sort of was like, no, no, no, wait, we were to get rid Kiryu, but no, we can't. don't think we can. Also, do you have to say, Kiwami-wan has one of the worst minigames in Mesu-King.
01:19:31
Speaker
Oh, God, yeah. Okay, so Mesu-King spawned off of the catfights Zero. Yes. And it's not the greatest because all it is is rock, paper, scissors,
01:19:43
Speaker
Yes. You go around Kamurocho collecting cards and on these cards are women cosplaying as insects. Yes. And like the Japanese. take flights so Yeah. Yeah. It's essentially this world's Pokemon. It's like, oh, you're going to be the Mesu King master. And it's a child who is your the professor, which I did kind of funny ah because it's like this is a kid's game as well. It's like it's how it's going. So it's kind of funny and like how it exists.
01:20:11
Speaker
The mini game itself is ass. Yeah, it's very dull. And you you sit through lots of long animations. Yes. And you can get just get screwed by it.
01:20:23
Speaker
Yeah, it because it's entirely it's rock, paper, scissors. Like, unless they tell you ah my name is Scissors Hikaru or whatever it was. I only play scissors.
01:20:35
Speaker
Yeah, bro. You just told me your goddamn strategy. It's either really easy and you just sit through the animations or it's like really hard and you're there for an hour trying to beat one goddamn child.
01:20:47
Speaker
just It's like, dude, it's like, I just want yeah I just need you to go to the shadow realm. Little dude. will tell me You gotta be, you gotta go to the shadow realm. i got other shit to do. I'm, you know, I'm a grown ass man. Yes. Um,
01:21:02
Speaker
yeah We also had this is where we saw the more traditional cabaret club. i mean, we did see the zero because Kiryu with zero still had his cabaret side of things, too. Yes. Where you go in, you select a girl, you order a drink to raise up her thing first. You order food to raise up her bar as well. yeah And then you're you talk and you're given prompts and you guys like the best options to raise the bar.
01:21:28
Speaker
And that's how you progress each girl. that that is That is the mechanic. That was how it's done from 0, 1, 2. Yep. has The GP. it had The the grand Prix. yeah The is the best. yeah for a job But
01:21:51
Speaker
kawami won three four and five all have this classic prompt type thing six did something a bit different and i'll get to that when we get to six But it's very, depending on how many cabaret girls there were, which thankfully in the first one, there were only two.
01:22:11
Speaker
yeah ah So it's not that bad. Also, I will. Then you take the girls out on dates. You would go sing karaoke. It's how you would get the music videos for some of the other songs in the game that ki you didn't sing.
01:22:23
Speaker
i will also say that Kiwami one has the worst selection of karaoke in the entire franchise. i I honestly would agree with that. Yeah. uh because you get a not so great remix of baka matai it's all you get a not so great remix of uh you get sorry you get the french remix of uh heartbreak mermaid you get uh there's weird decision on that which is like i don't know why they did that but you get the you do i will say like i think it was the of uh
01:22:58
Speaker
the The remix version of Shine Shine Shine was fine because they kept that one in other games. ah Zawa was fine. ah You had Oto Metal My Life, which was Otomeo My Life, but Metalcore that Haruka sang, which was fine.
01:23:16
Speaker
Everyone's favorite character in the series, Haruka. Haruka. I don't mind Haruka. I liked Haruka for what she offered.
01:23:28
Speaker
She wasn't pulled out granted for a lot of the early games. She is, I mean, she is just a plot device for Q to go x X place. I mean, yeah that is the plot of Kigouami 1 is like, Haruka this child he finds and her mother is the woman he loves. And he's like, huh? Yeah.
01:23:46
Speaker
Yeah. we'll get We'll get there. We're almost to three. he We'll get there. Yeah. I mean, one's plot overall. ah like The Nishikiyama stuff is probably the highlights of the story. Oh, sure. For sure. that, I mean, the confrontation of finally learning everything from Kazuma on the boat only to be ambushed by Shimano and then everybody fucking dies at that moment, basically. Yeah.
01:24:16
Speaker
That's a highlight. And then, like, the final confrontation atop the Millennium Tower, it's like the Nishikiyama fight, great. Getting the answers and clarity with Yuumi, great.
01:24:27
Speaker
jing jing junior yeah yeah it was like oh you know it's the first time where it's like surprise he's the real villain uh and you know what for it being for it being the first time i was like i was okay with that it's like looking back on it like jing jingoo was it jing jing yeah yeah ki yeah it was jing jing jing yeah it was all right. I mean, like how Jingu goes out with Nishiki, I'm a blowing up everything, blowing up the the safe and everything. Fucking fantastic.
01:25:05
Speaker
Yeah. Like great character death. Great. Like rick kind of redemption for Nishiki at the end. ah It is like a really good, like that. Like it's really like there it's got its moments that his, are him, his sacrifice leading into,
01:25:22
Speaker
what all like a bunch of characters that we'll see and talk about later. yeah And like how this all sort of like in the same way the movie crash works, where there's like one action just affects a whole bunch of people and you get to see how it affects a whole bunch of people. Like our boy, ah like our boy Shunaki Yama. Yeah. Like directly comes from like everything they set up in the first game. Like,
01:25:47
Speaker
on its own you think like oh well this is a pretty concise story it wraps itself up just fine yes and then they hit you with cool then they hit you with two and you're like oh and i feel a lot for the longest time if i loved kiwami 2 for the longest time and i still i still like kiwami 2 for what it is um the story one of my favorite stories uh great villain with go ryuji gota Ryuji is so cool he is he is just a hot headed young motherfucker who's like I'm ready to fight everyone and everything to get my way yeah I don't care who you are i don't care that my dad's the patriarch of the Obi alliance
01:26:32
Speaker
I'm just going to go fuck shit up He's willing to burn everything to the ground just because he's like, why would you get to do stop me? ah Yeah, ah I like Sayama.
01:26:43
Speaker
I liked her character. I like the dynamic that she had with Kiryu. Yeah. I did this. My one thing is like, I wish that they did something with Sayama and Kiryu in like the later games with her returning, possibly. yeah And I feel like it's one of the missed opportunities, especially with like, especially like some of the later games, like with six, possibly like, like, or like even like, like infinite wealth. They didn't really do like, they like added some weird moments for Kiryu they don't didn't really have something with Sayama.
01:27:24
Speaker
The, the whole, the whole bringing her back for infinite wealth and her meeting up with Dante. Right. And then, Dante's about to be like, yeah, no, Kiryu's still alive. And I'm just like, honestly, Dante would, you know, he'd be like wing man is motherfucker. Dante, he's the broiest bro of all time. Dante is one of the so many good characters. We're going say this about like almost everyone yeah in the series, but like, and Kiryu stops him.
01:27:50
Speaker
And it's like, dude, you you like being canonically a virgin. it honestly she is the one woman that you actually fell in love with. What are you doing? And it's like they were perfect for each other. and it works.
01:28:05
Speaker
like Like, dude, so somebody at Sega, like, just it deserves it. Deserves a swirly for that one, you know? but
01:28:17
Speaker
Someone's getting a swirly. forir these For shit like that. You see, what makes it better is like they they play fucking Sims. The sound of the sound of your breath. ah When ah like they share their first kiss. It's like, yo, that fucking works so well. God. yeah like It just elevated a song that I loved a lot because love Sim.
01:28:42
Speaker
Great band. ah And they do that and I'm like, ah Yes. Like when you... when you are have her like with you get the like heat actions with her in combat and they just look so good together they are yeah they're they're really good it's just it's it's a really it's a really good like dynamic of like the yuck the gritty undertone still already that continued on from the events of the first one and adding this just like yeah there's a little bit of there's a little bit of uh some some sexual tension between the two of them da they might they might do something they might not who knows nope
01:29:21
Speaker
No, ah no. Are you forever a virgin? Yeah. and He lost the one woman he loved and the, you know, the second woman he ever loved went to America. Yep.
01:29:34
Speaker
Crazy going to America. ah go ill go She went to America to be like a police instructor. Yeah. Which makes perfect sense. like That's that's ever happened ever in the history of. Yeah. Okay. Dog.
01:29:51
Speaker
um No, ah but no, I would say so two story good. The Jiguan Mafia. ah great. like well it was like It was like, it took the characters that we knew from one.
01:30:03
Speaker
it's like, if you decided not to go backwards into zero to see what they were like there, and you chose to go forwards, you learned more about them in like the darker sides of that with Kazuma's past and like him essentially eliminating the entire Jingwan mafia or trying to.
01:30:19
Speaker
yeah You had, and like the repercussions that that that that then puts on Kiryu, And then the Gota clan and how both Ryuji and Sayama are actually descendants technically from that and their siblings. You get to see Ryuji as a little punk kid in Zero. You do. You fight him as Majima and he's actually a tricky fight. like Yeah.
01:30:47
Speaker
yeah he's he's um I want to say canonically he's probably in the top three strongest people in in the Yakuzaverse. Yes, absolutely. if And you know what? And Gota goes out like, it's like when he realized he he was beaten at the end of two and he's like, well, no, because he was just knocked out. like he like He fought until like fucking there was nothing. The last like scene though where with say it's like fist met Gota's head or it was like our heads met each other at the very end of that climactic thing.
01:31:22
Speaker
Only Kiryu's left standing. And then the explosion goes off and Kiryu is the only one who lived that, which was crazy. Yeah. Which it's ah like, it it it was, it was also where like, it's like, okay, there's a couple of wild things happening. Like how is Kiryu the only one who lived that explosion? Was it,
01:31:41
Speaker
Did he get like, I was explaining that he got out in time or whatnot. I don't even remember. i so I don't know. I don't know. There's so many things that happens in the stories of these games where it's just after a while, you just go like, sure, whatever, dude.
01:31:57
Speaker
Yeah. rubber bullets and helicopters crashing. And, you know, I, I, I definitely remember murdering multiple people in gameplay, but apparently no doesn't happen. Nope. Does not happen.
01:32:13
Speaker
uh but no two is great um is yeah like that i liked to i i liked to it was like one of my first platinums with the franchise because it's where it's because it had a compared to the other games it had one of the easier completion lists yeah it's a much more it's a much more condensed package in kiwami 2 yes um and i i would say if you were only going to play like three Yakuza games play zero Kiwami and Kiwami to yeah call it and then if you're good call it there totally fine yeah I'd say it's like a great it's a if if you're I mean there you there's more if you want more but I think that sort of like whole three game arc is probably the strongest story arc in the whole franchise Kamurocho, you get Kamurocho in all three of them, and then in Zero and Two, you have Osaka as well. Yes. Forgot to mention Osaka. Because Kamurocho is your main city. It's a great overworld.
01:33:16
Speaker
Based off the Kabuki show stuff the kadu show district. yeah and i Because all of i think all of them don't are good don't go by their proper names because legal reasons, I believe, of like they can't actually use the names in a fic or whatever. Yeah.
01:33:32
Speaker
I don't know the exact reason why. It's, it's, I mean, it's, it's a wink, wink, nudge, nudge. Like, yeah you, you know, like you got like the golden, got the little golden guy district with the little tiny bars. And then you've got like at the South end, you've got that big neon, like Tory gate sign.
01:33:50
Speaker
it's like, if you, if you know, have been to like Kabuki show, like you'll see little things where it's like, I recognize that. Yeah, there's just there's no Millennium Tower. We'll just tell you that. There's no Millennium Tower. That one they added that one for sillies. Yeah, and then with Osaka you go to Sotenbori, which is based off the Dotenbori district in Osaka.
01:34:12
Speaker
yeah ah With the the bridges, they're real. Those two bridges on both sides, they're real. They're they're cool. All the Dion lights everywhere. Fuck yeah. Those are all... The the river where they are where they dumped that statue of the KFC Colonel Sanders into and and started a baseball curse in Japan.
01:34:34
Speaker
Actually? Oh, no. Yeah. So basically, like what ended up happening was... um there was ah like a guy ah who had run, like yeah let me see, the Curse of the Colonels. It's the Hanshin Tigers baseball team.
01:34:52
Speaker
And there was a statue of the Colonel outside of this KFC restaurant. And the guy who had the KFC restaurant was like, this this is cool. Like, It's going to bring in customers. So the Hanshin Tigers were kind of a like middling team and and like not very good um and would get to like occasionally get to the all Japan the allpan series and then lose every time.
01:35:14
Speaker
But in the 1985 series, their opposing team was the Yamiuri Giants. By the way, there were like three different teams called the Giants in Japanese baseball. Don't worry about um The Yamagiri Giants are like the they're like the Yankees of Japanese baseball. They're they' they're they're they're a Tokyo team.
01:35:36
Speaker
Oh, of course. So the Tigers all of a sudden have this have this American player on the team called Randy randy Bass. And he just he's an absolute slugger and he's killing it for the team. Right?
01:35:52
Speaker
Well, when they when they win, they beat the Seibu Lions in the Japan series. And everybody Dotonbori everyone in Osaka is going just ape.
01:36:04
Speaker
They're, they're drunk and fireworks at partying and disorderly and kind of like Boston Red Sox fans when Boston does anything remotely interesting. It's like the Cubbies that one year that they won the, the, won the one, the world series. Yeah. And it's like, it was, or the San Francisco giants. And it's like San Francisco giants win the world series. Let's go tear down San Francisco. It's like, you live here.
01:36:27
Speaker
Anyway, they these fans, they're drunk, they're rioting. They grab the statue and they throw it off of the Ibisu Bridge in Dotonbori, which is in the game. Yeah. and this is three weeks before the Japan series.
01:36:44
Speaker
um And they're yelling players' names. And with every name, a fan that looks like a player jumps into the canal. Because they didn't they didn't have a white dude who looks like Randy Bass.
