Yakuza 3

Platforms – PS3 Genre – Mixed Classification – MA 15+ Distributor – SEGA

This game is like playing an interactive “Eastern Eye” movie; all of the cut scenes dialogue in Japanese with English sub titles. Although I don’t usually like subtitled movies all that much the story here was involving and interesting and I really did care about the character I was playing and the trials and tribulations he was involved in. As most Japanese RPG fans would be used to, the in game dialogue is text based so because you are reading most of the interactions anyway, the cut scenes blend with the RPG text quite well to give it an interactive cinematic Anime feel. There is a main interwoven plot thread to do with a land deal, resort and a military base, so just when you thought it was safe to settle down and run an orphanage, you are forced back into the violent fold forcing you to once again kick some major butt and shed some blood. Just in case you haven’t played the first two in the series it includes a “previously on Yakuza” style story from Yakuza and Yakuza 2 to fill you in on the details. Basically it covers a web of stolen money, lies, betrayal, deceit, warring clans, fisty cuffs, guns, politicians, government agencies, sacrifice, explosions, death and new beginnings, alliances, attempted truces, more explosions, more death, police, foreign organisations, mafia, revenge, secret pasts, dying confessionals, tattoos, faked deaths, more guns, blood, more death and that was all just leading up to now. It does take a while to get into the big action in Tokyo and there are heaps of mundane tasks to complete beforehand like dealing with the domestic issues involving the kids at the orphanage, like a kid stealing money from one of her fellow housemates or playing dress ups to make one of them look cooler etc. This seemed boring at first but after a while I was really drawn in to them getting involved with the characters’ lives helped to form the care factor, character development and added to the overall experience/story as a whole. It was intriguing and can I even say heartwarming, watching and playing as the respect and trust is slowly gained from guys in local Yakuza gangs who start off wanting your head on a stake, come to your side, fight for your causes and even become protective over your single father type Brady bunch, to a point where the kids call them uncles. The game play is hard to categorise because it mixes so many genres together. This juggling of so many different styles made more interesting and surprisingly it never became convoluted. At its heart Yakuza is an RPG but it is set in an open world, action game environment that mixes in brawler, occasional First Person elements and quick time events with perfection. The fighting side of it is satisfying and deep with a good smooth brawling engine including heaps of special moves, combos, finishing moves, weapons using pieces of the environment in true street fight style. On top of all this the mini-games like fishing and golf have their own set of controls. I was astounded at the golf aspect because for a game inside a game, it actually plays extremely well and because it allowed for me to go back anytime so I used it as a break from the assault and battery of the streets. Each element of the game has been developed superbly with tender love and care so none of it seems like it has been rushed, or just tacked on for the sake of it. If you were to separate the Fighting, Open World action and mini games from each other and release them as individual titles they would make great games in their own right but to have them all included on one disc and weaved together seamlessly is highly impressive. Overall even though there is a lot to remember it is done in a way that feels natural, introducing new controls at a good pace in a way that it doesn’t seem like there is much of a learning curve, if that makes sense. Maceman