I had a rough experience with Kiwami 1, particularly in how the characters hinted at in Yakuza 0 were wasted by a plot that seemed to be uninterested in doing anything with the massive time jump between games or expanding on these less-explored characters.

Fortunately, Kiwami 2 is a big improvement in nearly every way and I’m surprised how mixed the reception seems to be in these reviews. Several twists caught me off-guard, though, unlike Kiwami, actually made sense and was correctly foreshadowed. The new characters introduced were solid and had satisfying arcs, while providing necessary backstory for Kazama that I felt was absent in Kiwami 1. The camerawork in the last game was a big step down from Yakuza 0. Thankfully, that bar of quality has been restored here, with a far more cinematic presentation, where the camera placement and movement is so much more creative and deliberate.

Combat is good, but it’s the one area that feels like a sidegrade rather than an outright improvement. Game feel is slightly worse than the last 2 games, and the overall difficulty is extremely low, even on Hard mode. On the other hand, the weapons are far better implemented this go around because of the ability to have multiple equipped. The progression was also streamlined in a positive way, with way more options being unlockable at once.

The side activities had better overall mechanics, with the Clan creator being surprisingly addictive and funny, in how it tries to parallel the setup of Yakuza 0. Some other small improvements include the addition of Golf and the selection of Karaoke being much wider this time. The substories were decent, though I doubt I’ll remember any of them a year from now, aside from… well you know the one.

I really loved this game and it’s restored my faith in the series.