01:36:58
Speaker
So they took the Colonel Sanders statue and was like, hey, he's white, and threw him into the canal um because Bass had a beard and was a Japanese. So like close enough. Yeah, Colonel has beard. So far look, it's a white dude with a beard. What more do you need?
01:37:16
Speaker
awesome This began the curse of the Colonel that stated that the Tigers would not win a championship again until the statue was recovered. That started an 18-year-long losing streak.
01:37:27
Speaker
Oh my God.
01:37:30
Speaker
There's, there's, they go, there's so much stuff. So that means if it was 18 years, that this was 85. That means 2003, they recovered the statue. They found parts of the statue there. People died trying to dive into the canal to like, try and pull it back out.
01:37:48
Speaker
They didn't ever find part. Like ah one of his, one of his, his they didn't find the Colonel's left hand or his glasses. ah But they did eventually. 2009, they finally found the colonel.
01:38:02
Speaker
Oh my god. Yeah. yeah ah March 10th, 2009, divers recovered the statue, and the first thought was only a large barrel, and then they thought it was a human corpse, but the handshin fans on the scene were quick to identify it as the upper body of the long-lost colonel. The right hand and lower body were found the next day, but the statue is still missing its glasses and left hand.
01:38:24
Speaker
It was said that the only way the curse could be lifted was by returning his long lost glasses and left hand. My God. Yep. And now that statue. I hope that's a side quest in Stranger Than Heaven.
01:38:35
Speaker
that we I would love that. Just like a pair of glasses and a left hand in yeah like some water. Yeah. I'd love to see that. That would be a great. That would just be a great life Easter egg to find. That. Wow. That awesome. One of the funniest pieces of lore ever. And there's your drunk history lesson for the day. That is great. My God. And it wouldn't, it it wouldn't be until 2023 that the tigers actually won the Japan series.
01:39:05
Speaker
Wow. And in twenty March, March 8th, 2024, KFC Japan held a burial ceremony for the statue. Because because the statue had been deteriorating. It was old. art you Yeah. Even if it was just not it is old and also in a river in a river. Yeah. So they and so they buried the kernel and buried the curse.
01:39:27
Speaker
Wow. That's crazy. Yeah. That's cool. I think that's also a great transition to get to Yakuza 3.
01:39:37
Speaker
Yakuza 3 what can we say about Yakuza 3 Yakuza 3 or as some people call it Blockuza 3 yeah that's the that's a big thing is you jump from Kiwami 2 into what before Kiwami 3 came out it was you jumped right into 3 And the combat is very jarring because this is the earliest combat that's like, caught that like is basically the outline of what all Yakuza combat is. Yeah. allas yeah ah And it's a bit rough at times.
01:40:16
Speaker
it Man, do you just.
01:40:21
Speaker
The, the, the adage beating your head against a wall really really accentuates the combat in three. Yeah. um And ah it's not even that. It's not just it's not even enemies just blocking constantly. You also have the chase battles.
01:40:40
Speaker
Yeah. which which weren't wouldn't Which wouldn't get refined. Until really judgment. until yeah Yeah. And even and even in judgment, like they they kind of overused that. Yeah. um Lost judgment does away with that. But I think I like the story and judge anyway. um But ah the training mentor is sort of like.
01:41:07
Speaker
It's like and it's neat on paper, but it doesn't feel as good as you really like. The nice thing about three is it introduced the revelation system and Mac, ah which is an unfortunate thing that they did away with it. Kawami free.
01:41:24
Speaker
because it is one of the funniest things to have Yakuza, where it's you snap photos of these wild events happening to learn new abilities. Yeah, it's it's very funny. It's like here. You just gets like a like like i like a bolt out of the blue. He saw I forget. There's like he watches like a ah lady like break up with her boyfriend or something to learn a new move. yeah It's been a while since I played three, but there's the granny on the motorbike. That's the that's the classic one. That one's so good. Yeah.
01:41:57
Speaker
and we also get the new location of ah oh my God, I'm blanking on the Okinawa. Jesus. ah You get Okinawa, which is a cool location. Okinawa is nice.
01:42:11
Speaker
It's small. It's a very small location compared to both Kaburocho and Sotonbori. It is like one of the smallest map regions ever introduced in the Yakuza franchise.
01:42:24
Speaker
ah Because you basically have um the main road going south of that is the the market. yeahp And going north of that is basically a straight path and then like a loop. And that's really about it.
01:42:38
Speaker
Yeah. And there's not much there. Cabaret minigame. There were two. you had the date the girls. but You also briefly ran one where you would basically like you would pick a thing, pick a girl and whatnot. You would walk up and down ah ah the aisle and then that would and then you would interact and and that would be the minigame.
01:43:00
Speaker
it was not It's not great. ah But again, OG3 is able to get away with the stuff simply because of like how, again, it was older. It was like fine for the time. like Obviously, as time goes on, like things age. And it is very much a product of that time.
01:43:19
Speaker
My biggest complaint with 3 is that Kiwami 3 should have come out much sooner to to maybe not have dealt with this.
01:43:29
Speaker
but having dealt to not have had dealt with this Yeah, so the distance between Kiwami 2 and Kiwami 3 does feel a little weird to me. yeah I know that, like, granted, indisperienced in all of this, there were the spinoffs games, too. There were the spinoffs, and also, you know, the whole re... Not really a reboot, but, like, redoing of how the core game plays. Yeah. We're not... Kiwami 3 is the... Is it the first one not on the Dragon Engine?
01:44:00
Speaker
Now that they switched to Unreal? Or was Pirate? Oh, did they switch? I thought they were still on Dragon Engine. No, they don't use a Dragon Engine anymore. think it might have been Pirate then, but it might have been Infinite Wealth. Let me see. I don't actually know. Yakuza game on Unreal.
01:44:23
Speaker
Isshin is the first one that was ah using Unreal 4. Oh, like yeah like the like like a Dragon Yeah, like a Dragonician. I thought it was... Okay, actually, that makes sense because of like it felt like the Zero Dragon engine and shit like that.
01:44:40
Speaker
Yeah, no, I used ah Unreal 4. Oh, shit. oh it every game Every game past that has been using Unreal. so Ah, you did not... I mean, it makes sense like because... Okay, that makes sense now. yeah yeah Interesting.
01:44:56
Speaker
Dan, you can feel that shift, too, because... Yeah. The Dragon Engine had much weightier combat, even when it was refined and slicked off like in like zero, like where like you're playing this like Majima when he's faster. Right.
01:45:13
Speaker
Yeah. Unreal is considerably floatier. Mm hmm. A little bit. I'm not like, I don't like dislike it. It still feels fine. it's like makes it They make it feel like they like, they like do a good job of like making it still feel like the dragon engine. Like I didn't even know it was unreal.
01:45:30
Speaker
Yeah. It's not, it's not terrible, but you like the, my first hint lighting engine. Okay, yeah. Remember remember when ah the first playable ver like the the playable teaser for ah ah fucking for 3 came out and everybody was goofing on the lighting because it was buggy? Yeah.
01:45:52
Speaker
That's Unreal Engine. Okay. that's that's unreal engine yeah Okay, that makes sense. Yeah, dead giveaway. Yeah, but yeah, three very much fault. if Three is very much His story is fine. The only issue with its store like it's the orphanage, the orphanage sucks.
01:46:13
Speaker
Yes. Now, in granted, that is what I will say. One of the good things about Kalami 3 was, was they decided to take all the orphanage stuff and make it its own side mode, which was as nice a smart thing to do. It's one of like, because how did how in the original 3 worked, it was like you did all this stuff and like progress the story, but then you're like in this very long block of just the orphanage kids yeah and helping them with their problems and developing cure you as like this father figure, which is needed, but it's a lot at once. And it's a lot of very, not the most interest. Like it's some interesting things, but it's like, it's not the most interesting thing. The, Oh man. I don't know. the,
01:47:02
Speaker
The Ryudo family doesn't feel like a convincing villain, even when they do ridiculously heinous shit. Nakahara is cool. Like, but... Eh.
01:47:16
Speaker
You know, Rikia gets done dirty. Yeah. Rikia, like, they set up Rikia so well, and the development between him and Kiryu, just to kind like...
01:47:28
Speaker
If there was one death I had hoped they would have retconned in the franchise, Rikia would be that death. yeah Because while... Because it's like... like They could have had Rikia set up to just like look after... like It would have been like like... Sure, he probably would have been reduced to just look after Morning Glory for me while I'm going back to Kamurocho again for the upteenth time.
01:47:54
Speaker
Yeah. it's It's very much... don't know. Ricky and like is erii is such like a great character, too. yeah Yeah. He's 100% certified Angus real bro. Yeah. one of I would say he's one of the best parts about 3.
01:48:12
Speaker
He's just so endearing. yeah you know He's such an endearing character. Uh-huh. And... I mean, it it makes his death like very hard. It's...
01:48:25
Speaker
It's a real bad cry at his death. There's ah oh there's a the the cooking minigame. It's kind of... ah Yeah...
01:48:40
Speaker
ah I'm trying to like OG three. A lot of it is blocked out of my mind. The sub stories. They did the sub stories weird in three, two as well, because there was a complete state and a fail state that you can have the sub stories in, or if you did them wrong, you've still finished the sub story, but it's not the right way to, but not the, the good ending per se.
01:49:06
Speaker
yeah they it was It was interesting. like ah but It was an interesting concept for it. ah But it's like, oh, but if you I think if you wanted the Platinum Trophy for it, you had to do everything like with the good state. Yeah. when we We all love when you can miss something in a game. and Yeah. like There's nothing more from that. They don't do that with the Kiwami 3, but also 90% of the side stories are cut from Kiwami 3. Yeah. Yeah, quite a few. Yeah, I saw the most cuts to like anything that like I know of but so Even OG3 had a bunch of cut content from the original Japanese release.
01:49:48
Speaker
It was an entire quiz minigame that was cut because it was all trivia about 2000s Japan. And they like, well, nobody in the West is going to get that. Yeah, that's fair to cut. That at least makes more sense.
01:50:02
Speaker
hence there were um there was ah There was an entire side story chain that was deemed to be transphobic that was cut. okay Some of the hostesses um were ah replaced just because of like likeness deals with a real life Yeah, and that makes sense because that shit does happen. Yeah, so it's like that licensing stuff, you know, there's not, you know, that's nothing to do about that. Yeah, speaking of like changed actors in Kalami 3, Rikia had a new actor. Yeah, not a big fan of that change. Yeah, it's not the greatest, but did a good job with it.
01:50:43
Speaker
Well, that's good. He did a good job with it because obviously they didn't re like rerecord a whole lot of things for Kalami three. It's still like the original, like lines and voices are like that. If they did it, like you get a new voice actor or whatever.
01:50:58
Speaker
um it was still like a lot of the original, the new Ricky, his new actor did a pretty good job. I will say that he did a good job with what he with, with him, that, and then obviously one of the biggest controversies out of Kalami three that will bring up was the actor for, ah Oh, what's his face? Has Hasma.
01:51:23
Speaker
The fucking... Oh, my God. what what is What is the character's name? ah Yakuza 3.
01:51:38
Speaker
I'm trying to... I haven't heard of this. Yeah, Hamazaki. Hamazaki's actor replacement. oh Oh. Yeah. Now, granted, I believe the original Hamazaki actor was also ah not great because he was all also essayed somebody.
01:51:56
Speaker
ah and that's why it's like, oh, like, like when the remake was to come, like they weren't go use it. But it turns out the replacement actor also essayed. uh somebody too and it's just like wow they really can't get that right and it's like obviously they didn't show us that shit until like the trailers came out and it's like wait they did that can't they just change the I'm like it was probably way too late to change the actor with where they were yeah kind of rushed Kiwami 3 felt yeah ah that they didn't now so like that was an issue in itself um
01:52:35
Speaker
Yeah, you know, like look of all the Columbia games three is not the greatest ah for a lot of things that it's done. It's okay. Like where is it still follow the story? It follows the story good, but there is felt like there the Kiwami three could have and should have been so much more than what we got.
01:52:58
Speaker
This is sort of a sentiment. It's like ah my argument is I feel like Kwame 3 is ah one of those games that came out but too late.
01:53:10
Speaker
yeah It should have been done much sooner with more care. And like, I honestly think they could have, they could have Kiwami 3 after Kiwami 2, like around the Like a Dragon time.
01:53:24
Speaker
They could have god done done it then differently and we'd be fine with it, I feel, a bit more. And it also would have been, I feel like we also would have gotten ah the the big, biggest difference with the game.
01:53:39
Speaker
ah The retcon of Mene. Yeah, there's, this is where, this is where the timeline shift happens. Yes. So what people are theorizing. So for those who don't know, ah the original developer, ah moving the lead of RGG, who was there for essentially one all the way to Six. Oh, up until 2021. Yeah. So like a good chunk of the games, like everything but infinite wealth onward, I think.
01:54:09
Speaker
Yeah. He'd worked at Sega since like 89. eighty nine Yeah. he He's also the guy who gave us Super Monkey Ball. Yes. Yes, he is. ah And and he he loves making fun of Chigus. Yes.
01:54:23
Speaker
Yes. Yes. Chiggyu is the like a cheese gudon. Oh. was like Yeah. Chiggyu. Okay. Gotcha. I was like, no, it's not a racial slur or anything. said i like i was I wasn't sure what that was like. so Okay. Basically, as he was and he was in yeah he was so he was in an interview and he was making and it was like, I forget um what game it was like he was talking about. And he's like, this is a baby game for babies. Like only Chiggyus like play this game.
