The year is 2075 the world is in ruin, order and peace are thoughts long forgotten, but in what we today would call April a man of unknown origin claws his way out of long collapsed rubble, he speaks only 4 words "Yakuza series retrospective compilation" and drops an ancient object on the ground as he draws his seemingly final breath that we today know to be a USB flash drive, but seemingly nobody of the post collapse world know what it is, and thus the contents may never be know.
People usually site Yakuza 3 as when the series starts to embrace its silly side, but I just love the idea of Yakuza 2 needing to be completed in 10 months, employees are stressed and working in unorthodox circumstances to make sure the finished product turns out well, only for one guy to hit the fattest blunt and be all like, "Sir, permission to include a substory where Kiryu fights a bunch of men dressed as babies?" and his superior is all like, "Jenkins, you're a genius!"
I have found this sentiment weird as I play through the games. Yakuza 1 was extremely silly. Yakuza 2 was a lil more serious. Yakuza 3 felt serious to me too but idk. 4 even moreso.
@@HunterForHire422 "Kazuma, hurry to Millennium tower I'm about to fucking die" Kiryu: "Alright but first i must help EVERYONE in Komurocho and Sotenbori so be there in about 10 hours" "K-KAZUMA WHAT THE HELL IM GOING TO DIE" Kiryu: "Can't talk gotta prep to fight Amon" **Click** *Millennium Tower just explodes*
IMO, Terada felt obligated to follow the Jingweon's revenge plot as a member, but he also held gratitude to Kazama. He didn't feel he could betray both loyalties. It's why the last bomb (representing the life of Kurahashi/Terada himself) is a dud, it's a dead bomb because it's to represent a spared life. This was the only way he could personally feel like he fulfilled both duties.
The games just get stronger as they go on. Even 3 being the “black sheep” has a lot of the spirit of the series with the games after topping one another.
3 is only the black sheep amongst the new fans who started after 0 came out though, mostly everyone else loves it. 4 is way more accurate to call the black sheep.
@@kannyboy1847 I personally hate 3 because of the fact many of the main quests just... stop having objective markers, every enemy blocks WAY more than any other game, a bunch of crime people don't know basic gun safety and disarming, etc.
@@Sonamyfan875 I never recall it not being super obvious where to go, the blocking is hysterically overblown by the new players, not that often and not hard to deal with and the last point applies to all Yakuza games pretty much, especially 4.
Yakuza 3 was great, Yakuza 4 though oh God. I mean it's the game that introduced Akiyama but sometimes I wish Dead Souls was the official Yakuza 4. I honestly enjoyed it much more.
"Kiryu being a Sigma Males" "Kiryu not having any if that shit" "Kiryu not letting anyone disrespect women in his presence" Every comment you make about this man is fantastic
That "filth around the character" effect you mentioned might be caused by Ambient Occlusion or Depth of Field. Which turned on together also clash, causing gaps in the DOF effect around people's hair.
I am currently at the tail end of becoming a 3D graphics specialist, and the speech about old games being art hit me hard. The reason I want to become a 3D artist is because I want to make games and give people the same experiences I had as a kid, To a point I went back and played some of my old favorites on my old ps2 to try to understand what made those games so special to me.
One part in the story that bugged me the most was Daigo’s arc. In his last scene, he was hyped up as the new leader with an all out war going out. However, we never see the fight ensue in favor of Kiryu just one manning the Omi Alliance similar to the climax of the first game. I know the in universe explanation has the Dojima Family were in another area but it would’ve been nice to see a war between gangs in a brief scene.
You may have had a point if you brought up the fact that daigo disappears for a majority of the game but comes back and is basically put in charge of what remains of the Tojo clan without really showing that he was capable of being a leader aside from one speech That and at the end of the first fight with r ryuji kiryu comments that it wasn't a fair fight since he just had to deal with daigo and I'm pretty sure we can only see in the background of one section it doesn't really look like it was much of a fight to begin with considering you walked out there without a scratch
Heres a fun fact: dragon engine was made for ps4 and was capped at 30 fps, however on xbox and pc, they had the fantastic idea of uncapping the frame rates which is why the physics fuck up so much
Speaking as someone playing kiwami 2 in PS4 the ragdoll is just as bad as he shows in this video it's not just a PC thing It's one of the only critiques he brings up against the remake that I actually somewhat agree with
Can we talk about how fucking good the editing is in this? There's a lot of really creative choices in here and they're so damn good (that tiger punch for example was amazing)
I love how you find the running theme of each characters story in this game. Even for characters as minor as the florists kid. And each yakuza story is definitely saying something about fatherhood and how broad of a role it can be. I can’t wait till you tackle 6 since it’s so overt with its messaging of the affect fatherhood can have on the next generation. Great work man you’re scripts are getting better and better. Can’t wait to come back and watch this video again in a couple months
1:23:09 Uh, no, Kawara wasn't wrong. Watch the cutscene again. The one Kawara was aiming at was the fake Kazuki. It's extremely clear in the Kiwami version, as it does a wide-shot right after the fake Kazuki shoots the real Kazuki and Kawara (not saying the original doesn't do this, I just haven't played it and so wouldn't know). It's taken from an above view, and you see that he's right in front of Kawara, who was aiming at him, with the real Kazuki on his left, across from Date.
Hey. I know I'm late, but I just wanted to say that you might want to re-listen to what Cvit is saying. He didn't say Kuwara was wrong, he said "Kuwara is f*cking RAW" (as in, u know, awesome) which makes sense since he compliments the character afterwards.
@@sharavy6851 You might wanna re-listen. He clearly says wrong. The G is very pronounced. Moreover, calling him wrong follows naturally from the previous sentence, whereas "raw" doesn't. And finally, he uses the visual of the fake Kazuki pulling out his guns when he says it, which supports my interpretation, not yours.
But Kiwami 2 is worse than everything from the old games though! …it’s like people can’t enjoy the new stuff when these fans of the older stuff just say to skip stuff like the cabaret club cause they didn’t enjoy it.
2:27:05 nobody brings up the fact that kiryu got up so fast from anger that his fucking chair just flies off so fast it basically vanishes. You can see the chair violently fly off when kiryu gets up.
@@xrayicecream_6342 it’s so fast that you don’t notice it but I feel they could’ve just kept it there instead of doing that because it’s funny to imagine kiryus sheer rage makes it vanish.
@@locodesert2 Honestly if the model for the chair was still there I think seeing the chair go flying would make the scene funnier and showcase Kiryu's rage more
I really liked getting closure on Makoto. Since I started at Yakuza 0 I really, really liked their relationship and was a little disappointed to see that after the events of Zero, Majima just does a complete 180 in personality with no remorse for his previous emotions
This is mostly because 0 is a prequel so the rest of the series couldn't take into account its story. This sadly also really made 5 weird to me (spoilers if you haven't played it): Majima having been married to one of the characters there (someone who is kind of terrible honestly) and the marriage predates most of the series, so it happened soon after 0 if I understand correctly. It just feels off, like 0's Majima would never do that, but pre-0 Majima probably would. So, there is this weird disconnect now where Majima is longing to love someone he isn't able to be with, while immediately marrying another woman soon after with no problems. It almost feels like he's cheating, you know? But I prefer the story with Makoto, so I don't care if its a retcon or doesn't fit perfectly or whatever, it still strange and makes me curious if a theoretical Kiwami 5 would change anything.
I wouldn’t say that he does a complete 180, there were definitely a few emotional turning points in the final arc of the story that led him to becoming who he was in the original games Though I do agree with you that the scene with Makoto was good emotional closure for Majima and subsequently the player, and that calling it “fanservice masturbation” is just the easiest way to dismiss something that was a part of a section that Cvit didn’t care for, it doesn’t actually serve as a critique, it just says “thing references other game in the series therefore thing bad” which I guess means Ryuji Goda showing up in one of the Y0 substories immediately means the entire substory is needless self-referential masturbation, ignore at all costs
Not really, if anything 0 did a poor job in bridging Majima's personality in later gamers. Bear in mind that 0 was released 10 years after the original game, where his character was clearly meant to be more of a villain.
To me, my favorite part in this review is the part where Cvit talks about preserving the original experience at 1:48:24. The part about how he critisizes the "It's old so why should we play it?" mentality is something I don't like as someone who doesn't like the phrase "This game/this thing in the game aged badly" like the former statement, it makes people not give older games a chance. Like people didn't suddenly came to the conclusion bad cameras, weird controls or really cryptic games were a problem after people figured out how to do them properly, if they aren't good now they weren't good back then. Because if that wasn't the case "Takeshi's Challenge" would've been considered a fine game when it got first released.
Yakuza 2 was the game that got me into the series, such an amazing game. But, yeah, fuck that mahjong story. I am half Japanese and my grandfather loves mahjong, I had him teach it to me just so I could finish that section. After I told him I still couldn't beat it he tried it and quit in anger since it cheats so much. I didn't beat that story until years later when I just brute forced it by playing over and over and over again for hours.
Heavily disagree with some of your points, but understand where you are coming from. Although I will agree that the Dragon Engine is...not preferable. Still, glad you were able to complete the retrospective and look forward to whatever comes next.
Yeah, his complaints about the changes often didn't make sense. He seemed to think that it was obvious enough that he didn't really need to elaborate, and the times he did it didn't seem convincing. (Long counter argument ahead, sorry!) I was struggling to see what was wrong about the green filter, outside of it making things green, but not overly so. I played this game myself and it never seemed like too much. Mostly because to me that fit the streetlight look the game is going for, nowadays we use more blue lights, but back in the early 2000s we still had all the old greenish lights. Plus, when he said that there was a mod that removes it and showed that without it everything looked too brightly lit and somewhat washed out, and yet he still recommended it? It didn't make things look better; it actively ruins the atmosphere even, and yet he recommends it without saying why its preferable except he just hates the green? Why not have a mod that keeps the filter but simply changes the colors? Though the lack of proper weather effects DOES ruin the atmosphere far more, and I wish they had done more in Kiwami 2! The face change for Kawara I also see no detriment to, it's definitely an improvement in my eyes. When he explained that the new face is worse because the old face looked disheveled and unhinged, I couldn't see it because the new face looks EXACTLY like that. He looks old, disheveled, worn down, and unhinged like a man that doesn't care to live. The old face looks out of place among the cast as it's much blander and less detailed than the others. It looks like a potato with a face painted on with generic Japanese salaryman hair. It's what I'd think people with face blindness see everyone as. He is definitely just biased there, which is understandable considering how drastic the change is, I'm sure I couldn't get used to it if I were in his shoes, but he doesn't have any solid reasons for it to be worse. But the change of the other character from someone young to someone old and famous (as an actor) is really weird, but it seems to have no real effect on the plot, which he fairly concludes as well. That said, I do agree with a lot of what he says are bad changes, though the missing overworld section isn't the biggest deal, it is disappointing nonetheless. And the Credits music definitely doesn't fit, it really comes too quickly too, it feels like you skipped a cutscene and were suddenly thrust into the credits, its something noticeable even to me who never played the original. Though I don't necessarily agree with the stabbing scene's music, I can understand that the new music may seem out of place for some people, while working for others. I personally didn't have an issue with it as I'm more used to that style of music used in that way and felt it worked for me. But my main problem is that he says the original didn't have this issue, but the clip he showed proved to me that the music felt tonally disconnected as it felt too upbeat. It's literally the same as when he complained about Kiwami 2 having upbeat jazz playing during the side story with the kidnapped girl. So, I can't agree with him on that basis, though I'd agree that the jazz would fit the scene better had it not been so upbeat (like how it started off from what I could tell). I agree with everything he says about the gameplay, though I don't necessarily agree to the extent he hates it. Mostly because having played so many Yakuza games now. I feel that all of them to some extent take too long to get the necessary upgrades needed to make the combat flow properly and give you something to deal with the harder enemies/bosses. And the token system is still preferable to the "pick 1 of the 3 styles without knowing what the next upgrade in that style will be, including the ones that are ABSOLUTELY necessary, while the upgrades take exponentially massive amounts of EXP every level", like Yakuza 3 for instance. The token system is at the very least not any worse (though the balancing for the cost is the main problem, not the system itself) than the other games (I haven't played 0, but I'd assume Kiwami 1 is like it, so maybe it's better, but Kiwami is held back by its upgrades balancing being destroyed by the Majima Everywhere system and other balancing issues from what I remember). So, all in all I think Kiwami 2 is actually pretty good, and likely don't see myself ever needing to play the original. Unless I have plenty of time on my hands and easy access to it, I guess. The changes and nitpicks don't ruin it, and while there are certainly some issues that I wish they'd fix, it's clear from this video that the original has its fair share of problems as well, but regardless of version those problems don't ruin a fantastic game and story (except the swinging enemies issue in Kiwami 2, that really does affect it a lot). I definitely think the Kiwami 1 video was better, as this one felt more exhaustive to watch because of how frustrated he gets about things that don't hurt the game as much as he thinks, or he is simply not explaining clearly enough how bad it is for me to see it from his perspective. It's just not very fun to hear him yell about how bad something is while I'm just thinking to myself "why is it bad?" "it's not that bad" "but everything you say is bad about it applies to the original more/too". I think just a change of tone would have fit better at the very least. It ends up sounding like "making a mountain out of a molehill", you know?
