A surface level attempt at interpreting what a "underground crime" is. "Black Monday" is the worst fucking name for a thing ever. Did Garfield write this? It's genuinely insane to me that people engage with this narrative to any capacity, when there's shit like this. This game's plot plays out like a Resident Evil movie. Or a Silent Hill movie. Or any other video game movie for that matter.
Why do character's randomly start speaking English? "Beautiful Eyes." Huh??
Has Kashiwagi been practicing his English?
What about Kiryu's eyes, have you seen them recently?
Here, I'll show you what they look like: ⚫ ⚫
Imagine Kiryu is at his step-father's funeral.
"Kiryu-san, I'm so sorry for your loss. Tell me, what were his last words."
"I don't fucking know I'm fucking Japanese."
What a joke.
By the time I reached the final boss, I was so disconnected from the story that I was surprised to find out I was actually at the end of the game. I was confused, I knew who Mine was, but I was waiting for the actual bad guy to show up, but apparently he was the reason for Monday's being so Black. I'm sure he's also behind the month of February too.
Of course, this was after they decided to throw some stupid American cunt with a gun who takes zero effort to take down at me, The Dragon of Dojima. I love the part where they stab the guy in the stomach while on a peaceful walk with his daughter, and then it turns out to be a fake out death. You guys know this game already "faked out" the death of its protagonist the second you started the game right? Why even bother with this redundant scene, if you're just going to have a shot of him looking up to sky at the Orphanage.
Speaking of redundant, this game's story is redundant. This paragraph is redundant. I'm surprised the later games haven't retconned the death of every single character in this game, like they did with Kashiwagi. It doesn't help that Kiryu remains apathetic towards the people that have died or gone away, only emoting in the moment it happens, and then never bringing it up again. It wasn't until Yakuza 5 that we actually got to see the "real" Kiryu that had all of this anger built up inside of him, as a result of the people he had lost, questioning why it was them and not him. It's not the most complex thing imaginable, but it held weight and meaning, and I understood Kiryu's rage, because I would've hated experiencing Yakuza 3 first hand, like he did.
The problems the combat system have range from not being able to throw people in the Sotenbori river to the enemies having recovery times that extend the length of battles to the point of tedium. Disregarding the famed title, "Blockuza 3, Patriarch of shitty games; A Tojo Clan Subsidiary" this game doesn't have any difficulty to it. The sheer variety of heat actions is immediately undermined by the horrible sound design that makes it seem like the entire country of Japan is an ass by virtue of having everything, from a punch to slamming someone on metal, sound like a pathetic slap.
All the goofy ideas here are absurd, but there's also way too many opportunities for you to get into combat because they spawn like 4 guys every 5 seconds. I was desperate to find Komaki, but gave up when the game kept cutting me off by making me fight more fucking guys that take forever to kill. Thankfully, they fixed this issue in the 4th game by having Komaki be one of the first character's you meet in that game.
Grabs do no damage, Kiryu does no damage, and the enemies do no damage, and the Heat action meter takes so long to build up to the point where I just say fuck it and slam buttons until I reach the end of the story.
To summarize,
Pros: some creative ideas for heat actions
Cons: Mandatory golf section.
Never revisiting this title.
Why do character's randomly start speaking English? "Beautiful Eyes." Huh??
Has Kashiwagi been practicing his English?
What about Kiryu's eyes, have you seen them recently?
Here, I'll show you what they look like: ⚫ ⚫
Imagine Kiryu is at his step-father's funeral.
"Kiryu-san, I'm so sorry for your loss. Tell me, what were his last words."
"I don't fucking know I'm fucking Japanese."
What a joke.
By the time I reached the final boss, I was so disconnected from the story that I was surprised to find out I was actually at the end of the game. I was confused, I knew who Mine was, but I was waiting for the actual bad guy to show up, but apparently he was the reason for Monday's being so Black. I'm sure he's also behind the month of February too.
Of course, this was after they decided to throw some stupid American cunt with a gun who takes zero effort to take down at me, The Dragon of Dojima. I love the part where they stab the guy in the stomach while on a peaceful walk with his daughter, and then it turns out to be a fake out death. You guys know this game already "faked out" the death of its protagonist the second you started the game right? Why even bother with this redundant scene, if you're just going to have a shot of him looking up to sky at the Orphanage.
Speaking of redundant, this game's story is redundant. This paragraph is redundant. I'm surprised the later games haven't retconned the death of every single character in this game, like they did with Kashiwagi. It doesn't help that Kiryu remains apathetic towards the people that have died or gone away, only emoting in the moment it happens, and then never bringing it up again. It wasn't until Yakuza 5 that we actually got to see the "real" Kiryu that had all of this anger built up inside of him, as a result of the people he had lost, questioning why it was them and not him. It's not the most complex thing imaginable, but it held weight and meaning, and I understood Kiryu's rage, because I would've hated experiencing Yakuza 3 first hand, like he did.
The problems the combat system have range from not being able to throw people in the Sotenbori river to the enemies having recovery times that extend the length of battles to the point of tedium. Disregarding the famed title, "Blockuza 3, Patriarch of shitty games; A Tojo Clan Subsidiary" this game doesn't have any difficulty to it. The sheer variety of heat actions is immediately undermined by the horrible sound design that makes it seem like the entire country of Japan is an ass by virtue of having everything, from a punch to slamming someone on metal, sound like a pathetic slap.
All the goofy ideas here are absurd, but there's also way too many opportunities for you to get into combat because they spawn like 4 guys every 5 seconds. I was desperate to find Komaki, but gave up when the game kept cutting me off by making me fight more fucking guys that take forever to kill. Thankfully, they fixed this issue in the 4th game by having Komaki be one of the first character's you meet in that game.
Grabs do no damage, Kiryu does no damage, and the enemies do no damage, and the Heat action meter takes so long to build up to the point where I just say fuck it and slam buttons until I reach the end of the story.
To summarize,
Pros: some creative ideas for heat actions
Cons: Mandatory golf section.
Never revisiting this title.