01:54:53
Speaker
And ah obviously the internet got real, real buttered about it. ah But like it's used to describe like otakus and uncool, like, ah, gotcha. like nerd Like nerds. And yeah, it's like a, like a, like a Japanese portmanteau for nerd. I'll send you the Wikipedia article about it. So can see, cause there's a, there's a picture there.
01:55:16
Speaker
And like that, there's like that, that um there's a guy that like somebody drew the guy and they're like that's a cheeky. Gotcha. Okay. I get, I get it. Yeah. Yeah. Which is funny because Nagoshi is like ultra fake tans. He's like 60, but he like dresses like he's like 25. Yeah. Yeah. So Nogoshi left. ah He now started his own studio, ah which that he then announced Gang of Dragon, which for those of you who are keeping up with the Gang of Dragon stuff recently, funding was pulled ah and now they got to come up with new funding for that game. Otherwise, that game is probably dead in the water.
01:55:55
Speaker
Unfortunately, It's almost a foregone conclusion that it's never coming out. Yeah. Because think, wasn't it NetEase? I think it was NetEase. And it's just another reason why dislike NetEase.
01:56:08
Speaker
Yeah, and and no money, no gang of dragon. Yeah, which is unfortunate. Yeah. ah But yeah, so the new alet lead, is it seems that he's... ah said what What this play seems to be now for what the future of Yakuza is of different storyline that still will connect to like a dragon by the time it gets there. So essentially...
01:56:37
Speaker
From this, the you have the OG timeline, 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, like a dragon. Because it's still everything still leads to like a dragon. Canonical.
01:56:48
Speaker
With both of these timelines. The original one, the Negoshi timeline, and now this new timeline, which but whoever i don't know the producer's name off the top of my head.
01:56:58
Speaker
The Kiwami timeline Which is going to be 0 Kiwami 1 Kiwami 2 Kiwami 3 And then whatever they do for 4, 5 and 6 Also including Dark Ties which is This includes Dark Ties Dark Ties was cool I will say Mine's fighting style is neat Not the best, not the worst Very middle ground ah low Low middle ground I would say story wise left me wanting i wanted to see a baby a bit more because it's very short it's only three chapters and a lot of the time you're just running around doing stuff for Kanda in his name because that's how Kanda rose to power was Mene did all the hard work for him
01:57:42
Speaker
yeah ah But it was also how Mine wanted to get into the Tojo clan because he wanted to know how Daigo could be this but so trusted and beloved by the Tojo clan and this much loyalty. He couldn't understand that and fathom that.
01:57:59
Speaker
He's like, i need to see how this man ticks, so I'm going to get into the Tojo clan to see for myself. Only for him to not be impressed until the very end when Daigo puts his own life on the line for Mide gets shot again because obviously Daigo loves getting shot.
01:58:15
Speaker
That's just a fact. It just keeps happening. It just keeps happening. The man loves getting shot. I warned you about those bullets, bro. Mine then fights the guy, kills the guy, I think. as Oh, no, he didn't kill him.
01:58:30
Speaker
He almost did. But I think... I honestly can't remember because I played... It's just like a blur. But it's like... That leads to like the two of them drinking at a bar every like at like every day of like the week essentially and they like become bar buddies and like that's how Miene and Daigo got super close and they did a really good job with the ending where like Daigo's in there alone like because he like they they they do the ending justice um and then But essentially, Mine gets recruited into the Daidoji faction, which is ah how Kiryu lost his name in Gaiden, is the Daidoji faction.
01:59:08
Speaker
And at the end of the game, at the end of Kami 3, base Kami 3 as well, Hamazaki, just as he's about to go stab Kiryu at the end of 3, which is candid event, it's how Hamazaki ends up in prison, how Seijima breaks out of prison, and how the events of 4 are supposed to play out.
01:59:27
Speaker
Ine stops Hamazaki from stabbing Kiryu and brings Hamazaki into the Daidoji. who What a twist. What a twist. It genuinely is.
01:59:39
Speaker
Yeah. it like Like, look, because here's the thing. They could have retconned Mine's death. He's just there in the shadows kind of yeah doing his own thing. They could have done that, left it at that. And it's like, oh, okay, maybe we'll see him again in these like the the other Kawami remakes, like within something somehow. Like very, maybe small or whatever.
01:59:58
Speaker
ah With this changing, it now changes the one key event of how the fuck does Saejima get out of prison? Yeah.
02:00:09
Speaker
and like and so is and now And they've said going forward that they're not doing Kiwamis anymore. Like they're going to something different title wise. Yeah. So it'll be interesting to see, but it's like we know that they still have to hit these certain core elements.
02:00:27
Speaker
Now we can get into four and those core elements. Here's the thing. I love four. here's this i love for I don't know what it is. I am a, I love four. And I also love five.
02:00:42
Speaker
Really? i do. genuinely do. Now, granted the things about four, I love, ah I love the the, one of the biggest things I love about four Akiyama's combat. It is one of the best. Oh yeah. His kicks.
02:00:56
Speaker
Amazing. I love Akiyama's combat style. The fluidity, the fluidity of it is just, it's going just kiss. Going from like, especially if you hadn't played Zero, right?
02:01:08
Speaker
Going from like, Kiryu feels like controlling ah like a dump truck in comparison. You're like, holy shit, dude, I'm so fast. Yeah.
02:01:20
Speaker
It's like everything that like I disliked about three is combat is like fixed within force combat. Yes. The, the, the, they got, they got the dragon engine down pat going into four. It was just like, Oh, it's so good. With all the characters, all the characters feel so much better.
02:01:37
Speaker
um Yeah. the Interesting that they went with multiple different like they were like, look, this was we right this was their first instance of multiple protagonists in the game because yeah obviously like you you saw it in zero, but this was the first time they properly did it. Yeah. They went with a whole ensemble cast. Yakuza four playable characters.
02:02:01
Speaker
Akiyama plays great. Kiryu, he plays like Kiryu. It's great. Seijima hits like a truck a little bit slower, but honestly, it's still good. And then Tanimora, the one where if you're able to master the Tanimora combat,
02:02:15
Speaker
I bow down to you because it is like it's a very trick his is the trickiest to learn but like if you're able to master it it's like the nicest to play it's like one of the nicer ones to play it's one of those it's it's where like you have an epiphany and it just clicks yes after a while and then you're like ooh this is buttery isn't it Yeah, that is very much... That is how Tanimura plays. and it's um Well, it's because it's because he's he's a cop. So his whole thing is Taiho Jutsu, which is the like the art of arresting, which is actually what Japanese police train. um And it's it's about like basically trying to... You want to detain someone. and you just don't You're not trying to beat the piss out of them. Yeah. like Maybe, I don't know, some some cops could learn that one. I'm not going to name names. But...
02:03:02
Speaker
It'd be nice if some cops learned the Taiho Jutsu, but um he can't he can't equip guns even though he's got a revolver, which is only used for his taunt.
02:03:16
Speaker
Yeah, I forgot about that. It is. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. no but then it's And it's Mine's taunt. Oh! Yeah. ah That's funny.
02:03:28
Speaker
um With 4, it's all done in Kamurocho, but they added stuff to Kamurocho. They added the rooftops, and they added the underground mall ah that you access from like the street level ah ah from like the the very south end like where you're like, oh, look, there's a stairway that goes down. Oh, we can't go down there. You can finally go down there in 4.
02:03:50
Speaker
And then there's like more of the sewers that you get access to. It's all in Kamurocha though. The story. The sunset is out there. It's a,
02:04:02
Speaker
it It ties in the four characters With it each one overarching Akiyama He is One of the best god damn rating characters There is love this man People simp for this man people love this man They want for good He is a lone shark In quotation marks he's a good he's But he's one of the good ones He's like the best lone shark Yeah He'll tell you, he'll have you do some weird things, but if you do them and you learn from them, he gives you the money.
02:04:34
Speaker
And that's it. He gets a customer one day. He tells her what to do. She, she isn't able Yeah. Lily. She, why can't remember. Did she, what it was like, she had to make x amount of money at his cabaret club.
02:04:48
Speaker
I can't remember if pays the money or not but she was his trust and he gives her the money yeah and it was a ridiculous amount of money it was like 4 million yet It was 3 million yen. 3 million yen in 3 days if she passed the test. Because her motivation is that um ah she wants to ah she wants to get Taiga out of of jail.
02:05:16
Speaker
Yeah, she wants to get Sejima out of jail because Sejima is on death row for An event that happened in the past. He and Majima are sworn oath brothers. yeah On the day that they were going to Basically go wipe out this. um The Ueno Seewa clan. The Ueno Seewa. Yeah. On the day that they were going do that. That was the day that Majima got tied up. And had his eye fucking gouged. ah Why are you wearing the eye patch? Seijima was the only one who went there.
02:05:47
Speaker
Took a like fucking... 18 of them down 18 of them down with like six revolve which is three revolvers one in each head and one in his mouth fucking Rorador Zorro three pistol style but he goes in kills 18 of them and gets caught and arrested and is basically put on death row you got Tawny Mora his plot involves finding the man who killed his father
02:06:19
Speaker
Or was it something else? i think that's that I think that's right. It's been a long time since I played three. Yeah, Tony Moran's plot is more of like, there's he's looking for answers about his father's death, and it leads into him finding out this the this police corruption.
02:06:35
Speaker
And then there's Kiryu who's all the way in Okinawa while all of this stuff is happening in Kamurocho. Well, Seizuo, he breaks out of prison and ends up in Okinawa. He fights Kiryu.
02:06:47
Speaker
He leaves for Tokyo. Kiryu is just like, whatever. It's not until ah the other guy that broke out with him ends up in Okinawa as well, who Haruka is scarred by because this is the guy who stabbed her dad, basically.
02:07:03
Speaker
ah I actually looked it up. it though The Sky Finance loan was 100 million. 100 million. It was a lot. It was a lot. 100 million yen. Anyway, it's because of Hamazaki that Kiryu ends up going to Japan. Back to Kamurocho because of Lily.
02:07:24
Speaker
ah Because she was briefly in Okinawa as well. Uh, and that's how he ends up there. Basically, it all overlaps, and it's all because of the Ueno Seewa, uh, because it turns out they didn't actually, well, it turns out when, uh, Seishima killed all of them, he didn't because the Seewa found out about the plan.
02:07:51
Speaker
planted the guns that Seijima was going to use and gave them what the police were testing at the time were rubber bullets rubber bullets so he didn't actually kill them but the guy the real mastermind after they had all woken up he killed all 17 of them which is the most ridiculous it is kind of ridiculous ah but it means that Seijima is an innocent man in his jailbreak is a okay he a good boy he's a good boy but uh during like essentially all like the learning all of this and everything that happened there lily ends up lily say my sister gets shot she dies uh before she ends up but she also takes out the guy that shot her uh as well which was just badass of her to do but it's like okay it's sort like
02:08:39
Speaker
there This whole plot for 100 million again was also like brewing down the line as well as like there's shits happening that like like money is tight for like a lot of things. There's corruption in places and things got to get.
02:08:51
Speaker
We got to add things on top of the millennial top millennium tower. Because of course, because of course. And so they get to the top and we find out the four kind of like other people that were like getting involved in this.
02:09:03
Speaker
You had Akiyama's friend from one of the other families who was like, you had him, you had Kido, you had Daigo, and you had the head of the police, the police chief Munakata.
02:09:19
Speaker
Yes. And essentially of all of this, Munakata is the main one. He's the big bad of this one. He is the corruption of the police. He's the deputy commissioner. Deputy commissioner. He's the big bad here. He he was like the one who was like he's like the one that was pulling like a lot of the strings for like a lot of this shit. You know, Seewa, a bunch of like Tojo subsidiaries and whatnot.
02:09:42
Speaker
Kiryu goes to beat the shit out of Daigo for kind of letting this all happen.
02:09:48
Speaker
Saejima fights Kido because balls out. Yeah, pretty much. Akiyama fights his friend.
02:10:01
Speaker
And then, uh, Tony Mora fights Munakata. And what is in what is the most unfair goddamn fight? And what is the entire series where it's like 12 to 13 armed cops with shields protecting this one motherfucker who all have a lot of health Yeah, yeah it's it's it's some bullshit. It's some bullshit, but when you beat that, ah everything's resolved.
02:10:30
Speaker
Akiyama gets shot, but he stays by a bunch of money bills. Yeah, Lunakota kills himself. Lunakota kills himself after realizing it's over. um And that's Yakuza 4. Yeah, the Seijima family is inaugurated.
02:10:47
Speaker
And then Sage decides I need to go back to jail to serve out the rest of my sentence. It's it's crazy shit, but it's very... i don't know. I like the fucking... I like it. it's It's more of just like... It's bad. Like, the parts that are bad... It's like it's bad that good for me.
02:11:07
Speaker
The parts that are bad are pretty bad. Yeah. the parts that are The parts that are good are unfortunately a little too few and far between. Yes. To like really like four is four, five, six.
02:11:24
Speaker
We're getting into like some weird decision making in the series, I feel. Yeah. ah Speaking of five. You like convoluted plots.
02:11:34
Speaker
Boy, do weak i we still to this day do not remember. Like, i I think I might like just, you know how, like some people have like a trauma response where they just blank out yeah stuff. I still don't remember what happened in five.
02:11:49
Speaker
Well, I'll recap well one. I love five. It's I had to sit on five for a bit of time, but it's like every time I think about it, it's like, you what? Five actually like despite it's how long and like some of the convoluted so long. It's got like 21 chapters. It is like still like one of my like it's like a really cool story that like with five is how like Yaga is a plan to wrap up originally as well.