@@GBDupree I share most of his complaints about the changes Kiwami 2 made to the game (though I will readily admit that not only getting the original Kawara back, but also putting his face in the game to secure his position as this character, is cool as fuck. He is definitely just biased there) but the main thing I feel he spent way too much time needlessly bashing was the changes made with the addition of the Dragon Engine. As someone who greatly enjoys the combat in 6, I feel that some of the problems in this game are due to the stupid "kiwami means extreme" mindset not really working in this game's favor. Sure, Kiwami 1 was the final game on its engine, they know it inside out, make the game stupid hard. But the Dragon Engine was still basically in its infancy at this point, the philosophy of just throwing in enemies with cheap, difficult movesets at you every other second combined with limiting your early game resources, does not work here. Plain and simple, Kiwami 1 feels like it can be learned and adapted to. Kiwami 2 feels like you don't get to have fun until your attack and defense are sufficiently upgraded, and the right skills have been purchased, and when you pass the point where you're equipped to handle the game, you quickly reach the point where you're just straight up overpowered.
It's almost definitely because I played Kiwami 2 before I played the original 2, but I do not have nearly the same level of animosity you have towards it. I never had any struggle with the level system and found the combat to be probably my 4th favorite behind lost judgment, 0, and 5. the ragdolls are also amazing to me cause it really makes me feel like the superhuman gorilla i'm playing as. I can agree with the visual and detail complaints for sure, though.
I agree with this It's most likely just a matter of perspective : What Cvit considers bloat is stuff that people who started with K2 (like me :) ) just didn't really think about, but that he feels is another layer stacked onto what already exists. As for the combat, it felt natural for me to have a Kiryu that starts as a big pile of junk which slowly gets refined as you get further into the game since K1 feels like this as well with how it nerfed Kiryu's 3 alt-styles compared to 0. I also think that most of his complaints, ESPECIALLY those about recovery frames, are fixed with upgrades like the side-step hit, which is a core part of K2's combat.
For me I played kiwami 2 years ago and the original just recently and even then I could tell just how much more fun I was having in the original vs kiwami. Honestly don't see myself going back to kiwami 1 or 2 cause the ps2 games just feel better for me and lack the filler.
My only issue with the combat is how less intricate and simpler it is compared to Kiwami 1 and 0. I think the style system is awesome and should've been built upon
It's interesting that you brought up the face model change for the detective as a negative, because I actually thought the complete opposite. I think the new face, resembling his actor conveys his chatacter so much better. Plus, something about the original face just doesn't sit right with me. I definitely think the new one in Kiwami 2 is a much better fit overall.
It is honestly his worst take here, as I never played the original game before watching this, but got all the attributes he ascribes to the old model from the new one. I always felt uneasy watching him, he never came across as an 'old dad' kind of character, but always felt unhinged, uncaring for life or consequences. Throughout the game I assumed him to be one of the bad guys down the line because of that and only at the end was that turned around with more context. Swapping the other face model, that of one of the antagonists, to an older face model I agree with, though. It's a weird change and actually affects the story and his character. But as with the cop it doesn't really impact new players, as the actor for this new model is doing a great job anyway with the changes made to the script. It also needs to be said that a lot of the faces have so much more range of expression, Ryuji looks amazing in this game and the same goes for the cop. This video is obviously created through the lens of a returning fan, so most of the time a new fan's perspective is not incorporated more, which would be nice.
@@PrayForTanqueray I'm also a returning fan, since I played the OG 2 before, and the only face model that irked me was the villian who was suddenly made like 30 years younger out of no where. Probably because, like you said, that impacts the story so heavily.
It's also a logistics thing. Facial animation is mostly motion captured in modern triple A games and doing facial mo-cap works best when the model looks like the person talking. This is the same reason why Insomniac's Spider-Man Remastered changed Peter Parker's face, the new face looks more like the voice actor which means his performance maps better onto the model's face
It's ironic that you say Yakuza _is_ Sega, because Sega themselves have(/had) pretty strong ties to the real life yakuza. In the book _"The Untold Story of Japanese Video Game Developers, vol. 2",_ John Szczepaniak interviewed a man (who himself was a former yakuza iirc) whose sister was kidnapped by Sega. Szczepaniak asked, "Could this interview cause problems for you?" to which he responds, "I might get murdered by Sega. [...] And if Sega doesn't kill me, I'll lose my livelihood, so make sure this story is an anonymous interview."
I just finished Kiwami 2. I got into the series late considering Like a Dragon was my first Yakuza game! Seeing the differences between the original and the remake opened my eyes on how much unnecessary change it had. My only disagreement is that I enjoyed Clan Creator and the Cabaret club mini games! I also enjoyed the Majima saga. It was cool playing him in the game, I just wish we had more content with him! Either way! I liked your video! I'm starting Yakuza 3 this weekend! I hope I can beat it before your next video comes out so I can compare different thoughts!
Welcome to the club of everyone in yakuza game community want majima solo game. We may unfortunately not get a majima solo game so best thing we get is zero and majima saga as well as dead souls and that japanese only samurai spin off. If i recall latter is true
Hey guys! I just wanted to update you all if you were curious! I played through Yakuza 3. Did as much side quests as I could, although some did stump me. Spoiler warning for those who didn't play it! I went in blind and I gotta say, this game is tough. Like I'm a soulsborne player saying that. I went into a lot boss fights chugging half a inventory energy drinks just to make it out on top. Not gonna lie, a lot of the mini games I just wasn't into! I was sorta hyped for fishing but it ended up just being okay. I feel like the Cabaret club was a downgrade from Kiwami 2. Something to be said about keeping mini games simple. Not to yuck anyone's yum of course. Storywise, this is the most I got invested in the Yakuza games so far. It broke me when the orphanage was destroyed. I know Kiryu went through some serious loss at Yakuza 1, but Rikiya's death was the most devastating to me. Especially after I did all his side stuff. If people say is true, that this is the worst in the series, then I must really be in for a treat for 4,5 and 6. Because despite it's flaws, I thought 3 was a pretty great game.
I ended up playing the original Yakuza 1 and 2 a while back. Yakuza 2 was a great experience that K2 just didn't emulate properly, but I can't find a single major reason to play Yakuza 1 over K1 unless you like the goofy voice acting. Sure there are minor reasons like a better soundtrack and a better ambience but I don't think those are deciding factors Also I completely disagree with you with a lot of your takes on the Majima Saga. Your claim that no one asked or cared about this story is just untrue. Look up most videos on the majima saga and they are a mixture of hype and admiration of the short story. I was there in the Yakuza discord when it was announced and it was the same story. I have watched many different youtubers and twitch streamers play the Majima Saga and at the very least the casual ones had a good time playing it and enjoying the story. So your idea that no one cared about the Majima Saga is either you being mistaken or being disingenous just because you personally didn't like it.
@@noobtube9551 Training matches? They breach solid walls with explosives specifically to use the shrapnel to take out people on the other side and use ammo strong enough to punch through walls. The only training in Rainbow Six is the medics learning how to treat headshots and shrapnel damage, and Lazerus pit used to rez everyone between rounds.
It's been a bit since I've played kiwami 2 but I personally never got bothered by the combat. To be fair I don't like using throws so it probably didn't affect me as much as it may have for you
Kinda what I was thinking, then again not having ever played the originals 1,2 I think that may be why, idk but I found that Kiwami 2s combat was perfectly good if not really fun when you threw in charge attacks which is what the game really seemed to prioritize in both early and later stages. I think the grab thing is just a major oof in regards to the engine and prolly why like you said he didnt have a good time because grabs for me where just drag to car slam head in door, drag to bike rack break spine on bike rack, I solemnly used the double circle grabs where I would actually throw the guy because it did piss damage and the physics.
I felt like the only one who think that y6 combat is way better than k2 - I think K2's early game combat was dogshit awful it cheapens the experience for everyone else
@@ronaldomendoza7578 0 definitely had the best of all worlds that’s undeniable it was smooth but not k2 smooth and not as rigid as previous games like 3-5
weirdly enough, the throws are exactly what I loved about it (haven't played 6 yet so K2 was my first experience with this combat style). Tossing a dude so that he dynamically bowls everyone else over as part of the natural gameplay rather than a heat action and then kicking everyone across the pavement as they struggle to get up is just... I know it's not the most well balanced combat system in the series but the physics were just way too fun for me.
Just gonna say I love the hostess story and mini game in this one as well as the Majima story and the massage scene. Y0 was my first game in the series so I absolutely appreciated all the connections to it in Kiwami 2
@@FranciscoFJM in the video he literally said. 'has there ever been a remake thats better than the original' wich makes him sound like he just is biased towards anything older and if its new its bad. not to mention most remakes are better
Honey wake up Cvit's Yakuza 2 retrospective is out Also Yakuza 2 is one of my favorite in the series along with Ryuji being my favorite villain in the series
Yeah, I think it just gives it atmosphere, it's not overly green to the point it was detrimental like he says. Now the lack of weather effects is the bigger deal for sure.
these vids are like waiting for the next installment of movie series. I really like these super in depths take on games you love. I wish these vids got more attention honestly they are the best content you make.
2:39:21-2:41:14 Favorite editing montage here. Simply amazing work, dude. This is such an informative and entertaining video on both Yakuza 2 games. I had no idea they'd be so different. Thanks for taking the time to make this video, Cvit!
Can't believe that this is so underrated. You're absolutely killing it with these long form retrospectives, gives me life. I pray that this video blows up eventually. Thank you for every bit of effort that went into making this video.
I love Yakuza 6 and everything you said about its mechanics and leveling up system are correct. The combat can be fun if you accept it for what it is (very limited).
@@MVS.NEOGEO I have but the original judgment combat is just ok because once you’re on the harder difficulties the absence of a dodge cancel due to longer animations kinda downplays the combat. Lost judgment tho fixed that and it’s really good
I feel like the "preserving the original experience" segment is a bit too preachy. It really started to sound like you were saying that if someone cares, but not as much as you then that's somehow a bad thing. I'm going to make this as short as I can: --There's nothing wrong with playing and enjoying old games more. --There's nothing wrong with playing and enjoying modern games more. --Remakes and remasters have their place. They aren't inherently better or worse than the original and preferring either the new or old version is not wrong. And desiring remakes or remasters isn't wrong. --Having both the original and updated versions available is ideal. --I also want way more older games to be preserved officially (you can find them unofficially very easily and it's not like you can buy them officially anyways, so it's a fair solution). --There is a limit where even I think that a service having every game ever released without resorting to emulation is lunacy. --Emulation is not at all a less correct way to preserve and play older games than having official hardware and software. --People shit on older games, but understand that others also shit on newer games for equally baseless I get what you mean, but you made it sound like your view is the minimum it takes to prove that you care about preserving older games. That old games should stay as they are. Shouldn't get remasters or remakes regardless of if the original is readily available or. Criticizing that original games are not 'preserved' as perfectly as they should be even though that's an impossible task when you take out emulation and filters. Getting a CRT to game on is cool, I've done that, but that's on the individual and has nothing to do with general preservation. Tying that into remakes and remasters being somehow wrong or unjustified does baffle me as well. When the Spyro remake trilogy released I started by playing the originals for the first time before hopping into the remakes so that I could judge how they updated the games myself. I loved both versions. I prefer the remakes because I think it looks better. It's flawed, but so is the original. It's not to the same degree, because it's nowhere near as old, but I feel like the same is true for the Dead Space remake. I would agree that it's not as necessary as something like Spyro for obvious reasons, but they aren't completely dissimilar. while Dead Space isn't nearly as old as Spyro, the remake didn't simply upres textures and call it a day. They added details, content, gave Isaac a voice, and foreshadowed Dead Space 2. You can say it's pointless to remake it, but I'd have to question why? when is it worth remaking? Maybe the people working on it just really wanted to and that is the main motivation, is it wrong then? Maybe they want to drum up interest and have a similar situation to the Crash series (Crash 4 is best Crash) happen here? I see nothing wrong with Dead Space's remake and if there is you need to explain it. Because as it is you make it sound like an elitist saying that it's wrong for a game to exist outside of it's original state outside of maybe the absolute worst games. I don't think that there's one way to play a game. Preserving them is great, but everything outside of that is a completely different topic. With Spyro you can play it easily enough, so the existence of it's remake is not negative in any way. I do think that the original two Yakuza games should be easily available. It's doubtful that it would run exactly as it would on a PS2 to a T, like you want it to, but it should be there. You say that the originals are the superior way to experience the games, but I feel like that's almost a joke. With the second, maybe, but the first? The first has so many flaws that even with Kiwami's issues I'd never say that it's better and questioning why someone wouldn't want to deal with the game when the terrible combat is most of it doesn't make sense. It does start to sound like nostalgia is the deciding factor. You think it's unreasonable to say that, but you also seem to think that pure preservation beats any remaster or remake hands down. If it's extremely faithful then it's pointless, but if it's not then it's an insult. What about Metroid Prime remaster? I don't know, I see nothing wrong with wanting to play a game in higher quality. To be clear, Yakuza 1 and 2 both have their charm and quality (not so much 1, but still), I'm not saying they should be erased or that they are worse than Kiwami 1 or 2. I'm really just saying that this is all subjective and at the end of the day there is value is remaking and remastering something. Ideally it would be done well, clearly Kiwami 1 and 2 weren't ideal. Though I wouldn't say that someone wanting Duke Nukem to be remade in Unreal 5 is literally how the entirety of remakes exist, where they are all equally as undesired. Duke in Unreal 5 would be cool just for the tech, not really the game, but that's not how it always is. Some people just want to play a game that they like or are interested in without being hard to look at. I like older games and think that more people should play them because why not. But if someone complains about the PS1's dumb texture wiggling I'd never say they are wrong. There's a strange charm to it, but it doesn't make the games better by being there. This is a long rant of me just being confused at what exactly your point was other than that the truly original experience is the best and that games should be preserved, but it an annoyingly preachy and somewhat insulting way. I agreed with preserving games in general and that old games are still fun, but that's it. You saying it's stupid to want a Kiwami 3 doesn't help. The only reason why I'd agree is because they probably wouldn't do it justice, but if they did a good job on it then yeah, why not? Again, it comes across as elitist. Despite how long that segment was, I still don't quite know how exactly you feel on something that is more complicated than you let on. If it was just a few seconds or a minute that would be one thing, but it was like 10 minutes.
