Yakuza 4 is in kind of a weird spot for me, it does solve many of the problems 3 had like the bad combat and clunky movement, graphically it also looks surprisingly better too, but despite all that I felt that 4 was a fairly unremarkable entry.
It does add for the first time in the franchise multiple playable characters, each with its own fight style, but it doesn't really do much else. For the first time since Yakuza 1 there's no other area besides kamurocho, and while kamurocho has been expanded by adding roofs and hallways they don't really do much besides providing shortcuts (that I personally never used) and maybe having a couple of substories that require to go there.
The plot is kind of a mess even for yakuza standards, I appreciate that they tried to intertwine 4 different stories, but it does become almost comical towards the end with the amount of twists and betrayals that it crams in like 20 minutes.
Overall I don't think that Yakuza 4 is a bad game, I enjoyed my time with it and I would recommend it to any fan of the saga, it just left me feeling kind of cold despite introducing some of the most loved characters in the franchise for the first time.

I think its pretty neat how this game managed to recreate an offline mmo on PS2, the main menu being the computer screen is cool, and so is being able to browse the game forums and read e-mails.

The characters are also likeable enough and the plot seems interesting (although I can't comment much because this is a trilogy and I only played the first game), but sadly it falls apart on the gameplay part.

I honestly don't know if I'll ever truly seriously get into this franchise as it is a pretty daunting task, but at the very least I can say that this game has some pretty interesting concepts.

Been playing this for a while, and I think the biggest praise I can give is that it managed to hook me up despite not being into this kind of games at all.

It takes a while to get used to it, the in-game tutorial does an ok job at explaining the very basics of the game but I'd reccomend reading the manual and watching a couple of videos to actually get a grasp of it. However as daunting as this may seem the game itself is pretty intuitive, everything you need to know is laid out on the many menus the game has, you just have to read it.

Anyway the game itself is basically a galaxy conquest simulator, there's multiple ways to win and each faction has its own distinctive playstyle that favors one way or another.

I think what really ends up hooking me up is all the narrative sprinkled through the game, this isn't just clicking on things and seeing number go up or down, there's a lot of flavor text that really adds to the experience.

Hunt Showdown is an interesting game to say at the least, its a battle royale but confronting others players seems almost optional.

The objective of the game itself is to track down 3 clues to find the boss lair, then kill it and fuck off. However you're not the only one after it, other hunters have the same goal as you and that's when you have to be wary. They might go after you once you killed it to stole the prize, or maybe they will be waiting for you at one of the extraction points, or maybe there's actually no one left but you just don't know it, and that's where one of the most fun aspects of the game enters for me.
Hunt never tells you how many players are in the map, instead you have to mostly rely on sound. In this game everything makes noise, running makes the character breathe heavily, shuffling through the inventory makes a clicking noise, any shoot you make will be hear pretty much anywhere in the map and then there's the environment itself, a bunch of crows will start cooing if you pass by them too fast, dogs will bark etc.
This makes it so everyone has to be extremely wary of the sounds, because it will be what tells you if someone is near most of the time. Finding out someone's position thanks to that is extemely satisfying.

If there's one big con its that the game is very slow. Due to the nature of the game nobody wants to take risks, couple that with the fear of losing your character if you die and you have big periods of nothing. Not knowing if there's anyone else left ramps the tension yes, but I have also spent 20+ minutes games where me and a friend were overly cautious only to find out that we were actually alone.

In any case I still find Hunt to be a pretty enjoyable experience, just expect every match to be a lottery if it will be fun or just tedious.