02:12:16
Speaker
Yeah. Kiryu is a taxi driver because Haruka is at the age and Wike's dancing and singing and was scouted at a talent agency and they're like look if anything comes out about her past with you being her dad it's not going to go good for her and Kiryu in the best interest for his daughter decides to leave and it heads to a different fucking city I can't remember which one he went to but this game takes place in five cities
02:12:47
Speaker
Yeah, because we had four characters and we got five cities. They really they love they love their puns here, I guess they do. So Kiryu becomes a taxi driver and basically is living life until the Tojo clan found him again. Daigo like got when he's like he wants to find him. Daigo goes missing because of course it's Daigo.
02:13:08
Speaker
um And Kiryu learns that like there's some stuff going on in Tojo. He deals with it as fucking John Suzuki. ah um ah and then the curious portion she ends when he learns Majima is dead he's like how the fuck is that happening Seijima, he's in prison.
02:13:29
Speaker
ah He ends up breaking out of prison, though, because he learns of Majima's death. ah He breaks out with one of his cellmates named Baba. They end up in Hokkaido. Turns out Baba is an assassin and works for these people that were trying to keep Seijima in prison as long as they possibly could.
02:13:50
Speaker
Then we go to Osaka Haruka's in Osaka because this is where the talent agency is. This is where she's becoming an idol. ah She does that, but then her manager ends up dead ah and she's starting to get weird, but she's still doing idle things and Akiyama's opening up a new branch of Sky Finance in Osaka as well. He learns that the Omi are somewhat involved as well. This is also the game that we meet the new head of the Omi fucking what's his face?
02:14:19
Speaker
Oh, um...
02:14:24
Speaker
Oh my Was it... um No, it wasn't Madarame, was it? No. mara Because Madarame was head of the Yamagasa family, if I remember correctly. Watase! Watase, yeah, Watase. Watase is great. Kiryu interacts with him in his chapters, ah but what like the Obi-Wan Alliance are involved somehow too.
02:14:43
Speaker
ah Oh, right, no, sorry. Watase is not the head of the clan yet, but he's in contention to be the new chairman because their chairman is dying. Yes. um So Akiyama finds some stuff. He basically does like some detective work and then he acts as Haruka's bodyguard as she gets to Tokyo it's for a big performance after she wins her idol competition show.
02:15:06
Speaker
And then you've got Shinada, the fifth character here, not Tanimora. You got Shinada, a former baseball player who was ah who had to be like removed from the league after he was the scapegoat for a scandal.
02:15:22
Speaker
Yeah. And he's like, I've never touched his face ball again. He was forced to throw a game and ah so then took the fall for it. Yeah, he he was given. the He had to take the fall for some. Shady business.
02:15:36
Speaker
ah He swore he would never touch baseball again. But as he ends up uncovering all the truth to that, why it happened. And then he fights Daigo.
02:15:48
Speaker
And then he goes to. Japan and oh well he first he got confronts one of his old baseball guys concludes like that kind of stuff and then he goes to Japan to help with what Daigo asked him to help with.
02:16:07
Speaker
And then everything concludes with a lot of shit happening. turns out like this detective that was like there throughout, like a lot of this stuff is like the dying chairman of the Omi.
02:16:17
Speaker
He forces Seijua to fight Majima because Majima was actually faking his death. There's a lot of shit that happens, but it ends up the, the the key thing is Kiryu is fighting the son of the dying chairman of the Omi because he wants him to take over the Tojo clan as well.
02:16:35
Speaker
and Kiryu beats him, but Kiryu has suffered a lot of injuries, and Kiryu, on his way back, kind of just collapses in the snow, and Haruka says, hey guys, thank you for listening to my Isle concert. My dad's an ex-Yakuza, and I love him. I'm gonna go find him.
02:16:55
Speaker
Leaves the stage, finds Kiryu, and is left to be ambiguous of whether or not he would live or not at the end of that. So the whole thing didn't matter. yeah In the end, and yeah it didn't matter.
02:17:09
Speaker
In the end, it doesn't even matter. Haruka. Everybody loves Haruka. Everyone loves Haruka.
02:17:19
Speaker
I mean, the rhythm minigame is fun. Her combat is fun. dance but The dance battles were fun. Yeah. I mean, it's a rhythm game. And then, you know, that one so the the one sub story where Akiyama has to do is fun, too.
02:17:33
Speaker
Yeah. But yeah, that's the best. Yakuza 5 is, a if you can appreciate what they try to do with 5, you'll really like it. And I do. That's why I like 5 a lot. It's like my number 3 or 4 in my top list for Yakuza.
02:17:50
Speaker
buts that's definitely That's definitely not what you would well you'd probably hear from most Yakuza fans. That's probably a controversial opinion. It is a very controversial opinion, but I love 5 a lot.
02:18:03
Speaker
Gameplay-wise, it's a little lot this lot of the same as 4. ah it's It's maybe like a bit more refined. That's really about it. like There's funny more funny revelations to have with all the characters.
02:18:17
Speaker
like a big giant woman trying to be a dancer and she jumps up and ends up in the river. um that's for Haruka.
02:18:27
Speaker
And, uh, yeah, no, that that's, that's five in a nutshell. Yeah. You got, um, quite a, like quite a lot of, um, the same. i don't remember any like super standout, like other mini games other than the dance battles.
02:18:44
Speaker
Right. Yeah. There really aren't a lot. Um, There's Pachinko and yeah Pachinko was in four, five, and like a dragon. Yeah. And oh, and air hockey.
02:18:55
Speaker
Oh, yeah. The only one that has air hockey. If I remember correctly, I think four might have had it four five had it. Maybe. Yeah. But not also all the standards Mahjong Shogi. Yeah. Nobody. You cannot convince me that Mahjong is real.
02:19:11
Speaker
Nobody knows the rules to Mahjong. Don't act like you do. I mean, I kind of do. well is It's how I get the hands at the end of the day. is like, unless I have the guide up, like the in-game guide to tell me that it's like, oh, you have a hand.
02:19:25
Speaker
It's like, I still like, I get the gist of what I'm supposed to do, whether or not I'm making legal ones or not. I don't know. Yeah. um Six is good.
02:19:37
Speaker
yeah It's short. and It is. It is. with it Probably. yes It probably is the shortest one. if It is. Yeah. Yeah. You go to Hiroshima. ah You have a baby. Yeah. It's not. It's not curious baby. It's not curious baby because, you know, man can't get anything, but Haruka apparently can.
02:19:54
Speaker
Yeah. Oh, God. This. It's like, man, if you loved Haruka before, you're certainly going to love Haruka in this game.
02:20:06
Speaker
Yeah. ah
02:20:11
Speaker
You got... my One thing I'll say about Six is... What's his name? Suemo? the the younger looking Yakuza that ends up being one of the villains.
02:20:25
Speaker
um Oh. ah Is that his name? Sumea? Sumea! yeah may ah Yeah. If there's one character that they retcon or like change the way they go out is sumaya i would like because like in six it's like at the top of the moyo tower where you're fighting him um and it's like you know the other guy turns on him is like yeah we have the woman that you both love or whatever the the barkeep from hiroshima
02:20:58
Speaker
And Sumea kills himself because he's like here, you protect her because you beat me and all that shit. I wish that he would have, I don't know, not done that. Yeah, just not done that. Just in general. You know, teamed up with Kiryu to go back to Hiroshima to go save her. And if he went down during that final fight, I would have been a lot more okay with that.
02:21:24
Speaker
That's like the one retcon I want from six. And that would
02:21:30
Speaker
like Like six, six is very much like, ah yeah, you play it. You're done. It ends the story. is the you story. yeah It is what it is. Here you curious. Like as long as I'm alive, my family will never be safe. So he has died. Do G like fake his death.
02:21:45
Speaker
Yeah. which ah Which will then be that will, you know, that that wasn't retconned. Yes. At least. Yeah. Until like but they and they do ignore it like very quickly as soon as the man who erased his name comes out. and then say oh Yeah. Okay.
02:22:01
Speaker
Yes. Kiryu puts it. Kiryu puts on glasses and now nobody can recognize him. Yes. It's just like Superman. Yeah.
02:22:13
Speaker
Hey. Yeah, you. You've been gaming for six hours straight with no hydration station. You're starting to look like a ghoul from Fallout 4. Go drink some water.
02:22:25
Speaker
Yeah, that's it. That's the whole message. Drink water, you gremlin. Welcome back from that short break, folks. We had to take a break because, boy, we've been chatting a lot and actually had to, you know, ah take take take a break. we this This is a long episode, so thank you for sticking all around ah this long into it.
02:22:44
Speaker
oh Yeah. no one Remember to stand up at least once an hour if you can. Yes. ah One of the last things I'll add about six. This was the first instance of like the new dragon engine.
02:22:55
Speaker
ah And things were ah things were funny with combat with that dragon engine with ragdolls when you would knock out. Yeah, probably one it probably one of the best versions of ragdolling in the series. It was.
02:23:11
Speaker
you could You could see some shit. You could. This was also the introduction where they actually put like all of the drinks in the vending machines. And like when you went to a vending machine, you would see like the like the actual like you could select like every drink and then drink it and whatnot instead of just having a drop down menu and whatnot.
02:23:31
Speaker
It was cool because I remember there was an achievement in the game to drink everything from the vending machines. Because of course there is. because Of course there is. I'm just saying the Yakuza series does does like to make you waste your time. They do.
02:23:48
Speaker
or Just inane bullshit sometimes. Yeah, like spearfishing in an on-rails shooter. Ooh, yeah. it it was a That was a fun one, but you had to get like a lot of points for the completion list, which I did.
02:24:01
Speaker
and It took a long time. Yeah, and this was also the introduction of the gang battle system. hey which is very hit or miss depending on how it's done.
02:24:12
Speaker
um Sixes was very basic where you just dropped units in and they fought for you. And they brought it back in Kiwabi 2, which was more like a tower defense army type style one.
02:24:28
Speaker
And that has changed from that. But there's usually that's what they've they've been doing. That is like, they're They're very hit or miss now, depending on how it's done.
02:24:40
Speaker
It's also fun fact. Beat Takeshi is in this game of Takeshi's Castle fame. Oh, yeah. Yeah, he's um he's a hero. Say.
02:24:54
Speaker
oh he Oh, yeah, he is Yeah, that I'm like, yeah, because he, i like, um but when I play Six, I'm like, that actor is very familiar. Yeah. He's one of the legends of Yakuza cinema.
02:25:07
Speaker
who Yeah. And he plays Hirose and the Hirose family are very or are a very interesting bunch. I mean, Hirose is like, what is like, we're real, like, who he really was and shit, and you go fight him. It's like, whoa.
02:25:22
Speaker
Yeah. That's one of the few times like in 6 that I was like, oh, I'd like hold on a second. Hold on a second. Here's something I like. 6 is also the first time Kiryu plays baseball like canonically.
02:25:38
Speaker
Yeah. It's also one of the weirder baseball mini games where you're managing managing a baseball team. It's fun. It's actually like I spent a lot of time on that baseball mini game.
02:25:49
Speaker
If you like if you like ah was it like backyard baseball. you remember backyard baseball? never played it, but I've watched a lot of it through Ray Darnay is junior. Yeah, I love I love it. It's very simple.
02:26:03
Speaker
But once you get your team set up and you're just knocking dingers on other teams constantly, it's like the funniest thing is when you go into new game plus and you have like that built team and it carries over.
02:26:17
Speaker
you you like score like so many runs like in the required play of that mini game but you're supposed to lose that match the other team still beats you by one point which is so funny but that still happens there's no way around it there's no way around it like imagine if you scored 99 runs it's like well fuck like I think that was the cap too so it's like so do they yeah just get to score 100 then like what what would happen But no, it's i like very funny.
02:26:48
Speaker
Fun fact, the box art for this is like vast vastly different between the Japanese and US releases of Yakuza 6. Because the Japanese release has Takeshi like i'll bigger than Kiryu on the box art.
02:27:07
Speaker
In Japan and then in the States It's like Kiryu Like it's you know shirtless is back Like sort of looking off into the distance And then Haruka holding a baby Haruka who doesn't do shit The whole game The baby Oh by the way Baby crying mini game Yeah It's only done in the one chapter only It's one chapter only When you're trying to find milk Yep it's it It's kind of annoying. It's like like very annoying. It's like the old days like we only like really like... ah part of the game. Because Haruto, which is the with the baby for people who don't know, um decides that every four steps or so, you need to play a two-minute long minigame to get him to shut the fuck up.
02:28:00
Speaker
Yeah. So... Anyway, Yakuza 6 is Yakuza 6. It's Yakuza 6. It's the shortest one. It's nice, but it's... It's the it's ah it's one of the weaker entries, unfortunately. It's a weaker entry aside from like its ending.
02:28:16
Speaker
Like, its ending is strong. is like I'm not saying, like... It's ending after you beat the final boss, which is a very interesting choice for who they made the final boss.
02:28:26
Speaker
Mm-hmm. But it's like every there habits post fighting that is very fucking it good. Oh, yeah, it was Iwami, wasn't it? Iwami was something he was the yeah the son of the... The shit-building guy. He was like, how dare you not make me a Yakuza out of you about your blood. He's like, you're going with this other guy. I want to be the Yakuza. Dad said I could be the Yakuza. I've been training my whole life for this, and you won't let me, so I'm just going fucking do it.
02:28:59
Speaker
Kills his dad or whatever. It was... Yeah, was i don't know. like like like That's another thing I've read. And I talked to you about it after I finished Kalami 3 is like, what if like, don't know, something goes awry within Nido Nidoji and he ends up working, going going to that ah third clan is like, he's like the guy who could be the successor like that chairman or whatever. Or like, he's like, Nidoji tells him to like, so to to go deal with Kiryu and that's the final boss in that moment instead.