I think the scripting on this video could’ve been significantly more thoughtful on how it communicated its intentions. I can’t even imagine the difficulty of making a video like this, so I’m not saying that I would do a better job or anything silly like that. It’s just that the thing that stuck with me from the video is the part way you say something like “despite what it may seem like, I think Kiwami 2 is a good game albeit worse than the original” and all I could think was “why didn’t he just make that clear in the video proper.” And I definitely don’t think that was the point.
I think the tone of some of the criticism leaves it feeling almost bitter. I get that a TH-cam review like this involves playing a character to some extent but things like the mini games and the Majima sidestory, even if there's a lot to find fault with, took a dedicated team of developers countless hours to flesh out. The implication that they just didn't care or put it in there to pad runtime just doesn't sit well with me.
One thing I think is interesting in my opinion is that even though he is a Dragon, he is still somewhat of a Koi Fish, and it is up to him if he will ascend to be the Dragon he is or fall down the waterfall.
This coming from the person that fell off of the series because I couldn't even play the original two games. I am genuinely glad for the Kiwami games. Both of the original two games have crashed repeatedly on PS2 which is why I was grateful for the Kiwami games when they came out on Xbox. I personally think that you harp up on the downsides of the Kiwamis a little too much. I respect how you feel about preserving and trying out the original games but do keep in mind that there are people that enjoy the Kiwamis changes and all.
Yeah, as someone who has no point of reference for how the original did things, it was surprisingly hard to agree with his points about how bad Kiwami 2's changes are. They all seemed to be "making a mountain out of a molehill" type arguments, and sometimes he would complain about a change being worse when I was clearly seeing it look better (like Kawara's new face matching the description he gave the original, while the original looked like a very bland face painted on a potato and didn't really fit with the detailed looks of the other characters). Plus, I wasn't convinced that the removal of the green filter mod was the superior version, when he brought up several issue with the look of the game without it and no benefits without it either. It was basically "make the game look worse because the color green is bad on principle". That said, the credits music is bad for sure, like even if it was from the original it would still be bad, but the original actually had music that worked much better. Though I can't really agree that the stabbing scene's music was better in the original when the clip he showed had very upbeat music that fit the exact same problem that he expressed about the kidnapped sister side story having upbeat jazz when it's a sad situation. Now not all the changes were no big deal, but those were the ones that he seemed to be the most angry and insistent about for some reason. To me this video just showed that the original is still good, and that Kiwami 2 isn't the definitive version, but that you might prefer one over the other.
Maybe I just missed it somewhere in the three hours of content, but I will say the fact he only mentions the ridiculous amon requirements for 2 and doesn't mention how eased those requirements were for kiwami 2 is just one example of what I feel are a few (perhaps subconcious) omissions that downplay kiwami 2's improvements to quality of life. Some of the minigames he actively disliked and disparraged as being lowpoints of the game are actively removed or entirely reworked for kiwami 2, so not mentioning things like this when comparing the games feels like a disservice. I won't pretend that kiwami 2 doesn't have major flaws, but it feels like preference is somewhat informing the way information is presented, in a manner that will naturally occur when anyone speaks on a topic, but in a way that I did notice.
I will defend the combat with my damn life. Sure I hate how much of a weak bitch Kiryu felt like in the early combat, but christ all mighty does the game really make it up to you significantly in the later gameplay. I think K2 is incredibly accurate in how the series portrays Kiryu, as a raging hulking powerful dragon
34:46 Actually, that wasn’t a mistranslation. Before the RGG team gave Kiryu and the other playable characters the strict “no killing” rule, Kiryu had looser morals and was originally meant to kill his enemies in the first game, including Lau Ka Long before Yakuza 3 brought him back. In fact, before they decided to bring back Majima due to his popularity, he was originally intended to die in his story boss fight at the Shangri-La soapland in Yakuza 1. And the Tojo Clan HQ meeting room being more empty in comparison to the meeting room in Yakuza 1 isn’t because Kiryu hospitalised most of the Tojo Clan Families but because he killed them.
Just finished OG 2 myself tonight…man I’m surprised at just how much of an improvement it is over the first game…and how it has more unique content even compared to Kiwami 2. Both games are definitely worth their time and since I’m going by chronological order…Yakuza 3’s next for me. I’ll probably finish the games before Cvit gets to at least 4’s retrospective. But these videos are an absolute treat, so I’ll be patient. [Edit 07/19/2022: The amount of SUDA and Atlus music I noticed in the background makes me love this video even more than the first video. It’s an amazing and based touch. Also, for the Cabaret Club, at least it’s good for making money quick…that’s the only reason why I binged it all other than for completion-sake.]
I am kind of curious if I would view things differently if I had played the original Y2 first instead of Kiwami, because I love the music in the Kiwami 2 stab scene and I find the original jarring. I'm wondering if that's because K2 was my first experience or if maybe it just comes down purely to musical taste, possibly a mixture of both.
Yeah, I'm wondering the same as well and I feel you. Personally speaking, I had a blast with Kiwami 2 and it's one of my favourites to this day and I respect his opinion and I understand where he's coming from but I just don't get why he bashes Kiwami 2 so hard. Like, other than two good points, the rest are negative. Maybe perhaps I'm just a freak I guess for loving Kiwami 2 as much as I do. Anyway, sorry about my long comment, I just wanted to open up myself. 😁👍😅
@@cerberusfil3009you're not the only one he has a very obvious bias towards the original and more often than not it feels like his complaints about kiwami 2 boil down to I liked how the original did it more there for game bad I think my favorite part is that he actively complained about the underground arena in the original game and then just never mentioned the fact that his complaints were addressed in the remake That being said I will agree with two points the ragdoll is a bit much at points and chapter 11 was unnecessarily tedious
For me the only thing I hate is that goofy-ass stabbing sound effect in the cutscene. It's obvious something went down from the way the scene plays out, but that sound is so fucking dumb
Honestly, these videos are always just so great. I can't wait for the Yakuza 3 video because I still think it's the most underrated game in the franchise and should be given more health by the community
I went into Y3 expecting a weak game and instead I got an orphanage simulator where you get to beat the shit out of the CIA. I could never ask for more.
@@rewoperomdeeni5340 Yakuza 3's combat was always like that in my experience, however what you may be thinking of is that due to (I believe) changes in framerate from the original, Kiryu's own quickstep now often loops him back in front of enemies instead of putting him behind them, making the mechanic actively detrimental in many circumstances. The enemy AI and behavior patterns were not adjusted at all in the remaster as far as I know.
You're not wrong to have the opinion that the original game is superior in many ways, but you can't criticize the remake for minor issues like weather ambience not being as nice while letting the original slide for minor issues like enemies materializing from thin air during a cutscene. To ignore issues with the original is to ignore the entire reason remakes exist in the first place, even if they're not the preferable gameplay experience. Many of your issues with the remake come down to personal taste but you present them as objective truth which is very disingenuous and hurts your very fair and justified points about the importance of maintaining the relevancy of the original material. Aside from that slight personal annoyance, the video is fantastic and I am very excited for future content from you. Other than the, in my opinion, slightly too long winded rants, the content is presented amazingly and the editing is incredible.
never played 2 but I can't imagine I would love it more than K2. Although the criticism of feeling and being stupidly weak in the beginning of 2 is true, the more I upgraded, I felt like a fucking monster, I loved it. And I think actively avoiding grinding makes the game and upgrading much more better, I had no issues with it.
@@thatitalianlameguy2235 . Ehm... Ok... Why do you say it like we're crazy people? 😅. Is there something wrong with us loving the game, despite what you said?
There's a couple of musical cues in the original that are lost in the Kiwami remakes too. Shindo's intro has a unique musical cue, which becomes the basis for his fight theme. Jo Amon also shares this fight theme. The song is called "The Grudge", which fits both of their character arcs perfectly. Ryuji's fight theme has the same motif as the song "Id" from Yakuza 1, which is used when fighting Omi members. This bridges that plot point about Ryuji being behind the events of Yakuza 1. We're not quite there yet, but the Kamurocho fight theme "Push Me Under Water" also has a lot of motifs in common with Yakuza 3's Kamurocho fight theme "Bruise". Also, it's worth pointing out that between story encounters and substory fights, the player most likely won't hear the excellent "Outlaw's Lullaby" until chapter 4, despite first showing up in Sotenbori in chapter 2. I thought that was a cool level of restraint for is one of the best fight songs in the whole series. Finally, it's not quite a musical cue, but Yakuza 1 and 2 both do this thing where it's always dark and rainy when talking about Sohei Dojima's death. When he's mentioned by name, lightning strikes like the gunshot that killed him. We see this in the scene where Yayoi confronts Kiryu in Yakuza 1, and we see it in the first scene with Daigo in 2.
the ragdoll physics alone make Kiwami 2 worth it seeing a dude go flying all the way to Taiwan because Kiryu lightly grazed their chin with his fist is always funny, and you cannot change my mind
The devs of this game really said “every time Ryuji isn’t on screen, players should be asking “where’s Ryuji?”” Easily one of the best villains/rivals in gaming.
What a fantastic video. I started to tear up a bit when hearing why it was so important for Yakuza 2 to get localized even when they knew it probably wasn't going to sell well This series is such a gem
After playing kiwami 2 I was extremely disappointed to find out about all the music they cut or didn’t use from the original, personally I feel like it ruins some of the overarching feelings over the series. Fighting hayashi from 1-3 doesn’t feel like it has the same progression when the music is replaced by generic boss track 2. It’s the same with the nishikiyama family in kiwami 1 the feeling of the family evolving through the music going from the first game to the third is almost completely lost when two of the tracks just aren’t used in the remake. I wholeheartedly agree with the points on original hardware and feel you made them perfectly; remakes aren’t substitutes for the original and miss the mark more often than not.
Watching this video only proved to me that Ryuji is the greatest Yakuza antagonist. Perfect foil for Kiryu. I kind of wish he remained around for the rest of the series, but then his farewell in Y2 is very impactful and that would be lost then; he'd run into the Majima problem of just kind of being "also there" after his character stops being relevant. But hey at least we have Dead Souls for that! Ha. Haaa... Also, as someone who played K2 before the PS2 version, I never realized just how much they screwed it up. On its own merits I remember having a good time, but there were a number of weird little things like the chunk of southern Sotenbori they removed for no reason???? Or the area in chapter 11, like you mentioned. I was definitely more impressed by the original Y2 when I played it later.
@@tecmangames69 Ryuji was great as a villan. But as an equal to Kiryu he was really disappointing, especially when Kiryu kicks his ass 3 times in the game while barely breaking a sweat the whole time. Mine was much better IMO.
Did you use a gamefaqs guide? I have kenzan but I haven't gotten past the tutorial yet, and I've been wondering if I should follow a video or text guide
Hey I really appreciate you going through the old games in a retrospective, I got into the franchise because I used to work at an arcade and a regular customer that was a huge yakuza fan told me to try out the games and to start with Zero since it makes the most sense and the Kiwami remakes go with the game, so that's where I started the games, I played Kiwami last year and a few days ago I finished kiwami 2 and I absolutely love these games, I wanted to see the difference between the old and the new games and it is why I watched both your yakuza 1 and 2 retrospective and now I have a bigger appreciation for these games, your videos made me want to play the old versions and I will be doing that as soon as I finish with the whole series as a whole because I want to see how it all wraps up. if it wasn't for these videos I would of not considered playing the old games any sooner so thank you again
Im really happy that you addressed your own viewpoint on preservation and original intent within art. Although i could tell that a lot of your grievances with Kiwami 2 were from a place of 'the original was better and Kiwami 2 did not do the original justice' i appreciate your perspective quite a bit more now that youve addressed that point blank, even if i still inherently disagree with some of it, fundamentally.
Tangentially related, i think youre wrong about Kawara not looking quite as deranged/strung-out in Kiwami 2. I think he carries a more unhinged expression in Kiwami 2 than his original PS2 model does - and im the type of person to be biased by graphical fidelity
Thank you for putting in the absolutely mammoth amount of effort to script, record and edit this whole thing. I can already tell I'm going to enjoy this immensely.
