THE YEAR OF THE DRAGON

Infinite Wealth is an anomaly. Originally, I meant this in a way that wasn't particularly endearing, but after letting this game cook with me more that's starting to change, if only a little bit. This and Final Fantasy VII Rebirth made for the most unexpected back-to-back combo I played this year. Both are these sprawling role-playing experiences trying to bridge the old and new of their respective franchise histories through addressing the fates of iconically beloved characters. Which fueled the marketing and expectations for fans like myself going in. Wondering what exactly is going to happen, and where it leaves us next. And interestingly, how both games addressed this said elephant in the room was an awkward compromise. A lack of full commitment to deliver on their initial promise of moving forwards that leaves the state of future entries very uncertain. For Infinite Wealth, I'm less positive because what I got was distractingly half-baked in a way no Yakuza/Like A Dragon entry was before. I've seen comparisons made with Yakuza 5, which I sorta understand. They're both packed with side content while messily telling stories with beating hearts underneath it all. I wouldn't call Infinite Wealth ambitious, at least not to the scale of Yakuza 5, but there's definitely something here that will leave me thinking about by the time of the next mainline entry, regardless of the execution. What we got are two games taped into one. A sequel to Ichiban Kasuga's first outing as the new lead protagonist, while the other is yet another final outing for Kazuma Kiryu who started it all -- for realsies. When I was making my way through these games, my biggest growing concern as I inched closer and closer to Infinite Wealth was the decision to make Kiryu a main protagonist again. Because if the last few games were any impression, it was that RGG were unwilling to let go of Kazuma Kiryu and his supporting cast. That despite landing success with Kasuga as the successor, they still needed to keep him and old series regulars around in some relevant capacity. Either this was a lack of full confidence in Kasuga taking lead, or because they're too sentimentally attached to Kiryu, or some mixture of both.

Now, I'm very critical of Yakuza 7. I don't love it nearly as many do. I think it has a lot of flaws which drag it back. From flimsily designed turn based combat and a story that took too long to reign in momentum to lock in for its very climax. Alongside introducing threads during that slow stretch to either try to awkwardly spice up the drama or just flat out forget. Nanba's random plot with his brother that went nowhere (isn't even acknowledged here lmao) and Adachi's plot of getting payback against the corrupt police officer working with the main antagonist that gets resolved in a literal post credit scene immediately springs to mind. I don't think it's 'great', but what Yakuza 7 sticks the landing despite that is passing the torch. We've moved on from Kiryu, and that's that. Until... Gaiden came along. Yakuza 7 was already pushing it by bringing back Kiryu, albeit in a supporting role for Ichiban's story, but Gaiden is where red flags were beginning to raise for me. Luckily, it surprisingly works as an epilogue to Yakuza 6's ending while bridging the gaps up to Infinite Wealth. Waiving my concerns about Kiryu sharing the spotlight with Ichiban, as though there's something cooking by pairing the two together like this. What I ended up getting was almost what I wanted yet at the same time, almost none at all at the same time.

Infinite Wealth wants to be two games, but it doesn't do either very well nor balance them together. I have no idea why RGG didn't use Yakuza 0 as the template for dual protagonists with their own respective plots and content that run parallel to each other until they converge in the climax. They did do this... half way through the game. When you finally switch to playing as Kiryu and everything from the trailers actually... happens. By the time the switch up happens, you only have 3-4 chapters for Kiryu alone. His stuff is incredibly backloaded as a result, mainly being relegated to glorified substories than something more integral to his side of the main story. I have the suspicion that something went down in development to cause all this. Like, there must've been more chapters intended to space out the story more evenly while accommodating the abundance of gameplay but it got rushed to meet the almost annual RGG release slot quicker. It would explain why many story beats and characters, especially beyond Kiryu's storyline, felt underdeveloped or forgotten. Maybe I'm asking too much, but considering this was marketed and intended to be Kiryu's final game -- they even gave him cancer to make it legit -- I was expecting something to wrap up loose ends in a big satisfying way that even his first finale in Yakuza 6 couldn't cover. While I was pleasantly surprised to see characters in his life pop up for closure, I was mixed on how it was treated in-game just to make the post credit scene feel moving in retrospect. I guess I'll have to mention Ichiban but I really don't have much to say because he's so impersonally involved in his second game. The first few chapters, iffy stuff aside like the Saeko romance subplot that was REALLY bad, feel like a wonderful follow-up to Yakuza 7's ending while seamlessly charting out the direction for his character in however many games he has left. The moment the ball gets rolling and when he goes to Hawaii though... it flatlines. Like, they had a strong hook for him but it got lost in the midst of the plot and what's going on with Kiryu that gained more gravitas. I can't buy into the Yakuza 5 comparisons seriously because unlike that game, Infinite Wealth has no sweeping highs or lowest lows going for it. It straddles on this fine line of just being... pretty boring, straight up mid I'd say, and for every step forward it does take from Yakuza 7 it needs to take two steps back. I'm also not kidding when I say this has the worst antagonists since Yakuza 4. How did we get back there. Look, I understand what the narrative is trying to go for on paper. This is a game about forgiveness, redemption, friendship -- the true Infinite Wealth -- along with some religious subtext the two main antagonists embody to foil Ichiban and Kiryu. Ichiban seeks selfless salvation and refuge for everyone, so he fights a bad guy who's a mockery of it. Kiryu is trying to take responsibility for his past, so he fights a bad guy representing the karma of the yakuza. These are good ideas for antagonists, but that's all it becomes. It's so underdeveloped that you can't help but wonder why the antagonists they each confront in the finale should've been swapped to feel more appropriate. Especially since Kasuga has been lacking personal stake in his own game, so an antagonist to offer him something would've been a bit fulfilling.