02:29:35
Speaker
I think that would be a lot cooler. i was going to say that that at least makes more sense. It would, yes. You know? Yeah. It definitely does.
02:29:46
Speaker
ah Okay, with that, we'll go into Gaiden next. i Another short one. I think Gaiden technically is the shortest game. Yeah, I think so, but i I don't think it suffers for it. Gaiden does not suffer for being short because Gaiden is meant to be short.
02:30:02
Speaker
Yet it packs... just as much Yakuza game in a Yakuza game as you want. Yeah. Like some of them get like a little long in the tooth. Gaiden, like does it doesn't, no, it just, it just does what it needs to do.
02:30:19
Speaker
And it's like, all right, here's your cool condensed story. I got, so I do have, I do have the platinum in this or whatever the steam. Yeah. Cause like, I think it was like with the introduction of a Gaiden or like, yeah yeah, yeah. It was like, you no longer had to like,
02:30:33
Speaker
complete like all of the completion list it was like yeah you had to do like certain things on it for some things but or like hit a certain percentage but you didn't have to do everything and yeah so so i have uh all achievements unlocked there's 62 of them so still quite a bit because yeah yakuza franchise 53 hours of play time whoo Yeah, that sounds about right, though.
02:30:56
Speaker
Which for a Yakuza game is surprisingly short. Like, to 100% any of the RGG games in less than 100 hours is, like... But it, but it the like we were talking about earlier, some of the most fun combat in the whole series. Yes.
02:31:13
Speaker
A really fun, like... and Like, the story itself is is super fun. Mm-hmm. Um... Here or you just do getting to do like cool secret agent shit fun.
02:31:28
Speaker
Yes. You got, you know, uh, the The fact that everybody's like, you can't, no, that's not Kiryu, that's Joryu. Yeah, Joryu, fucking Joryu. Joryu. And the story itself was cool.
02:31:42
Speaker
The only sad thing about that game is Infinite Wealth was written first before Gaiden. yeah this Despite Gaiden coming up before Infinite Wealth, Infinite Wealth was written first because of the relationship Kiryu has with his handler,
02:32:00
Speaker
is a very, like, it's like, it's it's a it's a great, like, they wrote that very well. Yeah. And we'll get to, like, why i like, it's an issue I have with Infinite Wealth when we get there with that specific out aspect. um And then it's also, like, it has, like, one of the better arenas in the game.
02:32:23
Speaker
Yeah. It introduced customization, and it makes sense to have customization in this game because here you could look however the fuck you wanted. Yep. ma you can You can play dress up.
02:32:33
Speaker
Starting from Gaiden. Yeah. um
02:32:38
Speaker
And, you know, it ties in directly to... the yeah the big brawl at the Yakuza dissolving thing in Like a Dragon as well, because that's where the game ends for Kiryu.
02:32:52
Speaker
And then it also has like one of the most emotional scenes in just Yakuza ever, when Kiryu sees the yeah the orphan his the orphanage kids grown up, ah basically sending him a message that they're like, I think it's...
02:33:06
Speaker
he's alive still and it's like they said like ah it was that it like Kiryu just like bawling his eyes out yeah it's like Jesus Christ like he finally got what he wanted yeah like the only other time you see Kiryu like break down that much is like at the end Yakuza 1 when Nishki died and did it for him at the when Rikia was dying in his hands and that's really about it those like the only times you ever see like Kiryu cry in the franchise yeah pretty much and it's like it's like but even so it's it's like this was like the most he's crying like it's like ge it hits it hits all the right notes guy that does yeah
02:33:59
Speaker
Yeah. Gaiden is one of those ones that I always try to um like recommend to people who like maybe don't want a to commit to the whole big you know hundred plus hours that a Yakuza game usually takes. Yeah.
02:34:19
Speaker
Right? in In this case, it's like, this is a nice... compact package like you you don't feel like you um like you're getting gypped on your money at all right like it feels like it's a it's a feature complete game it feels great to play like the combat is is just snazzy it is it's so good it's it's one of the best sets of combat in the series and like fun little like secret agent shenanigans drone swarms yeah
02:34:50
Speaker
Nothing is funnier than getting into being in the Coliseum and just being like, and here's a hundred drones. And watching that, watching that health bar go.
02:35:01
Speaker
Yeah. Cigarette. Finish it off. Yeah. Nice. Throwing exploding cigarettes on on dudes that are on the ground. You just chain smoking. That's why Kiryu got cancer. It's legitimately so that them explosive cigarettes. Who knows what they put in those things? True.
02:35:17
Speaker
ah Moving on to where the series changed its core gameplay like a dragon we'll combine infinite infinite wealth in this too, because these are the two games that use the turn based combat system, making them an RPG. Yeah.
02:35:31
Speaker
Yeah. um As crazy as it was, it works really well with the Yakuza franchise. It works better in Infinite Wealth. It does. It absolutely Infinite Wealth, like, um Like a Dragon is very dry. Very not... it It drags a little bit. You know what I'm saying? Yeah.
02:35:57
Speaker
um but it also not only does it introduce a new combat system introduce it introduces a new new protagonist Ichiban Kasuga our favorite schizophrenic with a perm yeah I love Ichiban it's honestly like it's also it's such a different outlook that he has compared to Kiryu uh ah And while the first in the first game, like, and that's the big thing, like, well, the first, like a dragon is like, it feels like there's a lot of like nothing for a lot of the game because they have to establish not just Ichiban, but like the entire party.
02:36:37
Speaker
Yeah. Like yeah it is very much the game that is, it is very much a
02:36:46
Speaker
Like if you're not interested in learning about all these characters and more interested about just like the overarching plot from each Yakuza game. That is like you got to skip like half of the game to get there.
02:36:56
Speaker
Yeah. it it It suffers from JRPG syndrome pretty hard. It does. um And. It.
02:37:09
Speaker
It definitely is better in in Infinite Wealth yeah as far as like as far as like the amount of like plotting along that happens yes it is a lot more plot with that like obviously with the two with the few new characters that they introduced with infinite wealth they they had they did like a couple things that but like it was only really the to say and
02:37:35
Speaker
taxi man King new guy fucking what's his name oh the taxi Toriyama told me tell me ah Tommy Tommy popped i' for um I'm trying to remember his name. This is what this is what happens when you when you like old Yakuza heads like us. Like there's so many characters. Tomizawa. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Tomizawa.
02:37:57
Speaker
Yes. Yeah. got God, you gotta love a franchise with hundreds of characters. Yeah. They all look. Yeah. the Which is funny. It's like everybody knows him as Tom is, but his name is Eric. Yeah. His name is Eric.
02:38:11
Speaker
Yeah. these Which is like, that's why we couldn't remember It's because it's, it's because his name. Yeah. he's just good. American name. He's the one guy in the series with an American name. Yeah. Cause it takes place in Hawaii, which was, uh, in Honolulu. Honestly, they, there's a really dope location to,
02:38:27
Speaker
more I, I, I, at first I liked it, but the more, the more we visited it, the more I found it to be sort of, too big actually a little bit on it it's like honestly it's like you have like yokohama density of stuff to do is not quite there yeah like compared to yokohama where you have take place with like a dragon that being like the big thing like yeah you go to osaka and kamarouch again but those are very small compared to like yokohama being the big thing and it is a massive map yeah and then you get to honolulu and it's like nearly just as massive as yokohama yeah it's a little it's a little
02:39:07
Speaker
i think they I get what they wanted to do. Right. I think they I think that if they just real because trying something new with the series going in entirely different direction. There's probably not enough times where people are like, well, maybe we should reel it in a touch.
02:39:23
Speaker
You know? Yeah. No, it is good. it's I like it. Well, also did a smart thing where it's like, hey, we're gonna we're going to split the party.
02:39:34
Speaker
and Yeah. For a good reason, though. Yeah. and actually It actually, it helps a lot. Oh my god, it helps a lot, because you have the Ishii-ban side and then the Kiryu side. The only thing about Evil The Wealth that dislike, party-wise, is like, you don't get Zhao or fucking Joongi.
02:39:54
Speaker
Joongi-han. Joongi-han until like, fuck in. end of the game yeah and they're two of the strongest characters that you could get to yeah also grinding jobs yeah in both games they're it's a but bitch like thankfully you don't have to grind out as much in infinite wealth Compared to like a dragon?
02:40:20
Speaker
Like a dragon? Okay, so here's ah here's a fun thing, all you listeners out there. You love a JRPG when you don't have to grind until the game literally tells you, i think you should probably start grinding here.
02:40:36
Speaker
And that happens in like a dragon. at At about ah just a little before the halfway point in the game, you're introduced to a battle tower. And the game sits you down and goes, okay, look, I'm gonna need you to complete this battle tower.
02:40:53
Speaker
Now you don't have to, but I'm strongly suggesting that you do. Because what happens not long after that is you get to fight Majima and Kiryu.
02:41:04
Speaker
Majima and Sejima at the same time. Oh, it's Majima and Sejima, yeah, and they don't fuck around. Then you the horde battle, then some story plus hot happens, and then you fight Kiryu. And then you fight Kiryu. And they will spank you.
02:41:17
Speaker
They do. The game the game goes from 0 to 100 on the difficulty you real fast. let like at The second they're like, hey, guys, the story matters now, get the fuck get the fuck up Yeah, it's there's there have been multiple times that I've like in having discussions about this game had heard from people who were like, i got soft locked there.
02:41:37
Speaker
and I just couldn't like that I couldn't proceed. I'd have to like I didn't have an older save. I couldn't you know, I couldn't beat um any of those fights.
02:41:48
Speaker
And if I did, i just I was scraping by using all my items, hoping, praying. Yeah. so There's some hard fights there, and then the lie and then like right at the very end when you fight ah Mr. Boxerman.
02:42:02
Speaker
none
02:42:05
Speaker
What's his name? i don't remember his name either, but I who you're talking about. Great cast, though. Songhee, great. Like... songy great like The whole the whole like ah political plotline with Bleach Japan and stuff yeah it was actually like really cool because they're like, well, it's not so much folk because it's not Yakuza anymore. Yeah, it isn't. It isn't Yakuza. The Yakuza's are gone. like They dissolve. Tendo. Yosuke Tendo.
02:42:36
Speaker
Tando, that's his name. Well, he's not the final boss because you know you fight Arakawa's Ryo Aoki, the the the son, the guy you grew up with, basically.
02:42:46
Speaker
like He's the final. It's quick time events, really. it's like yo yup It's one of those punch, punch, punch until we you win type things. It's the auto win thing.
02:42:58
Speaker
Tando's the real final boss. Oh, fuck. he's It's like a coach truck. Yeah, that fight. ah It's actually really funny that there's a bunch of people are like, OK, I made past the hard part.
02:43:12
Speaker
They get to tendo. They're like, you know what, dude? Like, no, I'm going to watch it on YouTube. I'm good. I'm good. I'm good. Now, this in Infinite Wealth, way smoother experience. Yes. Yeah.
02:43:29
Speaker
like They improved the they improved ah like how you can do your actions and whatnot where it's not just selecting actions. Your placement matters. Here you can break out of the turn-based thing and just start punching people. There's actually a mod that just turns the game into a normal dock as a game.
02:43:46
Speaker
i would Just do the whole game, just punch-a-sizing. I would be down for that. Yeah, it's a fun it's a fun way to replay the game. I bet. Yeah, because you're like, no more turn-based shenanigans. I'm just wailing on dorks.
02:43:59
Speaker
Makes the game way quicker to beat, too. Oh, I bet. Absolutely. Oh, yes. and So now we get to infinite wealth. ah yeah issue with god The thing about infinite wealth, the first thing, when talk about Gaiden, Kieru and his relationship with his handler is like so great at Gaiden.
02:44:13
Speaker
It's non-existent in infinite wealth. It's like, what the fuck happened? And, you know, they kill him and all Kiryu says when he finds out that he's dead, well, I guess he's dead.
02:44:24
Speaker
Shame. Anyways. Bummer, dude. yeah Anyways, I might as well go hit up Date about reliving my past. la mal Yeah.
02:44:36
Speaker
The, um... And the stuff with Bryce and Paul Iconoff does feel a little weird. It felt like they... Yeah. It doesn't mesh. It was like they had his mom cat. They were looking for his mom. was like, okay, it kind of makes sense. When Ichiban gets his mom away from that stuff...
02:44:59
Speaker
Yeah. Oh, and also, can we just talk about Ichiban just being a like ah just too much of a simp in this game? Yeah. Like, don't get me wrong, Seiko could get it, right? Uh-huh. But, like, there's... It's it's a little heavy-handed.
02:45:20
Speaker
and i And I can understand why people like don't really like Ichiban. I've heard this a couple times, that people are not huge fans of Ichiban as a character. He's goofy. um He's been very clearly mentally ill.
02:45:37
Speaker
Like the man is hallucinating almost everything that happens in combat. Dragon Quest. the Yeah. So he yeah, he gets bonked on the head hard enough that he believes that Dragon Quest is actually real. And everybody just sort of indulges this man's mental illness. And Kyu was sitting the head just as hard because Kyu starts believing it too.
02:45:56
Speaker
Yeah. So, um, it's everyone. Everyone's just like, you just, just let him do it. Just, he's just, he's having, he's having fun. He's let him have his foot. You know, it's the funnier thing is like, man, all these guys have knives and all of a sudden flamethrower.