Your long rant about preserving the past is great. I wish people would be more open to the idea, as businesses certainly aren't. Preserving history is one of the first things humanity started doing that has allowed us to grow far beyond our means, passing down wisdom and culture through the ages. I'm in the camp that believes games can be art, even if not all of them aspire to be. It's an unreasonable request to ask for companies to just do reruns of all their games or something, but preserving the legacy of video game history shouldn't be discarded. Making full catalogs available for download seems the logical choice for preserving video games. The old hardware dies out over time, but it's reasonable to believe that PCs will continue to be staples in the gaming market for years, perhaps even decades, to come. When you remake or remaster a game, you're BOUND to miss details or add fluff in places that wasn't a part of the original experience. In some ways, these things are improvements, but more often they seem to be simply missing details. It's nice to see, but it's like tracing the Mona Lisa. Sure, I can see the original image, but this is obviously not the original.
"This game has the worst combat in yakuza" Yakuza 3 low-level thug npc's blocking 48 attacks in a row and then counterattacking me with power ranger Level coordination:
Still better because you don't have a bajillion stats, blocking is only really an issue on hard, you can easily circumvent it and you still have better options than k2
With both Kiryu getting stabbed and the bomb fake out at the end, I was in genuine shock and could fully believe that Kiryu COULD die. I knew he wouldn't and that there are many more games with him, but the scenes were presented so well.
Stellar video, covered basically everything about one of my all time favorite games! And I really appreciated not just defaulting to Kiwami 2, but pointing out the strengths of the original. K2 did a lot of cool stuff, for sure, but I've always felt that the things that are missing from the original (the city area, some music in scenes, the combat engine) were HUGE strengths in the game, and notable points that put it at the top of the series' list for me. Music in two huge scenes and the end itself especially so. So much stuff adds up to that good, heavy vibe that is stronger in the original for me. I feel so validated now! hahaha But anyway! Great work, loved the vid, recommending it to people!
Honestly when I was playing Kiwami and Kiwami 2, while I appreciated them as they were, I couldn't help shake the feeling I'd enjoy the original versions better. Once I catch up and play Yakuza 6, I might honestly go back and find a PS2 + a copy of Yakuza 1/2 and playing it. Those games look super fun.
Just run them on an emulator on a pc, they work okay with a few weird graphical issues, but ps2 copies especially of yakuza 2 are way too expensive and if you have bought kiwami versions i don’t think there is any real moral issues with doing so.
I've been chipping away at this video for the past couple weeks. It's a really solid analysis that showed me some stuff I didn't know about with how the original games were for both this and your review of 1. I'm currently playing 3 since I got the remastered collection physically for 20 bucks, so I can't wait for your next retrospective. Really glad you stressed the part where its okay if some people only want to play the Kiwamis, I have a feeling many would initially perceive you as hating everything about them and coming off as an elitist/purist. And the memes here are great, especially the MGR music over the Ryuji fight. Oh yeah, and the Kronii cameo was great. Very cultured.
The theme of fatherhood is showed a lot in yakuza 3 and 5 in 3 kiryu runs a whole orphanage to take care of the kids and would want the best for them in yakuza 5 he changes his own name and background to keep the kids safe because he knows that him being there would bring harm to the kids and leaves in the shadows support them from somewhere else just that they could be safe because he knows his enemies would do anything to get to kiryu
Dude, I think this is a great video, but one part of it just pissed me off. You spent an entire section arguing why it's important to to preserve games as they were, and why remakes, like Kiwami 2, often end up taking away key aspects of the original experience. And I don't disagree. But my I ask then, why you thought it was a good idea to play music from Metal Gear Rising during the montage of the fight against Ryuji??? I love Metal Gear Rising, but the way I see it, 'It Has To Be This Way' doesn't capture the tone of the Ryuji fight at all. This battle is much more somber, compared to how over the top and batshit insane the Senator Armstrong fight is. That's why, as you said it, the final track 'A Scattered Moment' is so memorable, because it is very different from the music we usually hear in Yakuza games in general, and it perfectly captures the tone of fight. Look, I know this is a stupid nitpick, but I really don't think it fits and it just kind of felt like you forgot about the whole "preserving" thing when you added that in (unless if you did it to avoid DMC claims, I don't actually know if TH-cam detects music from Yakuza series or not, so I might be wrong here). Other than that, great vid!
Sir my AMV at the end of my video isn’t replacing the original experience of the game nor does it contradict my point about how the companies who make games aren’t preserving their art/products well.
My favorite thing about the big couch wielding guys is that there's literally a unique Heat Action to instantly KO them in 0 and Kiwami 1 (haven't played 3-6 yet), and yet for some reason they didn't think to add it back into Kiwami 2.
Oh boy! Looks like the finishing of these retrospectives is not getting done anytime soon as we now have Ishin kiwami, Yakuza 8, and of course the Joiryu origins!
I appreciate the effort you put in Kiwami 2 by modding the game many times. Yes, Sango Amon's AI did broke on you which is a rare bug to find. What he usually does is a rocket storm which completely destroys you.
actually fun fact, the reason that the ragdolls look all silly in 18:46 is because when you play Yakuza 6/K2 in 60fps the physics get all funny since the engine was made with 30fps in mind lmao, this is the only glitch that happens when played at 60fps
I couldn’t help but love the Clan Creator cutscene because i’m a mark for japanese wrestling and seeing some of the greatest legends of the sport made me happy
I was enjoying this but as one of the biggest cabaret minigame fans, I cannot in good consciousness agree with the idea that no one likes it. Actually, I dislike majong but I can appreciate it being there. Also, I am sorry but this video series actually is very elitist or whatever you wanna call it. The presenter keeps refering to Kiwami as the "inferior version/game" over and over. I am thinking of writing my thesis about preserving games, specially how emulators and other archival techniques, often performed by fans instead of companies, are so underappreciated. I say this to make it extremely clear how much I appreciate his points but it's just extreme. In archival theory we study several ways of preserving a digital document, from the physical to the logical and finally the conceptual objects. Yet, calling these games inferior versions is a very key issue, for we cannot attest that one game is inherently superior to the other in its totality. Even in a purely archival view, one document cannot be seen as superior to the other, since they are different documents made to different specifications and conditions. At most, if these were simple ports, one could argue that the fidelity and authenticity are compromised by one preservation technique over another. But it becomes specially clear to the fact that this doesn't refer to a text document being swapped software and hardware, it instead refers to art and entertainment, which is subjective by nature, being almost completely redone. Simply put, to start off, the Kiwami remakes are no mere copies, they are unique games based on previous ones, they cannot be understood as simple ports or adaptations but complete reworks. Secondly, both the first games and the Kiwami remakes were often made with a vision in mind that couldn't be achieved perfectly, therefore they aren't even the definitive artistic expression meant by its creators. So it becomes borderline asinine to render one judgment over version as inferior due to artistic and technical choices not following the original intent, since the original intent might not have been equal to the original result. That is, we do not know if the lighting and music were even meant to be like that or if they were compromises. Personally, I like the Kiwami songs, the minigames, the upgrade system, the Majima journey and clan creator, even though I agree with its criticism in near full. I also think that the original games were really good, yet we cannot comprehend that art will follow a linear or arithmetical evolution. Things are allowed to change and they will be changed according to the vision of the artists and the constraints of development. It's one thing to say that you like one over the other, it's another to say you appreciate both only to then spend an hour explicitly calling one game the weaker version of another. Once again, it shows a disregard for the fact that they are not just a version but altogether new game produced under a new context, not to mention that games are works of art and apart from technical criticisms, artistic choices are always subjective.
I suppose I'm in the minority when I say SiM's song is equally as fitting to the rain scene as the og song, might be cause I havent played the og game and I really like the way rock is used in Gintama so i might be biased but it always surprises me when I see such disdain for the song.
I doubt it’s ever going to happen, but I think 1&2 HD should get ported to newer consoles and retranslated for localization. I agree about the Kiwami 3 but the remaster did mess some things up.
An alternative to Filterless that I think is pretty good is Skirish's mod to make Kiryu look like Y0 Kiryu. It comes with Filters that you can separate manually from the rest of the mod that looks better than the game's default filters. I would definitely recommend looking into it.
I have waited so long for this video...and I absolutely loved it the entire time. It may just be because I like MGR songs in everything but still. Every aspect you talked about with the story and just the games is by far the greatest part of the entire video.
![[TH] RNT vs SPG - VCT Ascension Pacific - Day 1](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/RUTkf8Detj8/mqdefault.jpg)
I can't wait to 2030 for the Yakuza 5 retrospective
And the YMS review of The Lion King 2019 part 2
And considering how big Yakuza 5 is, the video will probably be 58 hours long.
I can't wait for Blockuza 3 i Ragdoll ga Gotoku 6
Gotem
The year is 2075 the world is in ruin, order and peace are thoughts long forgotten, but in what we today would call April a man of unknown origin claws his way out of long collapsed rubble, he speaks only 4 words "Yakuza series retrospective compilation" and drops an ancient object on the ground as he draws his seemingly final breath that we today know to be a USB flash drive, but seemingly nobody of the post collapse world know what it is, and thus the contents may never be know.
People usually site Yakuza 3 as when the series starts to embrace its silly side, but I just love the idea of Yakuza 2 needing to be completed in 10 months, employees are stressed and working in unorthodox circumstances to make sure the finished product turns out well, only for one guy to hit the fattest blunt and be all like, "Sir, permission to include a substory where Kiryu fights a bunch of men dressed as babies?" and his superior is all like, "Jenkins, you're a genius!"
I'd like to think he was a Japanese dude with a Japanese name, but the superior was on too much coke to not randomly call him that.
I'm pretty sure that's how Fallout 2 was made in a year.
It’s because the crime author who was consultant was no longer working with Sega anymore
I have found this sentiment weird as I play through the games. Yakuza 1 was extremely silly. Yakuza 2 was a lil more serious. Yakuza 3 felt serious to me too but idk. 4 even moreso.
@@suckassmork2972Tim Cain hates fallout 2 because of that, so was it entirely worth it?
Easily the hypest drop of the year on TH-cam. and now, unlike when i watched the last video, i’ve played every single Yakuza
Same lmao
Same here
Well I finished 0-6, just started 7, so almost same
this and Tehsnakerer's Yakuza 0 vid were the hypest drops for me
@@OnlyGoken how was it?
My one fear of playing the older Yakuza games: missable substories
When you give zero cares about 100% its tolerable but yeah sucks if you do.
@@HunterForHire422 "Kazuma, hurry to Millennium tower I'm about to fucking die"
Kiryu: "Alright but first i must help EVERYONE in Komurocho and Sotenbori so be there in about 10 hours"
"K-KAZUMA WHAT THE HELL IM GOING TO DIE"
Kiryu: "Can't talk gotta prep to fight Amon" **Click**
*Millennium Tower just explodes*
I played Yakuza 1 with a guide and I still missed quests, got annoying real fast
Yakuza 2 Marietta substory is a torture device
IMO, Terada felt obligated to follow the Jingweon's revenge plot as a member, but he also held gratitude to Kazama. He didn't feel he could betray both loyalties. It's why the last bomb (representing the life of Kurahashi/Terada himself) is a dud, it's a dead bomb because it's to represent a spared life. This was the only way he could personally feel like he fulfilled both duties.
The games just get stronger as they go on. Even 3 being the “black sheep” has a lot of the spirit of the series with the games after topping one another.
3 is only the black sheep amongst the new fans who started after 0 came out though, mostly everyone else loves it. 4 is way more accurate to call the black sheep.
@@kannyboy1847 I personally hate 3 because of the fact many of the main quests just... stop having objective markers, every enemy blocks WAY more than any other game, a bunch of crime people don't know basic gun safety and disarming, etc.
@@Sonamyfan875 I never recall it not being super obvious where to go, the blocking is hysterically overblown by the new players, not that often and not hard to deal with and the last point applies to all Yakuza games pretty much, especially 4.
Yakuza 3 was great, Yakuza 4 though oh God. I mean it's the game that introduced Akiyama but sometimes I wish Dead Souls was the official Yakuza 4. I honestly enjoyed it much more.
@@kannyboy1847 Yakuza 4's amazing wdym
"Kiryu being a Sigma Males"
"Kiryu not having any if that shit"
"Kiryu not letting anyone disrespect women in his presence"
Every comment you make about this man is fantastic
makes gc whole claim yakuza is sexist even more dumb.
“We tell him we peacocked his mom like the chad we are.”
and then marry his front teeth to the curb.
That "filth around the character" effect you mentioned might be caused by Ambient Occlusion or Depth of Field. Which turned on together also clash, causing gaps in the DOF effect around people's hair.
"Welcome to the sixth video of my Yakuza Retrospective, today we are covering Yakuza 5"
(Video Length 11:48:34)
I am currently at the tail end of becoming a 3D graphics specialist, and the speech about old games being art hit me hard. The reason I want to become a 3D artist is because I want to make games and give people the same experiences I had as a kid, To a point I went back and played some of my old favorites on my old ps2 to try to understand what made those games so special to me.
I really hope you get to live that dream
I’m rooting for you brother
Hey man, how's your career?
