Yakuza Kiwami 2 Preview

I must admit that I had not played a Yakuza game before going to SEGA’s office so wasn’t really sure what to expect when I played Yakuza Kiwami 2 for the first time, in fact, the only thing I knew was that it had a variety of mini-games, and that it just might be set in Japan.

For one, I was not expecting the story to be as wonderfully immersive as it is, kicking off with a set of flashbacks to what I presume is the events of the first game and what led to them. The player character, Kazuma Kiryu, is still reeling from the events that happened the previous year and is determined to put that behind him, until an assassination pulls him back into the world of the Yakuza.

It’s actually a testament to this game that it gave me just enough so that I wanted to know far more about what happened previously but also told me enough about the past events to get me immediately invested in these characters. I feel like I could still play the first game relatively spoiler free despite knowing the end result. Furthermore, it does a fantastic job at explaining all of the characters, their motivations, and gives them a surprising amount of fleshing out in a very short time.

The gameplay of Yakuza Kiwami 2 is essentially a simple 3D adventure title, but to say it is solely that would be an insult to the game. There’s a lot of different gameplay elements on show here, and if you were to just content yourself with wandering the various city settings in Japan, there’s Google Street View for that, and you would be missing a large portion of what makes this game so enjoyable.

Firstly is the combat, which is incredibly simple but yet has enough depth so it doesn’t become repetitive. It’s mostly performed using standard attacks with blocks and dodges until your opponent is stunned, then finishing them with one of the contextual finishers. Although this can involve a fair amount of button-mashing, and pretty much all fights can be won this way, it’s actually really gratifying to fight effectively using all tools available to you.

You’ll need to be prepared for this as these fights can occur at any point, with random groups of thugs taking issue with you for various reasons; but, as an additional sweetener for the combat, you are allowed to pick up weapons like bikes and traffic cones to use immediately or, in the case of things like knives, pocketed to use for later.

Yakuza Kiwami 2 isn’t just be throwing down in street fights though, what with a bustling metropolitan cityscape to explore and, quite literally, mess around in. On pretty much every street corner, and liberally thrown everywhere else, are a wide variety of different activities to participate in, from throwing a few games of darts, to playing Virtua Fighter 2 in an arcade, to those highly addictive crane games (which I spent far too long on), you will never be lacking something to do.

It’s this variety of gameplay that genuinely boosts the game up for me, as it genuinely feels like the location is a character of it’s own merits. What’s more, walking around those streets as Kiryu reminded me of walking around the streets of Tokyo at night while I was there. The same beautiful assault on the senses, and the same sheer excitement of being in a situation with so much to try and see, and wanting to do all of it.

Speaking of which, another thing I took away from my time with the game is simply how beautiful it is to behold. All of the locations are bright, colourful, easy to navigate, and yet wonderfully chaotic. All of the characters are well-animated and have realistic facial expressions that, although looking close to life, never fall into being uncanny valley. The voice acting is also superb, which is likely one of the reasons why the characters are so engrossing from the first moments.

This is an incredible game, even from my relatively short play around with it, and I really now want to go back and experience the earlier games as well as giving this one a lot more time. I really appreciated the option during the initial moments to skip a lot of the stuff that would have been covered in the earlier games; although I needed the primer, a lot of players wouldn’t so the inclusion of a skipping feature is wonderful. Also, I appreciate the diversity of the combat mechanics and how you are encouraged to keep an eye on your surroundings for not only weapons but also to avoid getting surrounded.

Yakuza Kiwami 2 is released on August 28^th 2018 (not soon enough because I am impatient) for Playstation 4.

Will you be picking up Yakuza Kiwami 2 on release? Have you played any of the other games in the franchise, or are you new to the series like myself? Let us know in the comments or on Twitter, and keep and eye on Rice Digital in the future for more coverage of both this and other games.