TCOAG - The Good&Bad And Beyond - Like A Dragon Ishin

Welcome to a new installment of our Good&Bad And Beyond series.

For more information of the nature of this section please check our The G&B And Beyond Presentation.

Let's drawn the important stuff out of this great game, sadly with some flaws but I'm pretty satisfied by the time I had with it.

The Good:

The Story & Ambience:

We are on a Yakuza game on the feudal Japan, a pretty interesting era for exploring, taking in account that I have literally 0 knowledge prior to the Japan story so having at least a little window like this game to see that period is awesome.

Now starting with the story of the game, it's a classic Yakuza style, an epic tale about brotherhood, vengeance, redemption, code of honor, great characters and some familiar faces with a new opportunity to shine ( Like Mine).

Strong characters aren't exclusive to men

The ambience working towards an story isn't something that you see every day, this era is ruthless and has a very rough class system.

The more you play the game and talk to all kinds of people and see the place with your own eyes can get you a pretty big picture of the era problems without your interference.

Now talking strictly about this game story, hits like the classic Yakuza style but the curve is different and the ending is as divisive as can be.

This isn't bad or good, is a matter of opinions and if you want to know about mine, I loved that ending but I catch why this isn't what a part of the fanbase expected.

The town is little but full of things to do as always

Little note: The Beyond section I will have a little spoiler section if you want to know why I loved the ending (Only my opinion, I won't be spoiling any direct info about the ending itself).

The Characters:

We control Sakamoto Ryoma, the "Kiryu" from this era with a few twists here and there that make the character far more interesting instead of a Kiryu on feudal Japan.

Reaching the first cutscene will already show you how is and isn't Kiryu, he has the same values and honor but is a different person and the story fastly shows it by the end of the first character.

He is a great representative of the main character of the saga but also a different person who has a different way of doing things (sometimes)

The story tends to drift away of the classic sequence of events after the few first chapters, the pacing is "interesting" with some flaws here and there, my criticism is that a lot of surprises are hidden all the way in the ending of the game so a couple of chapters can feel stale.

Let's talk about the other "main" characters

I never had the pleasure of playing the original version so I will only talk about the characters of this one.

When I saw the trailer I was hyped for a new game of Yakuza, plus showed that our boy Ryoma finally got a team that can be trusted and Mine was a good guy (talking strictly about the trailer)

We have a lot of side characters but is pretty obvious the good ones and the bad ones, add that the principal faces shine a lot more in the story and the other ones are less impressive.

Every character have a familiar face if you have played at least Yakuza 0,3,5 and 7, trust me they're worth all the saga but that isn't the point.

My point is that every character feels just like the original contrast part, for example Majima and Saejima are way more aggressive here and have less time to shine but their personalities are just as the ones from the original timeline.

For me it's pretty cool because is like a great crossover getting Kiryu, Majima, Saejima and Mine in the same team, nothing more to say, is one of those things that I enjoyed and appreciated the opportunity to be a part of it.

When the game wants to be epic, there's no stop to it

Now let's wrap this up by talking a little about the gameplay.

The Bad:

The Combat:

I know that sounds like a tremendous sin to criticize the combat of a Yakuza game but this is the first time I have ever skipped battles here and there because I never felt the same as the other games.

This game has a very visual and dinamic combat, also you can use a pistol and a sword, cool right?, in paper yes but as a fact this isn't as good as sounds.

Probably the best way to explain is by talking about the pace of the combat, this is a slow and reaction combat, the first to do a move probably will lose, the combos are slim and small and in the boss fights don't even try the heavy moves because they absolutely negate to be stunned.

There's blood, and heat actions are brutal but also isn't as satisfying

You can improve the speed of the combos but they will work on normal enemies and some of them won't be having a stun so you have to stick to light combat combos.

Another thing to point is that the different styles works but they feel like a tech test and not sure they're functional, for example the swordsman "main style" does a lot of damage but trying to fight a boss with this style is straight up suicide.

The tech is that you use wild dancer and constantly hit and dodge because the bosses of this game never stun.

Hey don't take me wrong, the combats are epic and the cutscenes are great is just the combat doesn't fit as right as the rest.

Running around and fighting is a chore most of the time (Yakuza 5 flashbacks)

The Substories&Side content:

To end this I have to say that the side content is a good addition but nothing to write home about, this time we have pretty good pieces and some that are a torture for me but let's dive into it.

This gives us a Yakuza Kiwami vibe, from pretty basic stuff to solving a food theft mystery or learning to dance.

The most vast part of the side content are filling friendship meters and doing simple chores like delivering a package or beating some thugs.

Objection!
Sorry, wrong game

We have some pretty unique side stories but I don't think is a good idea to spoil them so at least give them a try, instead of that I will have some screenshots of different situations you can get involved.

Beyond :

You can throw a freaking Kamehameha!

With this I wrap this day section and hope that you like it, I left some things in the dark like the battle dungeons but I wanted to finish this with my opinion of the end so if you're interested please continue.

I had my fair share of games of the saga ( I have played every one if them and beated em too ) as you can see I even have some work like Yakuza 7 and one of my most popular retrospectives Yakuza 0.

This game has an special ending because it doesn't follow the classic mold, we have a story from end to finish, the Yakuza series have a story that ends with something that makes Kiryu ends where it beginned learning something or straight up continue it's life like nothing happened (or at least try).

This game wraps up the story with some very interesting twists like the final boss and Ryoma ending, making the story a start and finish, our character don't resume their life as normal or begins again, instead choose to continue with their own legacy and wrap it up, hard to make a sequel but also a satisfying ending.

It's hard to talk about it without spoiling anything so I hope that at least I get your curiosity to end the game, that's all for today hope you find this helpful.