One part in the story that bugged me the most was Daigo’s arc. In his last scene, he was hyped up as the new leader with an all out war going out.
However, we never see the fight ensue in favor of Kiryu just one manning the Omi Alliance similar to the climax of the first game.
I know the in universe explanation has the Dojima Family were in another area but it would’ve been nice to see a war between gangs in a brief scene.
Daigo with his 200 men were tasked to defuse 32 bombs by kiryu so that's why kiryu fights
You mean like seeing random gang fights in the area between tojo and omi in the area during the last chapter
@@robert23456789 fr does bro even play Yakuza?
@@neinja66469 you either die as a yakuza or live long enough to become a yakooza
You may have had a point if you brought up the fact that daigo disappears for a majority of the game but comes back and is basically put in charge of what remains of the Tojo clan without really showing that he was capable of being a leader aside from one speech
That and at the end of the first fight with r ryuji kiryu comments that it wasn't a fair fight since he just had to deal with daigo and I'm pretty sure we can only see in the background of one section it doesn't really look like it was much of a fight to begin with considering you walked out there without a scratch
Heres a fun fact: dragon engine was made for ps4 and was capped at 30 fps, however on xbox and pc, they had the fantastic idea of uncapping the frame rates which is why the physics fuck up so much
To be fair making an engine in this decade that is designed in a way that it can never go above 60 fps is insane,
Yeah, I dunno why anyone wouldn't play the Yakuza games on PS, they are on PS+ and they were made for those consoles. It's an awesome experience.
Speaking as someone playing kiwami 2 in PS4 the ragdoll is just as bad as he shows in this video it's not just a PC thing
It's one of the only critiques he brings up against the remake that I actually somewhat agree with
@@theperson8539some people like to play on PC.
Also yakuza modding is integral to the experience
@@Norrabal Hard disagree, modding is never integral. Except for Bethesda games, but only because they can’t make complete games.
Even when knowing about it in advance, seeing Roblox Kiryu just appear with zero mention sidelined me like nothing else
If you think I'm going to set aside everything to watch an almost 3 hour retrospective on yakuza 2 then you're absolutely correct
Can we talk about how fucking good the editing is in this? There's a lot of really creative choices in here and they're so damn good (that tiger punch for example was amazing)
He was working on it for a while - Nice to see it come into fruition! Love you cvit
i mean he has been working on it for almost 2 years lol
Now if he can pronounce yakuza correctly, it would be a perfect video
@@kessoku96 nah i've only been working on it since November. If it was actually 2 years it would have been better edited than this
@@Cvit you managed to fool me lol the video was amazing
I love how you find the running theme of each characters story in this game. Even for characters as minor as the florists kid. And each yakuza story is definitely saying something about fatherhood and how broad of a role it can be. I can’t wait till you tackle 6 since it’s so overt with its messaging of the affect fatherhood can have on the next generation. Great work man you’re scripts are getting better and better. Can’t wait to come back and watch this video again in a couple months
1:23:09
Uh, no, Kawara wasn't wrong. Watch the cutscene again. The one Kawara was aiming at was the fake Kazuki. It's extremely clear in the Kiwami version, as it does a wide-shot right after the fake Kazuki shoots the real Kazuki and Kawara (not saying the original doesn't do this, I just haven't played it and so wouldn't know). It's taken from an above view, and you see that he's right in front of Kawara, who was aiming at him, with the real Kazuki on his left, across from Date.
Mfw Cvit blatantly spreads misinformation 😂
Hey. I know I'm late, but I just wanted to say that you might want to re-listen to what Cvit is saying. He didn't say Kuwara was wrong, he said "Kuwara is f*cking RAW" (as in, u know, awesome) which makes sense since he compliments the character afterwards.
@@sharavy6851 You might wanna re-listen. He clearly says wrong. The G is very pronounced. Moreover, calling him wrong follows naturally from the previous sentence, whereas "raw" doesn't. And finally, he uses the visual of the fake Kazuki pulling out his guns when he says it, which supports my interpretation, not yours.
@@KaNoMikoProductions Oh yeah, you're right. Sorry.
But Kiwami 2 is worse than everything from the old games though! …it’s like people can’t enjoy the new stuff when these fans of the older stuff just say to skip stuff like the cabaret club cause they didn’t enjoy it.
2:27:05 nobody brings up the fact that kiryu got up so fast from anger that his fucking chair just flies off so fast it basically vanishes. You can see the chair violently fly off when kiryu gets up.
Bro I think the model despwaned
@@xrayicecream_6342 it’s so fast that you don’t notice it but I feel they could’ve just kept it there instead of doing that because it’s funny to imagine kiryus sheer rage makes it vanish.
@@locodesert2 Honestly if the model for the chair was still there I think seeing the chair go flying would make the scene funnier and showcase Kiryu's rage more
I really liked getting closure on Makoto. Since I started at Yakuza 0 I really, really liked their relationship and was a little disappointed to see that after the events of Zero, Majima just does a complete 180 in personality with no remorse for his previous emotions
This is mostly because 0 is a prequel so the rest of the series couldn't take into account its story. This sadly also really made 5 weird to me (spoilers if you haven't played it):
Majima having been married to one of the characters there (someone who is kind of terrible honestly) and the marriage predates most of the series, so it happened soon after 0 if I understand correctly. It just feels off, like 0's Majima would never do that, but pre-0 Majima probably would. So, there is this weird disconnect now where Majima is longing to love someone he isn't able to be with, while immediately marrying another woman soon after with no problems. It almost feels like he's cheating, you know? But I prefer the story with Makoto, so I don't care if its a retcon or doesn't fit perfectly or whatever, it still strange and makes me curious if a theoretical Kiwami 5 would change anything.
Because he learned at the end of 0 to let go and do stuff his own way.
I wouldn’t say that he does a complete 180, there were definitely a few emotional turning points in the final arc of the story that led him to becoming who he was in the original games
Though I do agree with you that the scene with Makoto was good emotional closure for Majima and subsequently the player, and that calling it “fanservice masturbation” is just the easiest way to dismiss something that was a part of a section that Cvit didn’t care for, it doesn’t actually serve as a critique, it just says “thing references other game in the series therefore thing bad” which I guess means Ryuji Goda showing up in one of the Y0 substories immediately means the entire substory is needless self-referential masturbation, ignore at all costs
Not really, if anything 0 did a poor job in bridging Majima's personality in later gamers. Bear in mind that 0 was released 10 years after the original game, where his character was clearly meant to be more of a villain.
me 2 literally had the same exact feeling except i loved majimas personality but the complete 180 did kinda kill it
1:25:38 This is the most brutal NPC knock-over I've ever seen in one of these games
To me, my favorite part in this review is the part where Cvit talks about preserving the original experience at 1:48:24. The part about how he critisizes the "It's old so why should we play it?" mentality is something I don't like as someone who doesn't like the phrase "This game/this thing in the game aged badly" like the former statement, it makes people not give older games a chance.
Like people didn't suddenly came to the conclusion bad cameras, weird controls or really cryptic games were a problem after people figured out how to do them properly, if they aren't good now they weren't good back then. Because if that wasn't the case "Takeshi's Challenge" would've been considered a fine game when it got first released.
Yakuza 2 was the game that got me into the series, such an amazing game. But, yeah, fuck that mahjong story. I am half Japanese and my grandfather loves mahjong, I had him teach it to me just so I could finish that section. After I told him I still couldn't beat it he tried it and quit in anger since it cheats so much. I didn't beat that story until years later when I just brute forced it by playing over and over and over again for hours.
Heavily disagree with some of your points, but understand where you are coming from. Although I will agree that the Dragon Engine is...not preferable. Still, glad you were able to complete the retrospective and look forward to whatever comes next.
Yeah, his complaints about the changes often didn't make sense. He seemed to think that it was obvious enough that he didn't really need to elaborate, and the times he did it didn't seem convincing. (Long counter argument ahead, sorry!)
I was struggling to see what was wrong about the green filter, outside of it making things green, but not overly so. I played this game myself and it never seemed like too much. Mostly because to me that fit the streetlight look the game is going for, nowadays we use more blue lights, but back in the early 2000s we still had all the old greenish lights. Plus, when he said that there was a mod that removes it and showed that without it everything looked too brightly lit and somewhat washed out, and yet he still recommended it? It didn't make things look better; it actively ruins the atmosphere even, and yet he recommends it without saying why its preferable except he just hates the green? Why not have a mod that keeps the filter but simply changes the colors? Though the lack of proper weather effects DOES ruin the atmosphere far more, and I wish they had done more in Kiwami 2!
The face change for Kawara I also see no detriment to, it's definitely an improvement in my eyes. When he explained that the new face is worse because the old face looked disheveled and unhinged, I couldn't see it because the new face looks EXACTLY like that. He looks old, disheveled, worn down, and unhinged like a man that doesn't care to live. The old face looks out of place among the cast as it's much blander and less detailed than the others. It looks like a potato with a face painted on with generic Japanese salaryman hair. It's what I'd think people with face blindness see everyone as. He is definitely just biased there, which is understandable considering how drastic the change is, I'm sure I couldn't get used to it if I were in his shoes, but he doesn't have any solid reasons for it to be worse. But the change of the other character from someone young to someone old and famous (as an actor) is really weird, but it seems to have no real effect on the plot, which he fairly concludes as well.
That said, I do agree with a lot of what he says are bad changes, though the missing overworld section isn't the biggest deal, it is disappointing nonetheless. And the Credits music definitely doesn't fit, it really comes too quickly too, it feels like you skipped a cutscene and were suddenly thrust into the credits, its something noticeable even to me who never played the original. Though I don't necessarily agree with the stabbing scene's music, I can understand that the new music may seem out of place for some people, while working for others. I personally didn't have an issue with it as I'm more used to that style of music used in that way and felt it worked for me. But my main problem is that he says the original didn't have this issue, but the clip he showed proved to me that the music felt tonally disconnected as it felt too upbeat. It's literally the same as when he complained about Kiwami 2 having upbeat jazz playing during the side story with the kidnapped girl. So, I can't agree with him on that basis, though I'd agree that the jazz would fit the scene better had it not been so upbeat (like how it started off from what I could tell).
I agree with everything he says about the gameplay, though I don't necessarily agree to the extent he hates it. Mostly because having played so many Yakuza games now. I feel that all of them to some extent take too long to get the necessary upgrades needed to make the combat flow properly and give you something to deal with the harder enemies/bosses. And the token system is still preferable to the "pick 1 of the 3 styles without knowing what the next upgrade in that style will be, including the ones that are ABSOLUTELY necessary, while the upgrades take exponentially massive amounts of EXP every level", like Yakuza 3 for instance. The token system is at the very least not any worse (though the balancing for the cost is the main problem, not the system itself) than the other games (I haven't played 0, but I'd assume Kiwami 1 is like it, so maybe it's better, but Kiwami is held back by its upgrades balancing being destroyed by the Majima Everywhere system and other balancing issues from what I remember).
So, all in all I think Kiwami 2 is actually pretty good, and likely don't see myself ever needing to play the original. Unless I have plenty of time on my hands and easy access to it, I guess. The changes and nitpicks don't ruin it, and while there are certainly some issues that I wish they'd fix, it's clear from this video that the original has its fair share of problems as well, but regardless of version those problems don't ruin a fantastic game and story (except the swinging enemies issue in Kiwami 2, that really does affect it a lot). I definitely think the Kiwami 1 video was better, as this one felt more exhaustive to watch because of how frustrated he gets about things that don't hurt the game as much as he thinks, or he is simply not explaining clearly enough how bad it is for me to see it from his perspective. It's just not very fun to hear him yell about how bad something is while I'm just thinking to myself "why is it bad?" "it's not that bad" "but everything you say is bad about it applies to the original more/too". I think just a change of tone would have fit better at the very least. It ends up sounding like "making a mountain out of a molehill", you know?
@@GBDupree 👍
@@GBDupree I share most of his complaints about the changes Kiwami 2 made to the game (though I will readily admit that not only getting the original Kawara back, but also putting his face in the game to secure his position as this character, is cool as fuck. He is definitely just biased there) but the main thing I feel he spent way too much time needlessly bashing was the changes made with the addition of the Dragon Engine. As someone who greatly enjoys the combat in 6, I feel that some of the problems in this game are due to the stupid "kiwami means extreme" mindset not really working in this game's favor. Sure, Kiwami 1 was the final game on its engine, they know it inside out, make the game stupid hard. But the Dragon Engine was still basically in its infancy at this point, the philosophy of just throwing in enemies with cheap, difficult movesets at you every other second combined with limiting your early game resources, does not work here. Plain and simple, Kiwami 1 feels like it can be learned and adapted to. Kiwami 2 feels like you don't get to have fun until your attack and defense are sufficiently upgraded, and the right skills have been purchased, and when you pass the point where you're equipped to handle the game, you quickly reach the point where you're just straight up overpowered.
I think they've actually fixed the problems with the engine.
@@maxwellpaynewell5305 so, balancing issues?
It's almost definitely because I played Kiwami 2 before I played the original 2, but I do not have nearly the same level of animosity you have towards it. I never had any struggle with the level system and found the combat to be probably my 4th favorite behind lost judgment, 0, and 5. the ragdolls are also amazing to me cause it really makes me feel like the superhuman gorilla i'm playing as. I can agree with the visual and detail complaints for sure, though.