02:46:12
Speaker
ah How'd they get that? Why am I taking fire damage when this guy just has a knife? Dudes in garbage bags, just would literally just wearing garbage like ah of a full sack of garbage as clothes. um
02:46:30
Speaker
I mean, homeboy Zhao comes back. One of the best characters in the series. Love Zhao. Yeah. Yeah. He just Zhao. He's just chill. He likes to cook.
02:46:41
Speaker
um The drink links ah we figure forgot to talk about. Oh, yeah. The drink, the drink links really help sell the um just the the fact that you have such a dense cast of like playable characters, air quoting playable, but they're party members. Right.
02:47:01
Speaker
um And all of them are good. All of the stories are great. like the, the little character interactions that you get walking around all of the like events, she'll just randomly like have a conversation, like what a character will chime in and you can like pick to do. And that like raises their bonds and stuff.
02:47:20
Speaker
They don't feel like just like, I have four characters in a line. And they're basically all just me. They actually do have like, they are fleshed out. They are surprisingly well-written for having like such a such a deep cast.
02:47:34
Speaker
Yeah. um And it works great. Yeah. um And the um i liked the ah the the addition of the exclusive jobs. Oh, yeah, because only like, yeah, because certain depending on yeah the gender that could determine their jobs. Yeah. Yeah. Well, like Tomizawa. Oh, yeah. yeah their standard Yeah. Their standard their starter job, basically. But like, honestly, yeah most of those jobs are basically all you need to get through the game. is Yeah. Pretty much like Dragon of Nojima for Kiryu carry the whole game. Yeah.
02:48:07
Speaker
Yeah. non-buzz homeless guy the best buffer and debuffer in the whole game like assassin Sony is like her best class hitman for uh Joongi is but like you don't have to like you can in engage in it and you do get benefits like the more you level up you get like flat stat bonuses that don't really care about what job you're using but like and some of them are fun like night queen you know
02:48:38
Speaker
Yeah. ah Yeah. oh Yeah. Samurai and Desperado are cool. Housekeeper is kind of cool. Linebacker was a cool neat one. Linebacker is cool. Yeah.
02:48:52
Speaker
Like the job, like the jobs themselves. Very funny. Like with yeah the shit that they made for the games. Cause like the original concept was like, Oh yeah. you need jobs. Like, like real jobs. Yeah. You have to go to a job center because you're, because you're a, an ex Yakuza. Yeah. And then with infinite wealth, it's like, Oh yeah, these are your vacation jobs that you could take part in.
02:49:15
Speaker
Yeah. And that's how they were made with ah infinite infinite wealth in mind. Yeah. But last thing I want to say about infinite infinite wealth was it really the ending for it. I still don't know how I feel about the ending a lot of the time where it's like, here you go the millennium tower to go fight Ichiban's brother or whatever it is that they're. Yeah.
02:49:35
Speaker
Yeah. Cause they're coin locker, baby. Yeah. And then what's it called? Um, Aji is his brother's name, if I remember correctly.
02:49:45
Speaker
Yeah. And that, no, Aji was the wheelchair guy. And Aji, uh, Oh, wait. No, you're right. Yeah, it was the other Yakuza guy. remember his name. but Oh, you know. know because and It was just like Bryce. brett so Bryce was like the Palakana guy. Bryce was Palakana and Ichibana went to go fight him. Ibina. Ibina, yeah. Ibina wanted the the revenge on the Yakuza. Yeah. And Kiryu's like, what if you just don't, though?
02:50:14
Speaker
Yeah, it's like, I yeah hear you had has to go like, i gotta, like, look, I'm here to, like, honor the Yakuza. You're not going take them down like this. know you're not gonna get yeah it's it's I don't know I feel like they could have swapped it like Kiryu could have gone to Pelicana and dealt with that ah and then having Ichiban faces I don't know I really don't know how I feel about that and then the whole Eiji thing because like we chase Eiji for a bit like in the end game of the game and then he just kind of fucks off and then it's like Eiji's there at the end
02:50:51
Speaker
And it feels like something was missed. It's like, it feels like there was this a step there. they Yeah. It's just like, wait, I even remember like when we, when we felt like the one, um, when Ichiban like goes back to Japan to, to confront AG, I was like, I had to sit there. i was like, wait, who's this dude? Yeah. It's like, wait, wait it's like, wait, that's AG. It's like, I feel like we missed something.
02:51:16
Speaker
Yeah. It was, it was weird. it's I think it's still a little bit of growing pains, and also we're now dealing with the consequences of having um new but new new somebody new in the driver's seat for the series. Yeah.
02:51:31
Speaker
Right? And that's going to obviously cause some shakeup, some miscommunication, growing pains. um It's not bad. Like, it like like like look, everything's fine. At the end of the day,
02:51:44
Speaker
yeah The worst game out of all of these is ah fucking Koabi 3 or like three. it's It's either three or six.
02:51:56
Speaker
Yeah, like those are your worst. At bare minimum, they're still fine games. Like those are not like the worst games ever made. like there are things worse than that like the thing about this like the franchise hasn't put out like a god awful game yet yeah it's they've all they've all been like even even at their worst they're still like pretty fucking good yeah they still pass and then you get and as we said about growing oh i wouldn't say growing pace but like wilded out there pirate yakuza I fucking love, hate Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii. i Oh, dude. okay i've been
02:52:36
Speaker
I've been beating at the walls for a Majima-centric game. Yes. A lot of people have, sincerely, for obvious of so serious reasons. Yeah. And we kind of got that in Kwame 2 because Kwame 2 did give us a side story with Majima. Yeah.
02:52:52
Speaker
Yeah. Which is nice. It was nice. It cool it it was a very nice one of how, yeah you know, Majima was in the position of where he was into. Yeah. And also it was nice to see some closure with Makoto.
02:53:06
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. And i was like, alright, well, like, but there's so much, you know, because he's always, he's always, he's in those schemes. He's behind the scenes. He's in those schemes. He's in those schemes. He's scheming. He's a he's ah he's a tricky little guy.
02:53:19
Speaker
Right? He's a wild card. Yeah. And then they Then they announced Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii, and I said, okay. And then they show ship-to-ship combat, and I say, okay.
02:53:31
Speaker
And it's just kind of mid. Yeah. At best. like it i was expect Like, the ship-to-ship combat is cool, like, the first three times you have to do it. Yes.
02:53:44
Speaker
And then it's not anymore because it's really slow and boring. and It's really slow and boring. It's basically once you get the the laser cannons and you level them up, it's that's basically just what you use. it just good then its for that just at all And then you have to do the like the tournament part with the boarding. yeah The boarding combat. Ugh.
02:54:04
Speaker
very It's very, yeah. like It's cool. the fuuds like If you were to just do the story, it's cool. and like You leave it at that, but when you do it more than that, that's where it becomes more of ah a weaker part of the game.
02:54:20
Speaker
like it um The maps are are weak. ah The actual overworld in general. you have You go back to Honolulu. You have bryce iss i that that bryce Rich Island you got rich island rich island island and got And I just... Man, like...
02:54:37
Speaker
boring the badlantis madlantis which is ah which is a ah corridor yeah and i just man like i I wanted to love the game so much.
02:54:54
Speaker
I wanted, I tried so hard. i I mean, and I played the piss out of it. Yeah. Like, it's fun i yeah have ah I have 100% completion in it, 83 and a half hours. Yeah, it's a fun game. Everything else, I would say ship combat its weakest.
02:55:08
Speaker
Majima's combat is cool. It's fun. It's got some nice gimmicks to it. Yeah, it's I do feel like that the it it is. a It does feel gimmicky, though.
02:55:19
Speaker
Yes, I would say that's like because I mean, obviously, the whole thing is sort of like there's a whole lot of suspension to disbelief you have to do if you're gonna get into the game. Yes, it was like, but I don't remember anything. I guess I'm a pirate.
02:55:34
Speaker
I guess I'll become a pirate for this kid. Yeah, because apparently there's pirates in the way. yeah There's a apparently but there's a king of the pirates and it's fucking fucking Samoa Joe.
02:55:47
Speaker
Yeah. OK, Samoa. I do love Samoa Joe in the game, though, because I just I'm um umm a huge mark for Samoa Joe, one of my favorite wrestlers. um And he does a great job, actually. He's a really good actor.
02:56:00
Speaker
I want, i I like that they were willing to try something new and I appreciate that. And I think like maybe fell a little bit short of its mark. Not a terrible game by any means. No, is it's not. is very much the like, Hey, do you like the crazy, the funny wacky stuff about Yakuza?
02:56:16
Speaker
This is the game for you because it's just all the funny wacky stuff. the so Like there's really like not a lot of seriousness in the game until like the ending where Majima, Seijima and, uh,
02:56:30
Speaker
and yeah I think it's just those two are driving to the hospital to go see Kieran. Yeah, because Kieran has cancer. He is actually dying for reals. Yeah, just kidding.
02:56:43
Speaker
Spoilers. know itt um Also, the kid, um Noah. Yes. And the singing and dancing routines. Like...
02:56:56
Speaker
and the and And Noah's drunk-ass dad. It's like, it's so cornball. It's so like like a show you'd see on the CW network.
02:57:08
Speaker
You know? ah Like, it's just, I'm sitting there going like, dude, i um ah there was a couple times I'm like, I don't i don't think I can with this with this shit. Like, like i granted, like Jason like jason and and like,
02:57:24
Speaker
like pretty cool characters. Yeah. um like They get a lot more development as you go along. and It sort of evens out. and they You get ah drink links for your your core crew. yeah Jason Masaru, Ishida, and Minami, and Seijima.
02:57:44
Speaker
Yeah, and then... Like Raymond, a.k.a. Samoa Joe. Cool. um the only Also, let's let's be honest.
02:57:54
Speaker
um It turns out, yeah, the ah elixir of or immortality is a thing. It is. It's and it whale Yeah, it's Whale-cum. It Do you like to remember that? Oh, it's like, and Majumuk is like, huh, this has been a weird couple weeks. I had, ah like, I was a babysitter while I had none of my memories. I became a pirate. um I beat up a massive religious cult that was...
02:58:24
Speaker
ah basically using a nuclear waste facility is, uh, uh, you know, in, in one of the prettiest parts of the planet as a secret base of said cults that were looking for this treasure too, because they thought yeah everyone thought it it was everyone's after this and, uh, took down an underground pirate network.
02:58:41
Speaker
Yeah, like and it turns out I can become immortal if I give a whale a blowjob, and also my friend has ah terminal cancer. You think maybe those last two things might have something to do with each other, the whole like terminal cancer and not dying, but no, Majimo just fucks off back to Japan. She says, all right, see you guys later. Done, game over.
02:59:01
Speaker
Yeah, basically. He's like, all right, i because again, the original reason he even went there was because the rehabilitation program for former Yakuza we we were to get all that to waste out.
02:59:14
Speaker
I'm trying to remember is No, it was in... There's a giant squid fight. I remember... i Like, there's parts more parts of this I was like... I had a terrible fluke. There's a giant squid fight on the boat in Pariyakuva.
02:59:28
Speaker
Yeah, okay. I was gonna say, because I'm like, I wasn't sure if I was just... My alcoholism had kicked in and I was fever dreaming. Ichiban punches the squid. Majima shoots the squid. That's right. Yes. Yeah, the giant the giant squid thing. Wasn't there a giant shark fight?
02:59:43
Speaker
Oh... Yeah, infinite wealth. But they're chasing down the fucking Danny Trejo. That's right. Yeah. Cause he's following them or whatever. but Yeah. Danny Trejo is wow.
02:59:59
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. The celebrity cameos really kick in before it was just Japanese porn women, but then they're like, what if we put Machete in here? i sat there he doesn't Yeah. Why not?
03:00:13
Speaker
i mean, even in the English dub of a, like a dragon, they had George Takei as a Arakawa. Oh, Oh, that's right. I forgot George Takei was. You're right, though. Yeah. Yeah. I remember when that happened, actually. I was like, that pulled me right out. I was immersed. And i was like, really? i was like, George Takei. Okay. okay All right.
03:00:32
Speaker
Peking duck. ial Peking duck. God, the one food that has key significance in this franchise. I will say, Pariyaku did give us one of the best batting minigames ever.
03:00:45
Speaker
Yes, it did. In the franchise, which is a huge win. it also It also lets you feed animals. it does It did, yeah. Which is not fun and but at all. No, it's not. It's slow and boring. All lifestyle minigames that they had in a couple... The like the lifestyle minigames never are great. Yeah.
03:01:07
Speaker
i You know, I have to say, though, i think pirate Yakuza, Yakuza's and pirate Hawaii pirates has the best of the cooking minigames throughout the series.
03:01:17
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. You know what? Yeah. And that cooking minigame does kick did carry over into Kiwami three with the orphanage. Yeah, ah because I remember though in OG three, the cooking minigame was pretty dull. I honestly don't even remember the cooking game.
03:01:33
Speaker
That's how fucking... You don't have to... like you You only have to do it like once. Because Haruka's like, we're hungry! Yeah. like Help me cook, Uncle Kazuma.
03:01:44
Speaker
Help me cook, Uncle Kazuma. Yeah. I'm glad she's not part of the series anymore, dude. Fuck Haruka. I'm gonna say it, dude. Haruka sucks. I'm trying to think if there was something there was something else that i was like on the tip of my tongue that trying to remember I was gonna say about...