Moving beyond the story, Infinite Wealth's gameplay is generally a net positive in my book. Hawaii makes for a nice radical departure from every locale we've ever exploded in Yakuza/Like A Dragon. It's very big, vibrant, with so much distractions to get lost in when taking a break from whatever's going on in the main story. The substories are bit too spread thin but I enjoyed most of what I played. The mini games, like Sujimon, Crazy Eats, or Dondoko Island, felt really cool but I never sank deep into either for the sake of my insanity and time. Neither are really for me, but I see the appeal for others. Karaoke still remains my top favorite, of course. Honolulu City Lights is an instant classic and I felt too much emotion seeing Kiryu and Ichiban sing Judgment together. I've mentioned this before, I'm not really a completionist when it comes to this series, so I have to imagine this ranks very high as a monstrous beast to try and do that with.

Alright, no beating around the bush, lets get straight into it -- the turn-based combat. Now, Yakuza 7's turn based combat was... yeah, no it's kinda bad. There's no real strats at play, never any interesting enemy encounter design that invokes carefulness in approach, just spamming the same two or three most strongest abilities from a menu as long as your arm. It's... boring. Incredibly boring in a game with an overwhelming playtime that can breach 100 hours. A narrative can only do so much heavy lifting when the other half, the more important aspect for players to engage with, is slouching behind hard. I know there's many people who are here mainly for the story when it comes to games like Yakuza/Like A Dragon, but I'm here for both tbh. This is where the job system comes into play. Something I'm guaranteed RGG implemented to help remedy the lack of depth the turn based combat has. If your game doesn't have enough mechanical depth then make sure it has enough mechanical width instead. The beauty of the job system in RPGs is that it enables this layer of customization and player freedom. Every job is distinct, serves a unique function in combat, invites experimentation waiting to happen when optimizing a party for battle. RGG understands this... vaguely? Well, enough that it's a paper cutout of what a good job system looks like. Unfortunately, something that hasn't changed in Infinite Wealth by not directly addressing the key issue with the implementation. There's just no incentive to swap out of your starting job. Kiryu's the prime example of how RGG continues to botch the job system. Dragon of Dojima is incredibly imbalanced. Being way too good to swap out of by easily having more mechanical width than every other starting job combined. I'm not kidding. He can change change his basic attacks to grapple through guards, perform rush combos that lets him attack twice in a turn, and perform heat moves depending on the situation. Not even getting to how he has a special move that obliterates the turn based combat and temporarily changes the game to be a beat em up brawler. None of the other jobs have this level of flexibility going on. Not even Ichiban for some reason! And he's the main protagonist who should be getting the good stuff! They did address other criticisms I had with the turn based combat by tweaking it to take better advantage of the Dragon Engine's collision physics. Battles now feel dynamic, truly dynamic, where previously it gave you the illusion it was because party members and enemies aimlessly move around. Each party member now has their own radius where you can freely control spatial positioning. This lets you attack enemies from behind for better damage, knock them in a direction to collide with other enemies like bowling pins, sometimes even string up combo attacks on enemies by knocking them around the battlefield like bumper cars with help of your closest party member, have clearer use of AoE attacks, and can properly pick up objects in an environment to do improvised weapon attacks instead of hoping you're lucky. It's not perfect, not even 'good', as difficulty continues being a joke and the newfound approach for turn based gets exhausting in the last stretch of the game because it's still missing a modicum of depth for this new width. Nevertheless, much as I'm pretty sure I'll never get behind these games on their philosophy alone, it is reassuring that notes are being taken to get the combat up to snuff with the rest of the genre.

It's frustrating. This game was disappointing the more I do understand the intent underneath so much here. I spent months playing through entry after entry to get to this current endpoint. I can't even say I didn't enjoy this at least. I spent over 100 hrs into this and don't regret most of that experience. There's moments I liked, but never loved. The scene near the end that beautifully compares and contrasts Ichiban and Kiryu comes close... but it's placed in a game that had to strangely walk back on a lot of set-up in Yakuza 7 for the plot to even unfold. Knowing that it was written after Infinite Wealth was done, Gaiden is especially awkward looking back because so much of it didn't matter in this game. While seemingly having a resolution for Kiryu, I can't help but feel it's not truly over yet. So, this didn't work entirely as his final swan song for me because what he had to learn was more/less what he already learned in previous games. This is Ichiban's second chapter of his life and I'm left unsure what to expect or get excited for in his next game. I think RGG are aware of the faults in their approach in role-playing game design, but it's incremental improvements at best. My biggest hope is that Yamai, my new favorite of the newer characters, gets the opportunity to come back as a mainstay for Kasuga's games and become his Majima. He's way too great of a character to be left in just this entry. If not, then im just really concerned about the future of this series I grew to respect and love and hope won't change.