I agree with this
It's most likely just a matter of perspective : What Cvit considers bloat is stuff that people who started with K2 (like me :) ) just didn't really think about, but that he feels is another layer stacked onto what already exists.
As for the combat, it felt natural for me to have a Kiryu that starts as a big pile of junk which slowly gets refined as you get further into the game since K1 feels like this as well with how it nerfed Kiryu's 3 alt-styles compared to 0.
I also think that most of his complaints, ESPECIALLY those about recovery frames, are fixed with upgrades like the side-step hit, which is a core part of K2's combat.
For me I played kiwami 2 years ago and the original just recently and even then I could tell just how much more fun I was having in the original vs kiwami. Honestly don't see myself going back to kiwami 1 or 2 cause the ps2 games just feel better for me and lack the filler.
My only issue with the combat is how less intricate and simpler it is compared to Kiwami 1 and 0. I think the style system is awesome and should've been built upon
Paralleling your passion to preserve the old games and understanding the meaning behind tattoos got me good. PS2 era was special to me too.
It's interesting that you brought up the face model change for the detective as a negative, because I actually thought the complete opposite. I think the new face, resembling his actor conveys his chatacter so much better.
Plus, something about the original face just doesn't sit right with me. I definitely think the new one in Kiwami 2 is a much better fit overall.
Even with the graphics at the time he looks very low poly in comparison, especially his strange hair.
It is honestly his worst take here, as I never played the original game before watching this, but got all the attributes he ascribes to the old model from the new one. I always felt uneasy watching him, he never came across as an 'old dad' kind of character, but always felt unhinged, uncaring for life or consequences. Throughout the game I assumed him to be one of the bad guys down the line because of that and only at the end was that turned around with more context.
Swapping the other face model, that of one of the antagonists, to an older face model I agree with, though. It's a weird change and actually affects the story and his character. But as with the cop it doesn't really impact new players, as the actor for this new model is doing a great job anyway with the changes made to the script. It also needs to be said that a lot of the faces have so much more range of expression, Ryuji looks amazing in this game and the same goes for the cop.
This video is obviously created through the lens of a returning fan, so most of the time a new fan's perspective is not incorporated more, which would be nice.
@@PrayForTanqueray I'm also a returning fan, since I played the OG 2 before, and the only face model that irked me was the villian who was suddenly made like 30 years younger out of no where. Probably because, like you said, that impacts the story so heavily.
It's also a logistics thing. Facial animation is mostly motion captured in modern triple A games and doing facial mo-cap works best when the model looks like the person talking. This is the same reason why Insomniac's Spider-Man Remastered changed Peter Parker's face, the new face looks more like the voice actor which means his performance maps better onto the model's face
It's ironic that you say Yakuza _is_ Sega, because Sega themselves have(/had) pretty strong ties to the real life yakuza. In the book _"The Untold Story of Japanese Video Game Developers, vol. 2",_ John Szczepaniak interviewed a man (who himself was a former yakuza iirc) whose sister was kidnapped by Sega. Szczepaniak asked, "Could this interview cause problems for you?" to which he responds, "I might get murdered by Sega. [...] And if Sega doesn't kill me, I'll lose my livelihood, so make sure this story is an anonymous interview."
I just finished Kiwami 2. I got into the series late considering Like a Dragon was my first Yakuza game! Seeing the differences between the original and the remake opened my eyes on how much unnecessary change it had.
My only disagreement is that I enjoyed Clan Creator and the Cabaret club mini games! I also enjoyed the Majima saga. It was cool playing him in the game, I just wish we had more content with him!
Either way! I liked your video! I'm starting Yakuza 3 this weekend! I hope I can beat it before your next video comes out so I can compare different thoughts!
@TuTíoJefferson ?
@TuTíoJefferson okay?
Better late then never!
Welcome to the club of everyone in yakuza game community want majima solo game.
We may unfortunately not get a majima solo game so best thing we get is zero and majima saga as well as dead souls and that japanese only samurai spin off. If i recall latter is true
Hey guys! I just wanted to update you all if you were curious! I played through Yakuza 3. Did as much side quests as I could, although some did stump me.
Spoiler warning for those who didn't play it!
I went in blind and I gotta say, this game is tough. Like I'm a soulsborne player saying that. I went into a lot boss fights chugging half a inventory energy drinks just to make it out on top.
Not gonna lie, a lot of the mini games I just wasn't into! I was sorta hyped for fishing but it ended up just being okay. I feel like the Cabaret club was a downgrade from Kiwami 2. Something to be said about keeping mini games simple. Not to yuck anyone's yum of course.
Storywise, this is the most I got invested in the Yakuza games so far. It broke me when the orphanage was destroyed. I know Kiryu went through some serious loss at Yakuza 1, but Rikiya's death was the most devastating to me. Especially after I did all his side stuff.
If people say is true, that this is the worst in the series, then I must really be in for a treat for 4,5 and 6. Because despite it's flaws, I thought 3 was a pretty great game.
I ended up playing the original Yakuza 1 and 2 a while back. Yakuza 2 was a great experience that K2 just didn't emulate properly, but I can't find a single major reason to play Yakuza 1 over K1 unless you like the goofy voice acting. Sure there are minor reasons like a better soundtrack and a better ambience but I don't think those are deciding factors
Also I completely disagree with you with a lot of your takes on the Majima Saga.
Your claim that no one asked or cared about this story is just untrue. Look up most videos on the majima saga and they are a mixture of hype and admiration of the short story. I was there in the Yakuza discord when it was announced and it was the same story. I have watched many different youtubers and twitch streamers play the Majima Saga and at the very least the casual ones had a good time playing it and enjoying the story. So your idea that no one cared about the Majima Saga is either you being mistaken or being disingenous just because you personally didn't like it.
theres a discord???
@@carlosdejesus2153 everything has a discord
This must've taken a long ass time. Can't wait for Yakuza 3 in 8 years' time.
Kiryu: Doesn't kill people.
Also Kiryu: Shooting people with live ammo in Rainbow 6 Siege.
Well those matches u play in-game are canonically said to be training matches. So kiryu's k/d ratio is infinity
Also Kiryu: 2:15:43
@@noobtube9551 Training matches? They breach solid walls with explosives specifically to use the shrapnel to take out people on the other side and use ammo strong enough to punch through walls. The only training in Rainbow Six is the medics learning how to treat headshots and shrapnel damage, and Lazerus pit used to rez everyone between rounds.
@@PlebNC Hey man if kiryu can survive an explosion head on i think we can suspend our disbelief in this situation
What the fuck, kiryu is in siege?
I managed to finish 2 and 3 before this video, I'll probably finish the rest before the 3 retrospective, such great videos keep it up
Putting "It has to be this way" under the final fight game me chills man. Such a brilliant Idea and very fitting
Not to mention the editing during it.
Pure joy
It's been a bit since I've played kiwami 2 but I personally never got bothered by the combat. To be fair I don't like using throws so it probably didn't affect me as much as it may have for you
Kinda what I was thinking, then again not having ever played the originals 1,2 I think that may be why, idk but I found that Kiwami 2s combat was perfectly good if not really fun when you threw in charge attacks which is what the game really seemed to prioritize in both early and later stages. I think the grab thing is just a major oof in regards to the engine and prolly why like you said he didnt have a good time because grabs for me where just drag to car slam head in door, drag to bike rack break spine on bike rack, I solemnly used the double circle grabs where I would actually throw the guy because it did piss damage and the physics.
I felt like the only one who think that y6 combat is way better than k2 - I think K2's early game combat was dogshit awful it cheapens the experience for everyone else
I can agree but I definitely liked it less than 0/K1 which felt more dynamic
@@ronaldomendoza7578 0 definitely had the best of all worlds that’s undeniable it was smooth but not k2 smooth and not as rigid as previous games like 3-5
weirdly enough, the throws are exactly what I loved about it (haven't played 6 yet so K2 was my first experience with this combat style). Tossing a dude so that he dynamically bowls everyone else over as part of the natural gameplay rather than a heat action and then kicking everyone across the pavement as they struggle to get up is just... I know it's not the most well balanced combat system in the series but the physics were just way too fun for me.
Just gonna say I love the hostess story and mini game in this one as well as the Majima story and the massage scene. Y0 was my first game in the series so I absolutely appreciated all the connections to it in Kiwami 2
hearing him drone on about how much he despised kiwami 2 for more than 10 minutes ruined the rest of the video for me I ain't even finishing it
Open your mind
@@FranciscoFJM in the video he literally said. 'has there ever been a remake thats better than the original' wich makes him sound like he just is biased towards anything older and if its new its bad. not to mention most remakes are better
@@Rikhard9 no they're not. Aside from the crash and spyro ones, shit like the kiwami 2 and ff7re suck
@@Rikhard9 Like how you are biased towards anything new and if its old its bad?
Honey wake up Cvit's Yakuza 2 retrospective is out
Also Yakuza 2 is one of my favorite in the series along with Ryuji being my favorite villain in the series
Japan had these old fluorescent lamps that coated everything in this sickly green hue, while it looks bad it's definetly accurate for the time period
Yeah, I think it just gives it atmosphere, it's not overly green to the point it was detrimental like he says. Now the lack of weather effects is the bigger deal for sure.
Thats bullshit lol
these vids are like waiting for the next installment of movie series. I really like these super in depths take on games you love. I wish these vids got more attention honestly they are the best content you make.
2:39:21-2:41:14 Favorite editing montage here. Simply amazing work, dude.
This is such an informative and entertaining video on both Yakuza 2 games. I had no idea they'd be so different. Thanks for taking the time to make this video, Cvit!
Can't believe that this is so underrated. You're absolutely killing it with these long form retrospectives, gives me life. I pray that this video blows up eventually. Thank you for every bit of effort that went into making this video.
I love Yakuza 6 and everything you said about its mechanics and leveling up system are correct. The combat can be fun if you accept it for what it is (very limited).
weirdly enough yakuza 6 combat felt better than kiwami 2 for me
@@roshaanreddy8107 maybe because it was simpler? Have you tried Judgment yet?
@@MVS.NEOGEO I have but the original judgment combat is just ok because once you’re on the harder difficulties the absence of a dodge cancel due to longer animations kinda downplays the combat. Lost judgment tho fixed that and it’s really good
@@MVS.NEOGEO I think it was the enemies and feedback that was superior in yakuza 6
@@roshaanreddy8107 I'm glad that Lost Judgment ditched the Mortal Wounds mechanic from the first game. That shit was atrocious on highest difficulty.
Am I the only one who finds Kiwami 2's combat to be extremely overpowered and somehow addicting?
Kiwami 2 was throw-friendly and I liked that. So far it's my favorite (I have 5 and beyond pending yet)
I feel like the "preserving the original experience" segment is a bit too preachy. It really started to sound like you were saying that if someone cares, but not as much as you then that's somehow a bad thing. I'm going to make this as short as I can:
--There's nothing wrong with playing and enjoying old games more.
--There's nothing wrong with playing and enjoying modern games more.
--Remakes and remasters have their place. They aren't inherently better or worse than the original and preferring either the new or old version is not wrong. And desiring remakes or remasters isn't wrong.
--Having both the original and updated versions available is ideal.
--I also want way more older games to be preserved officially (you can find them unofficially very easily and it's not like you can buy them officially anyways, so it's a fair solution).
--There is a limit where even I think that a service having every game ever released without resorting to emulation is lunacy.
--Emulation is not at all a less correct way to preserve and play older games than having official hardware and software.
--People shit on older games, but understand that others also shit on newer games for equally baseless
I get what you mean, but you made it sound like your view is the minimum it takes to prove that you care about preserving older games. That old games should stay as they are. Shouldn't get remasters or remakes regardless of if the original is readily available or. Criticizing that original games are not 'preserved' as perfectly as they should be even though that's an impossible task when you take out emulation and filters. Getting a CRT to game on is cool, I've done that, but that's on the individual and has nothing to do with general preservation. Tying that into remakes and remasters being somehow wrong or unjustified does baffle me as well. When the Spyro remake trilogy released I started by playing the originals for the first time before hopping into the remakes so that I could judge how they updated the games myself. I loved both versions. I prefer the remakes because I think it looks better. It's flawed, but so is the original.
It's not to the same degree, because it's nowhere near as old, but I feel like the same is true for the Dead Space remake. I would agree that it's not as necessary as something like Spyro for obvious reasons, but they aren't completely dissimilar. while Dead Space isn't nearly as old as Spyro, the remake didn't simply upres textures and call it a day. They added details, content, gave Isaac a voice, and foreshadowed Dead Space 2. You can say it's pointless to remake it, but I'd have to question why? when is it worth remaking? Maybe the people working on it just really wanted to and that is the main motivation, is it wrong then? Maybe they want to drum up interest and have a similar situation to the Crash series (Crash 4 is best Crash) happen here? I see nothing wrong with Dead Space's remake and if there is you need to explain it. Because as it is you make it sound like an elitist saying that it's wrong for a game to exist outside of it's original state outside of maybe the absolute worst games. I don't think that there's one way to play a game. Preserving them is great, but everything outside of that is a completely different topic. With Spyro you can play it easily enough, so the existence of it's remake is not negative in any way.
