Yakuza Kiwami 2 is the 14th instalment in the Like a Dragon series and the remake of the second title, as well as the second title in the series being build on the Dragon Engine.
The first impression anyone who is trying to play the series in order starting from 0 has is that of a very different game from the first Kiwami: both the cutscenes and playable part of the game are graphically way more advanced than the first remake's one, and the result is a bigger world that feels way more alive and is easier to explore.
Sotenbori makes its debut in the new engine with this game and looks amazing but, just like in Yakuza 2, is still kinda irrelevant from a plot point, leaving the player to explore it mainly in the post-credits part of the game.
Kamurocho was mainly ported from Yakuza 6: The Song of Life with some minor addings, but for some reasons the game devs decided it was a good idea to use the same, weird green filter they used in the first Kiwami on the whole map, and the result is really weird.
The city isn't bad looking at all per se, but it definitely looked better in 6: I really felt like the game was tiring for my eyes, something that never really happened in the series before.
The city looks humid, dirty, gritty, and even if that was the devs intention, it isn't pleasant for the eyes at all, something that I'd expect from the map I am supposed to spend 90% of my time in.
Doesn't help that Kiryu doesn't really control as nice as in the previous engine, and sprinting around the city results in the player bumping into every object (most of the time even breaking it), person, shop, anything really. Even descending some stairs feels painful in this game.
The fighting also is a big downgrade from the previous remake, just like it was in Yakuza 6: the characters are made of jelly and bounce everywhere, the attacks lacks power and most enemies can be totally annihilated in just one Heat Action: for the first time in the series I beated all of the Amon in the game (5, this time) without even using any recovery item.
Even the final boss felt like a joke on the highest difficulty.
With that said, I didn't really like how Kiwami 2 played. What I enjoyed the most about it were the minigames like Golf and Baseball, while every other aspect about it felt less interesting than in past games; of course that isn't to say about the substories, which are still either hilarious or deep and depressing, and always ended up making me smile or just feeling sad for the characters.
As always, some backstories were hidden under some long ass activities like the Cabaret Club or the Arena and, while I enjoyed those for a while, I really had to drag myself to finish the hostess' substories, and that's why it took me 7 months to fully finish this game.
The Majima Construction minigame was definitely my favourite secondary activity among these.
With that said, you would have realized just how many things are packed into this game: there's just as many stuff as in 0, and that obviously is a great pros for the game.
Sometimes, you'll end up so absorbed into other activities that you'll end up forgetting this is actually an action-adventure game.
As for the story, I don't really have much to say about it.
It was just ok, nothing really to write home about. It was definitely better written than the first game one, but it still felt uninteresting, too political and at times too complex for its own good.
There were really, really too many different plot lines which unnaturally diverged into one at the end, something that the first game also did, but I really didn't expect this game to heavily re-write the original plot, since it would have meant trying to rewrite most of the series (which, at this point, had reached its first ending with Yakuza 6).
Basically, all of my complaints with Yakuza Kiwami 2 plot are the same I had with the original Yakuza 2 plot.
The new "Majima saga" was a nice addition for the plot, despite feeling a bit underwhelming on the gameplay side.
I appreciated the little cameos and changes introduced in the game worldbuilding in order to link the game with Yakuza 0 more.
So, in the end... did I like Yakuza Kiwami 2?
Well, yes, it was a solid game, and I've enjoyed my time with it, but it surely isn't a game I would like to return to, just like the first Kiwami.
The first impression anyone who is trying to play the series in order starting from 0 has is that of a very different game from the first Kiwami: both the cutscenes and playable part of the game are graphically way more advanced than the first remake's one, and the result is a bigger world that feels way more alive and is easier to explore.
Sotenbori makes its debut in the new engine with this game and looks amazing but, just like in Yakuza 2, is still kinda irrelevant from a plot point, leaving the player to explore it mainly in the post-credits part of the game.
Kamurocho was mainly ported from Yakuza 6: The Song of Life with some minor addings, but for some reasons the game devs decided it was a good idea to use the same, weird green filter they used in the first Kiwami on the whole map, and the result is really weird.
The city isn't bad looking at all per se, but it definitely looked better in 6: I really felt like the game was tiring for my eyes, something that never really happened in the series before.
The city looks humid, dirty, gritty, and even if that was the devs intention, it isn't pleasant for the eyes at all, something that I'd expect from the map I am supposed to spend 90% of my time in.
Doesn't help that Kiryu doesn't really control as nice as in the previous engine, and sprinting around the city results in the player bumping into every object (most of the time even breaking it), person, shop, anything really. Even descending some stairs feels painful in this game.
The fighting also is a big downgrade from the previous remake, just like it was in Yakuza 6: the characters are made of jelly and bounce everywhere, the attacks lacks power and most enemies can be totally annihilated in just one Heat Action: for the first time in the series I beated all of the Amon in the game (5, this time) without even using any recovery item.
Even the final boss felt like a joke on the highest difficulty.
With that said, I didn't really like how Kiwami 2 played. What I enjoyed the most about it were the minigames like Golf and Baseball, while every other aspect about it felt less interesting than in past games; of course that isn't to say about the substories, which are still either hilarious or deep and depressing, and always ended up making me smile or just feeling sad for the characters.
As always, some backstories were hidden under some long ass activities like the Cabaret Club or the Arena and, while I enjoyed those for a while, I really had to drag myself to finish the hostess' substories, and that's why it took me 7 months to fully finish this game.
The Majima Construction minigame was definitely my favourite secondary activity among these.
With that said, you would have realized just how many things are packed into this game: there's just as many stuff as in 0, and that obviously is a great pros for the game.
Sometimes, you'll end up so absorbed into other activities that you'll end up forgetting this is actually an action-adventure game.
As for the story, I don't really have much to say about it.
It was just ok, nothing really to write home about. It was definitely better written than the first game one, but it still felt uninteresting, too political and at times too complex for its own good.
There were really, really too many different plot lines which unnaturally diverged into one at the end, something that the first game also did, but I really didn't expect this game to heavily re-write the original plot, since it would have meant trying to rewrite most of the series (which, at this point, had reached its first ending with Yakuza 6).
Basically, all of my complaints with Yakuza Kiwami 2 plot are the same I had with the original Yakuza 2 plot.
The new "Majima saga" was a nice addition for the plot, despite feeling a bit underwhelming on the gameplay side.
I appreciated the little cameos and changes introduced in the game worldbuilding in order to link the game with Yakuza 0 more.
So, in the end... did I like Yakuza Kiwami 2?
Well, yes, it was a solid game, and I've enjoyed my time with it, but it surely isn't a game I would like to return to, just like the first Kiwami.