03:02:03
Speaker
pirate that I don't remember well while you're thinking of that i have to the dungeon crawling mode like starts great does not end great Matthew Mercer does a great job as Majimo all the time I always play the games of Japanese so i i only i I don't get to hear their ah English voices that often Oh, i I love, I will do, um well because I always stream them. And it's, as as a streamer, it's always easier to just play the games in English if you can. Because there's a lot of people who are going to be, like, listening in, you know, have my stream in the background, stuff like that. yeah so it's just easy, just more convenient. like um
03:02:47
Speaker
I do, fun fact, you remember Queen Michelle? Yes. You know who voices Queen Michelle? Who voices her? Deborah Wilson. ah It's always that they find me a game made in the last 10 years.
03:03:03
Speaker
where Debra Wilson is not involved in some capacity. I defy you. She's in everything. Literally. yeah She's in Death Stranding 2. She's in Suicide Squad Kill the Justice League. She's in Halo Infinite, Diablo 4, Destiny 2, everything. all Over head. She's Daisy Duck.
03:03:26
Speaker
well Over the head. to Everything. Like, Debra Wilson, like, I don't know who Debra Wilson's agent is, but if I ever become a voice actor, I am hiring that motherfucker right away. Okay, fair enough.
03:03:39
Speaker
but That's fair. I remember what I was going to say. The absolute, like, funniest moment in Pirate Yakuza is the 30-minute live-action dating show with Masaru.
03:03:55
Speaker
Oh, oh, oh, it was so, oh, the ick, the ick, oh, it was that point. I remember that part, I was actually streaming when it happened, and I had a bunch of people, they were like, come on, Masaru, you can't, dude, don't fuck this one up. Don't fuck it up.
03:04:14
Speaker
And he fucks it up five times. Five times. And it's like, dude, some people, I guess, just aren't built for it, you know?
03:04:24
Speaker
It was so great. it's it It was good. mean That's the thing. That's the thing. i think overarching with ah pirates in Hawaii is that there's It's highs are goofy and majestic and hilarious. Yeah.
03:04:40
Speaker
And it's lows are tedious, like a, almost like being a pirate. Sometimes you're just stuck at sea and it's, you just got to wait until the, until the fun part happens and they start singing and dancing. Like it's a fucking Broadway musical again. Yes.
03:04:55
Speaker
ah We are almost through everything. ah We get to move on to the spinoffs now. Uh, we'll start off with Ishan because I don't think we probably have a lot to say about Ishan.
03:05:07
Speaker
Uh, yeah, not really. it will Like, I think it's a cool history piece because it is based off of it is real events of Ryoma.
03:05:18
Speaker
What's his name? Samurai. ah it's about It's about the Shinsengumi and Nakamoto Ryoma.
03:05:30
Speaker
Yeah, and there's the whole like Toso was the capital at the time. Yeah. um And then there's Kyo is the capital city in Tosa.
03:05:43
Speaker
And then there's like you like you it's it's the whole dissolution of the Shinsengumi, the fall of the samurai Yeah, basically. Yeah. Basically, long story short, white dudes show, pull up, and they're like, guess what?
03:05:59
Speaker
Guns. And there you go. If you know the whole little story of the ah westernization of Japan and modernization of Japan at that time, and the fall of the Shinsengumi and stuff like that, you already know the story. Yeah. ah Other than that, it basically plays a lot like Zero. Yeah.
03:06:20
Speaker
like with four fighting styles mini games swords swords gun swords and guns sword and gun yeah there's chicken races which you can rig once you rig it and that's how you make your money in the game let's make a ton of money all of the actual historical characters are played by the Yakuza cast are the Yakuza cast yeah like which is really funny ah
03:06:51
Speaker
You get, a like, Takeda Kenryusai is Awano. Yeah, it was also it was also the return of, like, the the Zero cast members, like since they did Zero.
03:07:04
Speaker
Yeah. Of Awano...
03:07:09
Speaker
Ogita is in it from 5. I know Zhao is in it from Like a Dragon. Mabuchi is in it as well. um Ushijima is in it from 5.
03:07:26
Speaker
ah
03:07:29
Speaker
Kashiwagi is in it. Basically, everybody that like you've seen, like you're going to see again and be like, hey, that guy looks familiar, but he's like a different guy because he's in the past. Yeah. store Yeah.
03:07:41
Speaker
Yes. Yeah, no. So that you should it's fine. Like it's not my favorite. No, and it really does struggle with being the first game with them switching to Unreal Engine.
03:07:55
Speaker
um The combat definitely takes a step backwards as far as it's like yeah the the feel of it. Yeah, they wanted to like recreate how Eshin felt as well, which I think they should have just gone with like how modern Dragon Engine did.
03:08:08
Speaker
was and done it like that still I just I don't know this the decision to switch away from dragging it like I get it like it's not more of like the engine but more of like how like it's seamless from combat to exploration yeah instead of like instanced when you get into it like I wish that they went with a more seamless than the instanced Yeah, well, I just like I understand that, like having your own proprietary engine makes it harder because you have to bring in developers that you then train on to work with your proprietary engine.
03:08:41
Speaker
If everything but the problem is, if everything switches to unreal, then everything feels like unreal, you know? Yeah. And um at least when it first released, it had some like problems with how it ran and the lighting and the shadows and stuff like that. But I don't know. On the whole, like, it's cool. It's neat. It's fine. ah Then we get to the good spinoffs.
03:09:02
Speaker
Yeah.
Judgment Series Discussion
03:09:05
Speaker
Judgment and lost judgment. my Like we gushed about them earlier in this. Oh, such a fantastic game. do Not without their faults. No.
03:09:15
Speaker
But there's this is a series that defines itself on its faults, I feel. Yes. Because Lost lost Judgment has a way worse story than Judgment.
03:09:29
Speaker
Yeah. It's definitely, I think, of the two stories, Judgment has a better story Lost Judgment. Has the better gameplay. Has the better gameplay. Yeah.
03:09:40
Speaker
Like, and I think, I think Lost Judgment has the better side stories too, because oh yes I liked, I liked the dance competition stuff weirdly enough. And but had the boxing club. ory the the All the school clubs and they over are at the end.
03:09:56
Speaker
Yeah. Just for, but I also, it's all cool. I, I dislike, I forget her name in Lost Judgment. The, um the detective club girl. um I remember her name, but I'm not going to try it. doesn't but it doesn't but du Nobody needs to know her name because she's annoying. She's the worst part of the game. um Even though she is like the ah they basically who pulls the whole story along. but yeah um And also Lost Judgment, I believe, only has one chase sequence.
03:10:29
Speaker
Maybe two. Yeah, it's not as many as the first one. It's like, yeah, because the first one has on one hand. How many there are that? Yeah, well Judgment has way too many. And there was a whole bunch of fun about, ah you know, Johnny's and whatever. But also, like, if you don't really, if you want to play a game that, like, like a really good beat-em-up that has, like, cool, like, hot procedural drama elements to it, and you're not really into the whole Kiryu in Friends escapades thing, Judgment and Lost Judgment are
03:11:01
Speaker
Well, great way to go. Yeah. And these are the ones I played in English. I didn't play these ones in Japanese. Yeah. And Greg Chun does a good job as Yagami.
03:11:12
Speaker
Matt Mercer did a great job as what's Kuroiwa? Was that the villain of the first one? ah Oh, was it? It was Kuroiwa. I'm trying to remember. It was. No, it wasn't Kyohei, was it?
03:11:28
Speaker
um It's been a while since I played the first one. It is Kuroiwa. Mitsuru Kuroiwa.
03:11:38
Speaker
They also, Judgment, the Judgment games had like cool intros. Like you had the first one, you had the, you had Alexandros do that that, the opening song. and then you had Otto do the song, opening song for Lost Judgment as well. yeah It was like, ah that's cool. It's, it's, it was the, both those games are the height of the Dragon Engine.
03:11:58
Speaker
Yes. Because they play so smooth. Yeah. like the old and The only minigame you're going to dislike is Drone Racing. Oh, yeah. Drone Racing not good. that amazing It's fine.
03:12:14
Speaker
It's just there's a lot. it's Yeah, you just it overstays its welcome. That and then in Lost Judgment, the um the VR board game. Oh yeah. They made it worse.
03:12:26
Speaker
Yeah. And it's like, that's why like, what's going on here? like Like, it was, I mean, it was okay. Well, to be fair, it was, it it kind of, it is it's okay. And the first one, like it is how you make yeah money. Yeah. And the second one, it's very, ah very not good. Yeah.
03:12:42
Speaker
But, and also like stereo high school, definitely like you spend most of your time in, in, in the high school and like in the game. And yes, It's like why this where like, you guys just didn't bother adding any more map here. Did you? you just That's it? Spend 90% of my time in a high school. I'm like a 40-year-old man.
03:13:02
Speaker
Like, what are we doing? Also skateboarding. I forgot skateboarding was Los Dugos. Skateboarding, yeah. That was your payable of transportation. Yeah, that is a thing.
03:13:13
Speaker
they would bring that they would They would bring that back for the ah for the Like a Dragon games. e i should oh Well, we ended up getting the segues instead, which are definitely not as cool. Yeah, they're not as cool.
03:13:27
Speaker
Yeah. Nobody has ever thought a segue was cool. And I love that they bring that up in the game. It's like, I've invented this new way to get around. It's not a segue. And everybody's like, that's fucking lame. Just like in real life.
03:13:41
Speaker
Yeah. Do you know the guy who invented the Segway in a Segway accident? That's kind of ironic. Yeah, he was like, he was doing his like, he was on a path like he was somewhere in the UK that he would always like do his like morning Segway nerd ass ride around. And there's a guy coming the other direction walking his dog. And so he moved over to like give the guy with his dog some space, which is a nice thing to do. ah And he ended up going off the side of a cliff.
03:14:12
Speaker
Oh, yeah. And that's what killed the Segway brand really is like once the news of that came out, people were like the guy who invented the Segway died on a Segway and I'm not buying one. Yeah, that that would deter me from buying a Segway. Yeah.
03:14:27
Speaker
oh That and wanting to you know ever get pussy at some point in your life would probably also do it. At least for me. can you There's an incredibly tiny spider on my desk. That's a black widow.
03:14:42
Speaker
oh get rid of that Sorry, baby spider. Anyway. Okay. ah Well, we've covered every game now because neither of us have experience with Kenshin or the PSP games.
03:14:55
Speaker
Or Dead Souls. Or Dead Souls, unfortunately. want to play Dead Souls. I hope that they like just like release it on modern hardware. that would just be i would love so I would love if that were the case. It does emulate very well as far as I understand. I've heard that, yes. yeah And then the Curlhio games will never get a re-release because the main character is a juvenile.
03:15:19
Speaker
Oh! Yeah. You play as ah you play as an... an and like a ah under you play as a delinquent oh okay so they would have to like basically rewrite that for it yeah I mean granted if they had the balls to do it because ah from what I've read of like the plot and like seeing little bits and pieces like Ukyo is a really cool protagonist um and ah they they actually call him the mad dragon of Kamuro
03:15:53
Speaker
um And he's got just tons of fighting styles throughout the the two games, um like Shotokan Karate and like ah boxing and Muay Thai. And he'd Lucha Libre.
03:16:08
Speaker
Oh, shit. Yeah. Pankration, Krav Maga, Bajikwan. Like the dude, the dude is like weirdly enough, even though those games don't ever fit into the canon, like if they were to, he would be the strongest.
03:16:27
Speaker
Well, okay. Yeah. That's kind of nuts. Yeah. um i don't I assume you could emulate as well. because i I feel like you could. Because I think I've seen the things that like some I think they've made a translation for.
03:16:40
Speaker
Yeah. I know that. I think some people have. so ah Black Panther is the. Yeah. It's also called Black Panther. It translates to Black Panther. So it's like, well, that's a whole other. ah Yeah. Yeah.
03:16:54
Speaker
to deal with it'd be it'd be nice and then like Kenzan is as far as I understand just more Isshin yeah it's just a different era that takes place in last thing I'm going to ask you before we move on to the bonus level Stranger Than Heaven thoughts predictions So I'm well, I know that they're going show a like an actual like at least some vignettes or something at the Xbox showcase next month.
03:17:26
Speaker
i It's getting its own showcase. I can't remember what it is. Yeah, it's like, it's on the, so I think on the 6th of May. um But at first, I saw the the the first initial but you know release trailer, like the the reveal trailer, I mean to say.
03:17:43
Speaker
And I was like, oh, cool. Like set during post-World War II reconstruction. like That's awesome. i love Because I love historical dramas and stuff like that, Yeah.
03:17:55
Speaker
um And then they showed like, oh, it's going to happen over multiple eras. Also pretty cool. I. If they can get the little bits of kinks worked out from like.
03:18:15
Speaker
like moving back to Unreal Engine, like, you know, if they if they can maybe give it the combat a little bit more weight, the way it felt like like we talked about, more like the Dragon Engine. And keep, I want this one to be a little bit of like return to like Yakuza 1, Yakuza 2, where like I get like it's fun, like pirate Yakuza is fun and silly. I get that. I like that. Yeah, but like I want this.
03:18:38
Speaker
Yeah, I want a little bit more grit this time around. i want, like, especially if this is going to be, like, over multiple eras and the way, like, and if they're going to deal with, like, Japanese history and like the way that people interact with their, with their culture and their economy and their politics and stuff like that, which you should, if you're going to be going, showing all the different eras, right? Yeah. um There, there should be like, pose there, I shouldn't be helping to wipe someone's ass in just got the shit bombed out of you, Japan.
03:19:15
Speaker
Right. Right. Like there's so there's a gravitas that needs to exist there to like respect the historicity of the setting. Yeah. You know, and like ah it's cool if they like show up in the in the boom era again and it's like money, money, money. I get that because that's of the time. Right.
03:19:35
Speaker
And show like how that worked around and then like show the... maybe maybe I don't know what eras they're doing. Maybe show the the the bubble era in the 90s. Make it a little darker again.
