Retrospective - Yakuza 7 : Like A Dragon

Welcome to my favorite Rpg of the new era.

This time we will be doing something a little different.

For this retrospective, we will focus on the most important points of the game and why is or not praised.

Plus all you must know if you are interested in learning more without spoiling anything for a better experience playing it.

With nothing more to add here we go!

TL;DR Section:

Chronicles Conclusion :

Highly recommended

Pros:

Turn Based Combat Feels Smooth

New Protagonist Blends Right

Sub-story quests are of the most quality

Minigames are on point

Dinamic intros are excellent

Cons:

Some boss fights don't work so well in turn based combat

Certain moments of the story are grind fests

The Story:

The Yakuza series has come a long way and Yakuza 7: Like A Dragon are a new fresh entry with a new protagonist face that work as a start point for new fans a a different way of playing Yakuza for old fans.

The cinemas look as good as always

If you're interested in the saga then probably want to take a look to our Yakuza 0 review.

With that said let's review the story.

We start a long time before 6 with a new face, Ichiban Kasuga in the times of Yakuza 1 or Kiwami in Kamurocho, then after a while we get a time skip all the way to the times after Yakuza 6 ending (the story takes part after the ending but don't spoil it directly so no worries if this is your first Yakuza)

This is one of those entries in a really long saga that work well without previous knowledge but has a lot of glimpses and recurring characters that we appreciate as fans of the other games.

It has a great story and works well as a bridge between passing the torch as a protagonist to another and changing the central point of the story, the Tojo Clan still exists but this story is more personal and the focus isn't exactly what the last games were about, a nice change to be honest.

Tutorials are fairly simple

Ichiban is a completely opposite in certain perks of personality to Kiryu, and the story unravels around it.

To explain it, with Kiryu you're an indestructible powerhouse in and out of gameplay (storywise), but you're almost always alone or you have few friends to help you but the lone Wolf style is Kiryu star.

Works out and for the sake of no spoilers that's all I will say, with Ichiban on another note is completely different in certain edges.

Just see the special punch Ichi is charging

First of all is the personality, Ichi are more happier, not exactly dumb but more like naive and more importantly isn't near as strong as Kiryu.

7 beggining shows this very clear, Ichi isn't weak but comparing to Kiryu will always lose, plus him has this strange "idea" of fighting in turn based combat as our friend in the prologue explains, Kasuga let's some people get punches in for free even if they're way weaker than him.

The perks of his personality (besides his enormous amount of imagination) are the charisma, the people around seems to be drawn to Ichiban and that works for building a "party" the pure style of a Jrpg.

A party with the full meaning of the word

The Gameplay:

To absolutely everyone surprise, this entry used a entirely new gameplay, turn based combat.

As a little note, this all began as an April fool's joke that surprisingly became a reality.

We start from the basics, the turns combat works well but to be honest isn't that good on specific unique fights like the bosses are.

You can choose from a wide variety of growing fight skills that depends on your level, job and sometimes they're connected to side stories.

First let's see the overall menu

The easiest way of explaining it are what could we get by Paper Mario mixed up with Yakuza, you have active skills depending your actions and also dynamic environments interactive in the battles, quick time events on the most unique fights and tag team moves.

Straight forward attack that does more damage as you improve the bond level of ypur active party

Every character has a base skill set and you can change them after a certain moment of the story with the "jobs", this is the most diverse way of adapting the party to your liking, also every few levels in the job will get you an special permanent bonus like more damage, an skill or another stat upgrade.

Also you have the normal level up as any rpg that improve the numbers of every stat of your character and unlock new moves every now and then, classic rpg style.

To end this section, you have elemental damage and almost every enemie has a weakness one so this is fairly important to keep in mind (you will want some diversity in this area).

Also there's some most special powerful moves that are commonly unlocked by leveling a lot of a job, cinematic and useful so always seek those

The Side Content& Minigames:

To finish the retrospective let's talk a little about all the extra stuff that you can do on this game.

For anyone new to the saga, you must know that a large portion of the game is and always will be the side content, all those minigames, strange, crazy or epical side stories and some other stuff here and there.

Let's talk about some of them:

Karaoke:

One of the most classic and most appreciated minigames of the saga with some new and old songs appearing again with all the party members (with a few exceptions) every one having a particular song and cinematic.

Dragon Kart:

Hey imagine if Mario Kart had a campaign as crazy as the game itself (like Mario Kart DS)

Welcome to Dragon Kart, a go karts racing minigame with a few interesting character and an actual plot (nothing as serious as the main story)

You have races with items and other rivals at the same time, a couple of grandprix and the casual races so the mode delivers.

Ichiban Confections:

Probably the most important side thing of all the game, in a certain part of the story you became the CEO of Ichiban Confections (the name was by chance) and you have the task of getting the entire store to the highest point possible.

This also will be your principal mean of getting money and you can get an additional party member (entirely optional) but it's there and its fun, you must control the ads of the company, the your workers and an very unique minigame of making investors be happy with your job.

Classic Side Stories:

The gem of every Yakuza, this game has some top quality diamonds here, some are the classic help someone in distress, fighting a scammer of some sort or helping your pals out with some things.

Others hit more on the emotional side like the persimon tree one and other certain ones that I absolutely won't wanna spoil but you will identify immediately after playing them.

In Conclusion:

Is an Rpg of a kind, very unique and special, as I said on our retrospective of the excellent Yakuza 0 this is a game with heart on the content, not exactly sure how to explain it up to this day but the side content isn't there to only fill time, there's some quality content hidden in plain sight here.

Anyway thanks for reaching the end of this retrospective, be sure to check our other ones like Red Dead Redemption 2 or Super Paper Mario, check our list on the category section.