I do think that the original two Yakuza games should be easily available. It's doubtful that it would run exactly as it would on a PS2 to a T, like you want it to, but it should be there. You say that the originals are the superior way to experience the games, but I feel like that's almost a joke. With the second, maybe, but the first? The first has so many flaws that even with Kiwami's issues I'd never say that it's better and questioning why someone wouldn't want to deal with the game when the terrible combat is most of it doesn't make sense. It does start to sound like nostalgia is the deciding factor. You think it's unreasonable to say that, but you also seem to think that pure preservation beats any remaster or remake hands down. If it's extremely faithful then it's pointless, but if it's not then it's an insult. What about Metroid Prime remaster? I don't know, I see nothing wrong with wanting to play a game in higher quality.
To be clear, Yakuza 1 and 2 both have their charm and quality (not so much 1, but still), I'm not saying they should be erased or that they are worse than Kiwami 1 or 2. I'm really just saying that this is all subjective and at the end of the day there is value is remaking and remastering something. Ideally it would be done well, clearly Kiwami 1 and 2 weren't ideal. Though I wouldn't say that someone wanting Duke Nukem to be remade in Unreal 5 is literally how the entirety of remakes exist, where they are all equally as undesired. Duke in Unreal 5 would be cool just for the tech, not really the game, but that's not how it always is. Some people just want to play a game that they like or are interested in without being hard to look at. I like older games and think that more people should play them because why not. But if someone complains about the PS1's dumb texture wiggling I'd never say they are wrong. There's a strange charm to it, but it doesn't make the games better by being there.
This is a long rant of me just being confused at what exactly your point was other than that the truly original experience is the best and that games should be preserved, but it an annoyingly preachy and somewhat insulting way. I agreed with preserving games in general and that old games are still fun, but that's it. You saying it's stupid to want a Kiwami 3 doesn't help. The only reason why I'd agree is because they probably wouldn't do it justice, but if they did a good job on it then yeah, why not? Again, it comes across as elitist. Despite how long that segment was, I still don't quite know how exactly you feel on something that is more complicated than you let on. If it was just a few seconds or a minute that would be one thing, but it was like 10 minutes.
Jesus Christ in heaven, I’m not reading any of that.
Hey guys, they localized ishin.
Ya'll can rest now
RGG are chads
Well localized the Kiwami
I think the scripting on this video could’ve been significantly more thoughtful on how it communicated its intentions. I can’t even imagine the difficulty of making a video like this, so I’m not saying that I would do a better job or anything silly like that. It’s just that the thing that stuck with me from the video is the part way you say something like “despite what it may seem like, I think Kiwami 2 is a good game albeit worse than the original” and all I could think was “why didn’t he just make that clear in the video proper.” And I definitely don’t think that was the point.
I think the tone of some of the criticism leaves it feeling almost bitter. I get that a TH-cam review like this involves playing a character to some extent but things like the mini games and the Majima sidestory, even if there's a lot to find fault with, took a dedicated team of developers countless hours to flesh out. The implication that they just didn't care or put it in there to pad runtime just doesn't sit well with me.
@@mikeadams6909 effort put into it doesn't change how shit those things turned out. Or else sonic 06 would be the best game of all time
That "Preserving the Original Experience" section was fantastic
I also like the music choice throughout
One thing I think is interesting in my opinion is that even though he is a Dragon, he is still somewhat of a Koi Fish, and it is up to him if he will ascend to be the Dragon he is or fall down the waterfall.
This coming from the person that fell off of the series because I couldn't even play the original two games. I am genuinely glad for the Kiwami games. Both of the original two games have crashed repeatedly on PS2 which is why I was grateful for the Kiwami games when they came out on Xbox. I personally think that you harp up on the downsides of the Kiwamis a little too much. I respect how you feel about preserving and trying out the original games but do keep in mind that there are people that enjoy the Kiwamis changes and all.
Yeah, as someone who has no point of reference for how the original did things, it was surprisingly hard to agree with his points about how bad Kiwami 2's changes are. They all seemed to be "making a mountain out of a molehill" type arguments, and sometimes he would complain about a change being worse when I was clearly seeing it look better (like Kawara's new face matching the description he gave the original, while the original looked like a very bland face painted on a potato and didn't really fit with the detailed looks of the other characters). Plus, I wasn't convinced that the removal of the green filter mod was the superior version, when he brought up several issue with the look of the game without it and no benefits without it either. It was basically "make the game look worse because the color green is bad on principle". That said, the credits music is bad for sure, like even if it was from the original it would still be bad, but the original actually had music that worked much better. Though I can't really agree that the stabbing scene's music was better in the original when the clip he showed had very upbeat music that fit the exact same problem that he expressed about the kidnapped sister side story having upbeat jazz when it's a sad situation. Now not all the changes were no big deal, but those were the ones that he seemed to be the most angry and insistent about for some reason. To me this video just showed that the original is still good, and that Kiwami 2 isn't the definitive version, but that you might prefer one over the other.
Maybe I just missed it somewhere in the three hours of content, but I will say the fact he only mentions the ridiculous amon requirements for 2 and doesn't mention how eased those requirements were for kiwami 2 is just one example of what I feel are a few (perhaps subconcious) omissions that downplay kiwami 2's improvements to quality of life. Some of the minigames he actively disliked and disparraged as being lowpoints of the game are actively removed or entirely reworked for kiwami 2, so not mentioning things like this when comparing the games feels like a disservice. I won't pretend that kiwami 2 doesn't have major flaws, but it feels like preference is somewhat informing the way information is presented, in a manner that will naturally occur when anyone speaks on a topic, but in a way that I did notice.
I will defend the combat with my damn life. Sure I hate how much of a weak bitch Kiryu felt like in the early combat, but christ all mighty does the game really make it up to you significantly in the later gameplay. I think K2 is incredibly accurate in how the series portrays Kiryu, as a raging hulking powerful dragon
@@andrewvillatoro4605 i agree with you a lot, for some reason dragon engine really just hits the spot and its amazing for me
I would think most people prefer the Kiwami's to the originals
34:46 Actually, that wasn’t a mistranslation. Before the RGG team gave Kiryu and the other playable characters the strict “no killing” rule, Kiryu had looser morals and was originally meant to kill his enemies in the first game, including Lau Ka Long before Yakuza 3 brought him back. In fact, before they decided to bring back Majima due to his popularity, he was originally intended to die in his story boss fight at the Shangri-La soapland in Yakuza 1. And the Tojo Clan HQ meeting room being more empty in comparison to the meeting room in Yakuza 1 isn’t because Kiryu hospitalised most of the Tojo Clan Families but because he killed them.
absolutely fantastic timing, ready for this and thank you for your hard work.
Just finished OG 2 myself tonight…man I’m surprised at just how much of an improvement it is over the first game…and how it has more unique content even compared to Kiwami 2.
Both games are definitely worth their time and since I’m going by chronological order…Yakuza 3’s next for me.
I’ll probably finish the games before Cvit gets to at least 4’s retrospective. But these videos are an absolute treat, so I’ll be patient.
[Edit 07/19/2022: The amount of SUDA and Atlus music I noticed in the background makes me love this video even more than the first video. It’s an amazing and based touch.
Also, for the Cabaret Club, at least it’s good for making money quick…that’s the only reason why I binged it all other than for completion-sake.]
I am kind of curious if I would view things differently if I had played the original Y2 first instead of Kiwami, because I love the music in the Kiwami 2 stab scene and I find the original jarring. I'm wondering if that's because K2 was my first experience or if maybe it just comes down purely to musical taste, possibly a mixture of both.
Yeah, I'm wondering the same as well and I feel you. Personally speaking, I had a blast with Kiwami 2 and it's one of my favourites to this day and I respect his opinion and I understand where he's coming from but I just don't get why he bashes Kiwami 2 so hard. Like, other than two good points, the rest are negative. Maybe perhaps I'm just a freak I guess for loving Kiwami 2 as much as I do. Anyway, sorry about my long comment, I just wanted to open up myself. 😁👍😅
@@cerberusfil3009you're not the only one he has a very obvious bias towards the original and more often than not it feels like his complaints about kiwami 2 boil down to I liked how the original did it more there for game bad
I think my favorite part is that he actively complained about the underground arena in the original game and then just never mentioned the fact that his complaints were addressed in the remake
That being said I will agree with two points the ragdoll is a bit much at points and chapter 11 was unnecessarily tedious
For me the only thing I hate is that goofy-ass stabbing sound effect in the cutscene. It's obvious something went down from the way the scene plays out, but that sound is so fucking dumb
Honestly, these videos are always just so great. I can't wait for the Yakuza 3 video because I still think it's the most underrated game in the franchise and should be given more health by the community
He has to wait for the optional bosses to stop quickstep dodging before he can finish the review, so its gonna take at least a year or 2
@@Namingway248 holy fucking shit 😱😱🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 he also has to 😴😴🙄 wait for the 🤼♂️🤼♂️🤼♂️🤼♂️ enemies to stop 🚫🚫🚫 blocking 🙄🙄🙄
I went into Y3 expecting a weak game and instead I got an orphanage simulator where you get to beat the shit out of the CIA. I could never ask for more.
@@Namingway248 isnt that only in the remaster?
Petty sure the original isnt like that
@@rewoperomdeeni5340 Yakuza 3's combat was always like that in my experience, however what you may be thinking of is that due to (I believe) changes in framerate from the original, Kiryu's own quickstep now often loops him back in front of enemies instead of putting him behind them, making the mechanic actively detrimental in many circumstances. The enemy AI and behavior patterns were not adjusted at all in the remaster as far as I know.
You're not wrong to have the opinion that the original game is superior in many ways, but you can't criticize the remake for minor issues like weather ambience not being as nice while letting the original slide for minor issues like enemies materializing from thin air during a cutscene. To ignore issues with the original is to ignore the entire reason remakes exist in the first place, even if they're not the preferable gameplay experience. Many of your issues with the remake come down to personal taste but you present them as objective truth which is very disingenuous and hurts your very fair and justified points about the importance of maintaining the relevancy of the original material.
Aside from that slight personal annoyance, the video is fantastic and I am very excited for future content from you. Other than the, in my opinion, slightly too long winded rants, the content is presented amazingly and the editing is incredible.
Please, I can't be only one liking Kiwami 2 more than original... I finished both.
Yeah, don't worry. I'm with you, my man. I just love Kiwami 2 so much, too. 👍😁
Played original 2 awhile back and played kiwami 2 when it launched preferred kiwami 2 over the original hands down.
never played 2 but I can't imagine I would love it more than K2. Although the criticism of feeling and being stupidly weak in the beginning of 2 is true, the more I upgraded, I felt like a fucking monster, I loved it.
And I think actively avoiding grinding makes the game and upgrading much more better, I had no issues with it.
I sure love grinding and shit combat and so much cut content
@@thatitalianlameguy2235 . Ehm... Ok... Why do you say it like we're crazy people? 😅. Is there something wrong with us loving the game, despite what you said?
Thank you finally someone likes yakuza 3, I've been playing for the first time and so far its great.
There's a couple of musical cues in the original that are lost in the Kiwami remakes too. Shindo's intro has a unique musical cue, which becomes the basis for his fight theme. Jo Amon also shares this fight theme. The song is called "The Grudge", which fits both of their character arcs perfectly. Ryuji's fight theme has the same motif as the song "Id" from Yakuza 1, which is used when fighting Omi members. This bridges that plot point about Ryuji being behind the events of Yakuza 1. We're not quite there yet, but the Kamurocho fight theme "Push Me Under Water" also has a lot of motifs in common with Yakuza 3's Kamurocho fight theme "Bruise".
Also, it's worth pointing out that between story encounters and substory fights, the player most likely won't hear the excellent "Outlaw's Lullaby" until chapter 4, despite first showing up in Sotenbori in chapter 2. I thought that was a cool level of restraint for is one of the best fight songs in the whole series.
Finally, it's not quite a musical cue, but Yakuza 1 and 2 both do this thing where it's always dark and rainy when talking about Sohei Dojima's death. When he's mentioned by name, lightning strikes like the gunshot that killed him. We see this in the scene where Yayoi confronts Kiryu in Yakuza 1, and we see it in the first scene with Daigo in 2.
the ragdoll physics alone make Kiwami 2 worth it
seeing a dude go flying all the way to Taiwan because Kiryu lightly grazed their chin with his fist is always funny, and you cannot change my mind
The devs of this game really said “every time Ryuji isn’t on screen, players should be asking “where’s Ryuji?”” Easily one of the best villains/rivals in gaming.
I just beat the game half an hour ago and I'm still asking where Ryuji is :(
Yah-ku-zuh
It's not Yuh-koo-zah Goddammit- it's not hard.
You should change the title to why I hate yakuza Kiwami 2
What a fantastic video.