03:19:48
Speaker
That'll allow us to have that sort of like tension and release that the series always has between its main plot and its side stories. right yeah and i just just think like i just don't I just don't want them to like go overboard and make it to new Yakuza. I want them to go old Yakuza.
03:20:08
Speaker
Yeah, no, definitely. I have the same boat as you in there. Like, I'd like to see bit more grit. Yeah. that More, take it more serious than the Yakuza games do.
03:20:21
Speaker
Yeah, it, it, it's, it's a nice, like, it's a nice, I, I do like how they're sort of like, split the series into a couple like different venues, right?
03:20:35
Speaker
Like they're not afraid to do goofy stuff with like pirate. And then they've done the two different timelines, like move, like, you know, make certain things that maybe, uh, whether you think they need to be retconned or not, you know, whatever,
03:20:53
Speaker
i'm I'm sort of an old head about it, but I get like they're trying to modernize the series a little bit. um But with the spinoffs and stuff like the Judgment games, it's also nice to see like they get to stretch their legs when they want to.
03:21:09
Speaker
So it's cool. They got all options. They do. ah we I'll be excited when we see more from the showcase. ah We'll report on that here on the podcast, obviously.
03:21:21
Speaker
With that, three and a half hours into the podcast, it is now time for us to dive into the bonus level. Woo! Crazy lists, great deals, and recapping gaming history. It's all here in the bonus level.
03:21:36
Speaker
All right, we're starting off with Game Clash, and we've got some gimmick roguelikes for you, Flavorful, to pit up against each other. Are you ready? Yeah, yeah, I am. i um I looked through these, and I i did a little bit of... ah little bit of research because I have been ah somewhat addicted to the rogue slop lately. Excellent. All right. Starting off, we got Ballionaire versus Beyond Words. Now, Beyond Words did, of course, just come out. But the concept of it is more of the concepts of each one that we're getting up against each other.
03:22:09
Speaker
It's it's so funny that like. Just knowing the story, like who made Beyond Words, like to me is just like, just completely ridiculous.
03:22:22
Speaker
um And, but Bollionaire, what a huge fan of, to be honest with you. um I see, I'm looking at it right now. It it has, ah it has very not favorable reviews on Steam as we speak.
03:22:39
Speaker
um And it's, it just doesn't, It's fun and it has the flashies. Ballionaire is like, yes, the dope you should get the dopamine. You just never do. You never hit a point where you're like, hmm, this is starting to present a challenge to me. It's pretty it's pretty consistently easy all the way through. i actually got a refund on it. I'm going to have to go with beyond words here just because it's heckin' silly.
03:23:04
Speaker
All right. ah Next up, we got Haste versus Peglin. Oh, man. This is this one's the actually the toughest. um This one's the toughest for me.
03:23:15
Speaker
Haste is really cool. It is. Like, Haste is a visual smorgasbord. Penguins fun.
03:23:25
Speaker
But haste is Haste is just got the swag dripping from the pores. So I have to go with Haste. Okay. Next, we got Cloverpit versus Ballotrow.
03:23:38
Speaker
clover pit okay the grut the grime the grit the and blotro you know is is sort of like i guess the og here um and it's you know has has but had the most staying power i would say but clover pit hits for me like aesthetically like very few other games have okay ah And last f round of the the qualifiers, Ball Pit versus Raccoin.
03:24:10
Speaker
Yeah, Recoin just came out a couple days ago. It did. Yeah, and i I'm a sucker for coin pushers, man. i love coin pushers, and I like Ball Pit, but I find that like if i'm if I'm playing a rogue slop game, i don't want to have to be laser-focused. I want to be able to like drink and watch a YouTube video at the same time. like i but I've got an essay like a YouTube video essay about a game that I'll never play that's like eight hours long.
03:24:39
Speaker
um Or i actually, funny enough, ah retrospective on all of the um ah ah Metal Gear Solid games. It's a day and like 30 hours long. um That's I'm going to have to go with Recoin. All right. Coin pusher.
03:24:58
Speaker
Also prefer the aesthetics. All right. Semifinals beyond words versus haste.
03:25:07
Speaker
Well, I kind of have to at this point disqualify beyond words because it doesn't technically exist right now. Technically, the day we're recording this, it does exist.
03:25:18
Speaker
It just came out the day we're recording this. Oh, it just gave gay came out today? oh Yeah. Oh, did it really? i did Oh, well well, I haven't played it yet. yeah done It was just still fair. it's just yeah yeah It just came out.
03:25:34
Speaker
So that's why it just barely makes it into the list here. becausere yeah I needed some unique roguelikes of like, you know, these gimmicky things. But so, yeah, but no, but Haste takes that. That's fair. I'm going to Haste. Haste is it's good.
03:25:47
Speaker
so It's so stylish. And what like, oh, well, I forget that game. There's this game that came out a couple of years ago that was like a platformer shooter that um like had the people in the masks. They were like in hell and you had to like, you go with your levels really fast.
03:26:03
Speaker
Neon white. the The sense of speed that you get in haste reminds me of like when you're in the zone, reminds me a lot of neon white. And it's once you're there, if you like that kind of thing, you want to go fast.
03:26:14
Speaker
You want Sanic yourself off. Yeah. Haste will do it. Clover Pit versus Recoined. Clover Pit. it's so It's so dirty.
03:26:26
Speaker
It's so grimy. Finale, finals, Haste versus Clover Pit. What wins here, Flav? Dude, that's... ah because they're so They're so different, right?
03:26:37
Speaker
Um...
03:26:40
Speaker
I've got to go with Clover Pit mostly because mostly because I love the way Clover Pit, like I love i love both their aesthetics for very different reasons. I love their what the their game the gameplay is for both of them for very different reasons.
03:26:54
Speaker
But I like that Clover Pit, it's meta progression. is a little more esoteric it's a little bit more like scummy it's a little like it's the whole the whole game just feels like you know when you like when you go to take a shower and you see a cockroach in the bottom of the tub what you never never had that happen where a cockroach comes up through the drain maybe this is like a south maybe this is a southwest america we have cockroaches in alberta i I would be surprised. I would be shocked. I bet you you do, but I guess, you know, definitely a different climate. But like, yeah, sometimes they just come up through the drain.
03:27:34
Speaker
I've never had that happen. Hold on. I'm actually Googling whether or not because we cal believe it or not, we don't have rats.
03:27:46
Speaker
Okay, no, we do have cockroaches, but they're... I was going to say, I'm pretty sure like every warehouse cockroach. I've just never seen one in my city. Or what I've just never seen one out here.
03:27:58
Speaker
Yeah, they'll... So you lucked out. yeah ah not they're they're they're they're kind of They're kind of gross, man. They are. ah All right, moving on to this week in gaming history. Here's what happened in the past from April 13th to 26th. Starting with major events, April 19th, 2002, U.S. District Judge Stephen Limbaugh rejects a request against the St. Louis Ordinance of 2000, limiting access of minors to video game arcades. The judge rules that video games are not protected by freedom of beach the craziest part of that story is that it happened in 2002 yeah game arcades still existed somewhere in the united states in 2002 because they could have fooled me man yeah uh april 21st 2000 sonic team is founded in tokyo japan uh and april 26 2007 sony head of playstation division ken kutanagi announces he will step down
03:28:54
Speaker
Game birthday wise, on the 13th, The Legend Zelda A Link to the Past turns 34. On the 15th, Breath of Fire 2 turns 24. On the 18th, Brain Age turns 20. On the 20th, Monster Hunter Tri turns 16.
03:29:09
Speaker
On the 22nd, The World Ends With You turns 18. the 24th, Fear turns 19. ah the twenty fourth fear turns nineteen and on the Guilty Gear Dust Strikers turns what Moving on to Tony's Game Bowl, our seasonal poll that we've got flavorful. What sport should Mario play next?
03:29:26
Speaker
That he has not played already. Russian roulette. but That's a man's sport right there. ah Don't know if that would ever be feasible to release. Unfortunately. Yeah, probably not. i don't think that think Nintendo is going to be happy with that one.
03:29:48
Speaker
I... i I think i actually i think like a hockey game would be fun. He has played an official sport. it's one of the sports best games that he played hockey. Currently, Mario has played tennis, baseball, soccer, basketball, golf, volleyball, dodgeball, ice hockey, horse racing, dancing, and the track and field Olympics. like But the Olympics, like...
03:30:14
Speaker
I'm leading in with the Olympics. Like no track and fields can be said because obviously that is the core of the Olympics. But like certain Olympic games, I will like allow because they are their own thing as well.
03:30:24
Speaker
You know, I'd like to see, um I'd like to see a Mario skateboarding, like extreme sports game. like Like a Tony tony Hawk's pro skater. Absolutely.
03:30:36
Speaker
That is absolutely what ah like a good choice there. Like skateboarding, BMX, in aggressive inline kind of. Oh, that would be cool. Yeah, that would be sick. Yoshi on a Razor scooter just slap just hitting his shins every time he gets off of it. Yeah.
03:30:51
Speaker
That would be funny. ah Your upcoming deals of the week, ah your free games on Epic are Propsumo until the 16th. And then from the 16th to 23rd, you got the Stone of Madness.
03:31:04
Speaker
As for some sales coming on, Steam sales, Arc System Works, Publisher sale goes until the 22nd. Frostpunk franchise sale goes until the 20th. And the Avalanche Studios spring sale goes to the 18th. I have to say, ah that Frostpunk deal? Ridiculous.
03:31:20
Speaker
Ridiculous. wo you You get Frostpunk and all the DLC for like five bucks and you can you can get tens of hours out of that game. Like it's low. Oh, good to know.
03:31:32
Speaker
You're playing PS Plus games of April were released. Lords of the Fallen, Tomb Raider 1 to 3 Remastered and Sword Art Online Fractured Daydream are your PlayStation Plus free games for the month of April. Your achievement of the week is in Darwin's Paradox. Progress is good, which is to find five discoveries.
03:31:49
Speaker
Your game of the week is Tamodachi Life Living the Dream. And, Play, if if there's a one game older than you that you'd recommend right now, what game would that be? A game that right now I would recommend? Um...
03:32:06
Speaker
ah can't say I was going to say a thousand times. yes but I think you said that last time. Right now, I'm having a really fun time with a game called Kuloniku. K-U-L-O-N-I-K-U. Bull up.
03:32:19
Speaker
It's a pretty chill ah You can make it less chill if you if you want the challenge. It's a pretty chill cooking simulator game about making ah meatball soup.
03:32:30
Speaker
And you do Iron Chef battles with meatball soup. And it's got um light puzzle elements because people will like, hey, I want this recipe, but I want it to taste this sort of way. and I want you to like not put this ingredient in there. So you have to like think about...
03:32:45
Speaker
how you're going to like make the dish to best satisfy your customers. Oh, that's cool. It's a pretty neat, it was a pretty neat little, and the cast of characters are very silly, very like early 2000s anime. And also it's the only game I've ever played that is by Javanese development team from the island of Java.
03:33:08
Speaker
Oh, that's cool. Yeah. All right. Well, go check that out, folks. Uh, Flav, we've finally made it to the end of the episode. Three minutes, three hours and 40 minutes in.
03:33:22
Speaker
Wow. This is a historic episode. I think this is the longest episode that we've ever had in the game lounge. ah Thanks for coming on again. Thanks.
03:33:34
Speaker
Thanks. It was, it's always a pleasure to hang out. I love coming on the show and yeah, I mean, maybe the next topic we'll pick something that we're not quite as deep into. It'll be a regular episode next time, folks. Yeah. This, this, this is, this is one of the specials. this is This is a special. This was a special episode. I didn't know how long we would end up chatting for.
03:33:57
Speaker
But you know what? I'm glad we did. This gives ah is a great time. good to Quickly shout out our editor. ah Shout out to our editor, Mike. He is editing through all this right now for us.
03:34:13
Speaker
So shout out to him. Link will be a description where you can follow him. Flavorful, where can we find you on the Internet? ah I'm almost always live on ah in the mornings on twitch.tv slash flavorfulvt.
03:34:28
Speaker
VT as in VTuber. ah That's the same for my Blue Sky and my Twitter. um I'm just out here shitposting, playing a lot schizocore games, playing a lot comfycore games, playing a lot of horror. building some gunpla, uh, sometime soon in the near future. So if you want to, you want to listen to some jazz and hear me ramble while I build a tiny robot, you know where to find me.
03:34:49
Speaker
Uh, and of course you can find me at Tony's game lounge everywhere. YouTube, Twitter, blue sky, Instagram, Tik TOK and Twitch. Like I said, on the 16th, we'll be playing Tomodachi life all out. I'm good. Try to do it all day. Uh, making me's living life, living, living the dream as the game says.
03:35:08
Speaker
And of course, you can also catch me doing my Final Fantasy Marathon. We are currently on Final Fantasy for the after years. It's a game. that's it is It is a game. It is for certain. It's currently the first low point we've hit on the marathon, but we'll get through this. Don't worry, won't be the last. It won't be the last, apparently. Flav, thanks again for coming on.
03:35:32
Speaker
absolute pleasure thanks for having me and thank you the listener for tuning in be sure to like share and follow this podcast on whatever platform you're listening to this on be sure to go check out the highlights from this episode every Monday Wednesday Friday on the official Tony's Game Lounge YouTube channel we will be back in two weeks time with a brand new episode right back here in the Game Lounge bye Deuces.
03:35:57
Speaker
Thanks for listening to this week's episode of Tony's Game Lounge. New episodes release every two weeks. Make sure to follow, like, and share the podcast on your streaming service and follow us on Instagram, YouTube, Twitch, and X.