This game was certainly an experience, there's a lot I liked and disliked about it soooo… The story is a shame because for the first two chapters it starts out really strong. I really like the setup and mystery revolving around Kiryu's agent shenanigans and I really like characters like Hanawa. But Chapter 3 onward just becomes a mess. It really tries to rush itself to tie the events of 7 together and you can tell they wrote themselves into a corner. Some moments that would have been really memorable and hard hitting just become cheap and garbage. They also somehow managed to write the worst plot twist that just ruins one of the characters. I’d say it’s honestly worse than the surprise final boss of Y5 and the Onomichi secret in 6. It almost ruins the story because of how cheap it is. The side content is very strong and I was surprised how much I enjoyed it. I really like stuff like the Akame network system and this game quite possibly has the best coliseum in any of the RGG games. The substories themselves are also really enjoyable but it's expected with these games. The thing I’ve been dreading talking about the most is the combat. Needless to say it’s a mess and a huge disappointment. I really wanted to like it and the new Agent style looks super cool but it just feels awful to use the later you progress. Its upgrades don’t really impact the use or utility of the style especially when you get to fights with huge crowds. The spider whip is cool at first but leaves you entirely open and don’t have that many opportunities to really use it when in crowds. It’s a major downside that it doesn’t work on any bosses and that's what kills it. The drone and the cigar grenade are cool on paper but having to hold down the buttons to use them just feels really awkward and when they do come out, it just doesn;t really feel like they make an impact.The rocket boots are the only somewhat useful thing because you can cheese crowd control but other than that it doesn’t mesh well with your moveset. As for the Yakuza style, it's fine to use. It would've honestly been better if they reused the old dragon style because it still isn't as great to use. A lot of the upgrades are weird, especially giving the roll when quickstep is fine and feels better. It’s just out of place and doesn’t fit a style unlike Yagami's Tiger style. I do like the addition of a triple finisher though, even if it is super clunky to use. The best way I can describe the feel of this game is that they wanted to have the long combos and juggle system of the Judgement games, but they also wanted to have the feel of early Dragon Engine games like 6 or K2. It just becomes a mess where while you do have the tools to do stylish combos, it’s honestly not worth doing because of how bad they feel to perform and how little variety there is to spice them up. When you do try to play it similar to the older games where it’s not based on juggles, you end up just wishing that you were playing the older games instead. Performing launchers just feels awful. Agents' launchers require the whip but the setup feels bad to use and it doesn’t matter anyway because you can’t use it on bosses. Yakuza Style’s launchers are better but not by much because you have to needlessly charge them to even do anything, sometimes to end up not even working. This might’ve been a thing with my experience of the game but locking on just felt awful. It doesn’t feel as fluid as the other games and you can literally just miss attacks outright. There are other design choices that just confuse me like that your party members can hit you and fling you away. I can forgive all of these things if it just wasn’t for this. THE STYLES THEMSELVES ARE WAY TOO SLOW. It is just such an issue and really kills the game. It just straight up makes the styles not fun to play at times (especially the Yakuza style). It makes the combat that was already kinda disappointing even worse. This is such a huge detriment to combat as I would genuinely go back to kiwami 2, 6 or even judgment because at the very least I can upgrade the speed of my combos (which you can’t in this game). It feels like those games without the speed upgrade and it just hurts so much as Lost Judgement fixed this issue. It really just drags the game down because the bosses are incredible and some of the best in the series. It just really sucks that you have to use such a messy combat system. I can’t express how much this brings the game down for me because they genuinely nailed it with Lost Judgment and the Kaito Files. It feels like we’re going backwards in the department and I don’t think I want any more action games from the studio if this is what we’re gonna get. All in all, as much as I ripped into the combat and parts of the story I still think this game is worth playing. A lot of people probably won’t be bothered by these issues and there are still a lot of strong moments. Especially the ending.