I started to tear up a bit when hearing why it was so important for Yakuza 2 to get localized even when they knew it probably wasn't going to sell well
This series is such a gem
After playing kiwami 2 I was extremely disappointed to find out about all the music they cut or didn’t use from the original, personally I feel like it ruins some of the overarching feelings over the series. Fighting hayashi from 1-3 doesn’t feel like it has the same progression when the music is replaced by generic boss track 2. It’s the same with the nishikiyama family in kiwami 1 the feeling of the family evolving through the music going from the first game to the third is almost completely lost when two of the tracks just aren’t used in the remake. I wholeheartedly agree with the points on original hardware and feel you made them perfectly; remakes aren’t substitutes for the original and miss the mark more often than not.
The soundtrack for kiryu smoking in the rain SHOULD have been left in.
@@mmaScholar99 it couldn't have been due to licencing issues.
Watching this video only proved to me that Ryuji is the greatest Yakuza antagonist. Perfect foil for Kiryu. I kind of wish he remained around for the rest of the series, but then his farewell in Y2 is very impactful and that would be lost then; he'd run into the Majima problem of just kind of being "also there" after his character stops being relevant. But hey at least we have Dead Souls for that! Ha. Haaa...
Also, as someone who played K2 before the PS2 version, I never realized just how much they screwed it up. On its own merits I remember having a good time, but there were a number of weird little things like the chunk of southern Sotenbori they removed for no reason???? Or the area in chapter 11, like you mentioned. I was definitely more impressed by the original Y2 when I played it later.
and devilleon07 says that he is a medíocre villian lol
PS:i know that Is his own opinion but Its a weird take.
@@tecmangames69 i actually agree with, him. To me, ryuji is all hype
@@tecmangames69 Ryuji’s cool, but I think Mine is a better foil tbh.
@@tecmangames69 Ryuji was great as a villan. But as an equal to Kiryu he was really disappointing, especially when Kiryu kicks his ass 3 times in the game while barely breaking a sweat the whole time. Mine was much better IMO.
I played both Japan imports (kensan and inshin) with a guide and it was super worth it. The PS3 game was my favorite yakuza game.
Did you use a gamefaqs guide? I have kenzan but I haven't gotten past the tutorial yet, and I've been wondering if I should follow a video or text guide
@@Regulo1d KHHsubs videos and website. Although the website only has one of the two games. But play along with the videos and it worked for me.
did bro just spend ten years in the joint because my god you sound like kazuma kiryu
"I learned how to play Manjoh because of this mini-game"
"Thanks to learning Manjoh I understood this late reference"
ALWAYS
TRUST
THE SYSTEM!
Hey I really appreciate you going through the old games in a retrospective, I got into the franchise because I used to work at an arcade and a regular customer that was a huge yakuza fan told me to try out the games and to start with Zero since it makes the most sense and the Kiwami remakes go with the game, so that's where I started the games, I played Kiwami last year and a few days ago I finished kiwami 2 and I absolutely love these games, I wanted to see the difference between the old and the new games and it is why I watched both your yakuza 1 and 2 retrospective and now I have a bigger appreciation for these games, your videos made me want to play the old versions and I will be doing that as soon as I finish with the whole series as a whole because I want to see how it all wraps up. if it wasn't for these videos I would of not considered playing the old games any sooner so thank you again
Im really happy that you addressed your own viewpoint on preservation and original intent within art. Although i could tell that a lot of your grievances with Kiwami 2 were from a place of 'the original was better and Kiwami 2 did not do the original justice' i appreciate your perspective quite a bit more now that youve addressed that point blank, even if i still inherently disagree with some of it, fundamentally.
Tangentially related, i think youre wrong about Kawara not looking quite as deranged/strung-out in Kiwami 2. I think he carries a more unhinged expression in Kiwami 2 than his original PS2 model does - and im the type of person to be biased by graphical fidelity
Thank you for putting in the absolutely mammoth amount of effort to script, record and edit this whole thing. I can already tell I'm going to enjoy this immensely.
Your long rant about preserving the past is great. I wish people would be more open to the idea, as businesses certainly aren't. Preserving history is one of the first things humanity started doing that has allowed us to grow far beyond our means, passing down wisdom and culture through the ages. I'm in the camp that believes games can be art, even if not all of them aspire to be. It's an unreasonable request to ask for companies to just do reruns of all their games or something, but preserving the legacy of video game history shouldn't be discarded. Making full catalogs available for download seems the logical choice for preserving video games. The old hardware dies out over time, but it's reasonable to believe that PCs will continue to be staples in the gaming market for years, perhaps even decades, to come.
When you remake or remaster a game, you're BOUND to miss details or add fluff in places that wasn't a part of the original experience. In some ways, these things are improvements, but more often they seem to be simply missing details. It's nice to see, but it's like tracing the Mona Lisa. Sure, I can see the original image, but this is obviously not the original.
"This game has the worst combat in yakuza"
Yakuza 3 low-level thug npc's blocking 48 attacks in a row and then counterattacking me with power ranger Level coordination:
Still better because you don't have a bajillion stats, blocking is only really an issue on hard, you can easily circumvent it and you still have better options than k2
51:43 In Daigo's defense, he was drunk out of his mind when he fought Kiryu.
With both Kiryu getting stabbed and the bomb fake out at the end, I was in genuine shock and could fully believe that Kiryu COULD die. I knew he wouldn't and that there are many more games with him, but the scenes were presented so well.
Heavy disagree with most of the things you had to say about the majima parts of the story
Stellar video, covered basically everything about one of my all time favorite games! And I really appreciated not just defaulting to Kiwami 2, but pointing out the strengths of the original. K2 did a lot of cool stuff, for sure, but I've always felt that the things that are missing from the original (the city area, some music in scenes, the combat engine) were HUGE strengths in the game, and notable points that put it at the top of the series' list for me. Music in two huge scenes and the end itself especially so. So much stuff adds up to that good, heavy vibe that is stronger in the original for me.
I feel so validated now! hahaha
But anyway! Great work, loved the vid, recommending it to people!
Cabaret club mini game is a full game in itself, i spent more time on it than on the game itself. I regret nothing
I'm happy to be one of the few 40,000 who bought yakuza 2. Best blind purchase I've ever made in my life
Can confirm that you don’t have to perform every heat action to fight Amon, you just have to have unlocked every heat action
Duuuuuude so hyped to see this. Your Kiwami 1 episode is what got me into the series
Honestly when I was playing Kiwami and Kiwami 2, while I appreciated them as they were, I couldn't help shake the feeling I'd enjoy the original versions better. Once I catch up and play Yakuza 6, I might honestly go back and find a PS2 + a copy of Yakuza 1/2 and playing it. Those games look super fun.
Just run them on an emulator on a pc, they work okay with a few weird graphical issues, but ps2 copies especially of yakuza 2 are way too expensive and if you have bought kiwami versions i don’t think there is any real moral issues with doing so.
hes secretly waiting for kiwami 3 to come out for the extra 20 minute runtime comprised of rants
"I could not imagine anyone else doing [Kazuma Kiryu] justice if they tried"
YongYea: Allow me! to. Introduce? Myself!
I've been chipping away at this video for the past couple weeks. It's a really solid analysis that showed me some stuff I didn't know about with how the original games were for both this and your review of 1. I'm currently playing 3 since I got the remastered collection physically for 20 bucks, so I can't wait for your next retrospective. Really glad you stressed the part where its okay if some people only want to play the Kiwamis, I have a feeling many would initially perceive you as hating everything about them and coming off as an elitist/purist.
And the memes here are great, especially the MGR music over the Ryuji fight. Oh yeah, and the Kronii cameo was great. Very cultured.
I adore this series, and adore these videos. Glad this is for real this time. Can't wait to dive into this one.
The theme of fatherhood is showed a lot in yakuza 3 and 5 in 3 kiryu runs a whole orphanage to take care of the kids and would want the best for them in yakuza 5 he changes his own name and background to keep the kids safe because he knows that him being there would bring harm to the kids and leaves in the shadows support them from somewhere else just that they could be safe because he knows his enemies would do anything to get to kiryu
Dude, I think this is a great video, but one part of it just pissed me off.
You spent an entire section arguing why it's important to to preserve games as they were, and why remakes, like Kiwami 2, often end up taking away key aspects of the original experience.
And I don't disagree.
But my I ask then, why you thought it was a good idea to play music from Metal Gear Rising during the montage of the fight against Ryuji??? I love Metal Gear Rising, but the way I see it, 'It Has To Be This Way' doesn't capture the tone of the Ryuji fight at all. This battle is much more somber, compared to how over the top and batshit insane the Senator Armstrong fight is. That's why, as you said it, the final track 'A Scattered Moment' is so memorable, because it is very different from the music we usually hear in Yakuza games in general, and it perfectly captures the tone of fight.
Look, I know this is a stupid nitpick, but I really don't think it fits and it just kind of felt like you forgot about the whole "preserving" thing when you added that in (unless if you did it to avoid DMC claims, I don't actually know if TH-cam detects music from Yakuza series or not, so I might be wrong here).
Other than that, great vid!
Sir my AMV at the end of my video isn’t replacing the original experience of the game nor does it contradict my point about how the companies who make games aren’t preserving their art/products well.
My favorite thing about the big couch wielding guys is that there's literally a unique Heat Action to instantly KO them in 0 and Kiwami 1 (haven't played 3-6 yet), and yet for some reason they didn't think to add it back into Kiwami 2.
Its been in the games since Y3, I think they did not bring it back for the DE which makes no sense as well...
They probably didn't add it for K2 because canonically Kiryu learns the move in 3
Oh boy! Looks like the finishing of these retrospectives is not getting done anytime soon as we now have Ishin kiwami, Yakuza 8, and of course the Joiryu origins!
I appreciate the effort you put in Kiwami 2 by modding the game many times.
Yes, Sango Amon's AI did broke on you which is a rare bug to find. What he usually does is a rocket storm which completely destroys you.
That old games side rant is one of the best things I’ve heard on TH-cam.
actually fun fact, the reason that the ragdolls look all silly in 18:46 is because when you play Yakuza 6/K2 in 60fps the physics get all funny since the engine was made with 30fps in mind lmao, this is the only glitch that happens when played at 60fps
I couldn’t help but love the Clan Creator cutscene because i’m a mark for japanese wrestling and seeing some of the greatest legends of the sport made me happy
I was enjoying this but as one of the biggest cabaret minigame fans, I cannot in good consciousness agree with the idea that no one likes it. Actually, I dislike majong but I can appreciate it being there. Also, I am sorry but this video series actually is very elitist or whatever you wanna call it. The presenter keeps refering to Kiwami as the "inferior version/game" over and over. I am thinking of writing my thesis about preserving games, specially how emulators and other archival techniques, often performed by fans instead of companies, are so underappreciated. I say this to make it extremely clear how much I appreciate his points but it's just extreme. In archival theory we study several ways of preserving a digital document, from the physical to the logical and finally the conceptual objects. Yet, calling these games inferior versions is a very key issue, for we cannot attest that one game is inherently superior to the other in its totality. Even in a purely archival view, one document cannot be seen as superior to the other, since they are different documents made to different specifications and conditions. At most, if these were simple ports, one could argue that the fidelity and authenticity are compromised by one preservation technique over another. But it becomes specially clear to the fact that this doesn't refer to a text document being swapped software and hardware, it instead refers to art and entertainment, which is subjective by nature, being almost completely redone.
Simply put, to start off, the Kiwami remakes are no mere copies, they are unique games based on previous ones, they cannot be understood as simple ports or adaptations but complete reworks. Secondly, both the first games and the Kiwami remakes were often made with a vision in mind that couldn't be achieved perfectly, therefore they aren't even the definitive artistic expression meant by its creators. So it becomes borderline asinine to render one judgment over version as inferior due to artistic and technical choices not following the original intent, since the original intent might not have been equal to the original result. That is, we do not know if the lighting and music were even meant to be like that or if they were compromises. Personally, I like the Kiwami songs, the minigames, the upgrade system, the Majima journey and clan creator, even though I agree with its criticism in near full. I also think that the original games were really good, yet we cannot comprehend that art will follow a linear or arithmetical evolution. Things are allowed to change and they will be changed according to the vision of the artists and the constraints of development. It's one thing to say that you like one over the other, it's another to say you appreciate both only to then spend an hour explicitly calling one game the weaker version of another. Once again, it shows a disregard for the fact that they are not just a version but altogether new game produced under a new context, not to mention that games are works of art and apart from technical criticisms, artistic choices are always subjective.
Those edits with the Koji Shindo Katana fight was Godlike! Much Respect. You got me wanting to play Revengance again.
I suppose I'm in the minority when I say SiM's song is equally as fitting to the rain scene as the og song, might be cause I havent played the og game and I really like the way rock is used in Gintama so i might be biased but it always surprises me when I see such disdain for the song.
I agree it still works cause the song feels like something that would come on the radio in the early 2000s
Some like it hot
I doubt it’s ever going to happen, but I think 1&2 HD should get ported to newer consoles and retranslated for localization. I agree about the Kiwami 3 but the remaster did mess some things up.
An alternative to Filterless that I think is pretty good is Skirish's mod to make Kiryu look like Y0 Kiryu. It comes with Filters that you can separate manually from the rest of the mod that looks better than the game's default filters. I would definitely recommend looking into it.
I have waited so long for this video...and I absolutely loved it the entire time. It may just be because I like MGR songs in everything but still. Every aspect you talked about with the story and just the games is by far the greatest part of the entire video.