Worst one of the series, most dungeons have convoluted leveldesign while being not that various in terms of secrets compared to Ys VI (2003, this game is 2005 btw), retarded placement of enemies and checkpoints, also dumb platformer sections that even some bossfights have.
Hard difficulty will rape your ass, there's differences in bossfights too because of it.
Grindy shit overall, can't say anything good about it.
Abandoned right at the last bossfight

"Yakuza made him stupid" (c) - Joseph Anderson
Pretty much a letdown and beating around the dead horse after a good closure with 6. Combat feels a little less balanced and "right" after Lost Judgment, played on professional. Could be better considering the arena mode. Having only Sotenbori and "castle" wasn't that fun either
Even though last cutscene got me nevertheless the writing is awful, no reason to keep fucking up Kiryu's life that much except for milking fan's wallets

Fucking love this game: all the jokes and surreal shit happening in the story for a kids game, actually censored american version because of stage 6 where in JP/EU version Lammy goes straight to hell and plays song with innuendo lyrics, having option to select wah-wahs, distortion, reverb and other shit on select button while playing songs, coop and versus modes and to top it off Parappa version of songs - just damn, what a trip.