#lad8 gaiden

[gamerism]

Majima Goro in the Like A Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii Reveal Trailer

[oceanicoleander]

[zaddyazula]

some people love opening their mouths

[bitternace]

the father, the son, the end of the world (x)

[ID: two digital drawings of three iterations of kiryu kazuma that are intertwined in a downwards sequence. the background is a night sky with two framing clouds, and city lights, moon backlightning the three figures. the colors are tinted blue, and the image is held in a frame that is transparent on the outer part.

on top, kiryu is shown in his yakuza 3 okinawa outfit, in the middle in his yakuza 0 pinstrip suit and at the bottom, in a black shirt as he appears in infinite wealth.

y3 kiryu curls his right arm around y0 kiryu's neck, hand in a fist, his right hand comfortably lying on top of lad8 kiryu's head. his expression is a deep frown, as he stares at the audience.

y0 kiryu is turned to the left side of the image, as if running away, his left arm resting over y3's left forearm, hand slightly curled into a fist. his right arm curls forward over lad8 kiryu's shoulder protectively, palm held upwards. he is frowning at something off-frame, mouth slightly open.

lad8 kiryu has his right hand in a fist over his stomach and the left one reaching up to hold y0's left forearm. his expression is blank, as he stares at nothing, mouth slightly agape.

The second image is the same, only slightly less dark for visibility. /End ID.]

(ref) (edited)

[todayisafridaynight]

you probably won't even care about yakuza by the time the plushies are out if we go by your track record

i cant even deny this cause my interests do tend to have a shelf life of one year and it'll be one year come june

[bellsliturgy]

ragdoll physics are the highlight of our current era of gaming

[averydavery]

The Like A Dragon Infinite Wealth Problem

Ichiban sprite WIP for my (admittedly self-indulgent) fangame

Pseudo-essay and ramblings below the cut

Tldr:

I’m a sore, butt-hurt player who feels a bit cheated and a lot disappointed.

Critical Rating- 8/10

Personal Rating- 6.5/10

SPOILERS AHEAD

So I’m writing this as of just finishing the game. Mind you, it took me about three-fourths of this year to beat LAD8. Not because it was challenging but because one thing or another pissed me off so much, I had to put it down for extended periods of time. Now I want to get my glazing out of the way so you understand the things that I’m 100% not bashing here and a lot of my criticisms just have to deal with how RGG studio as a whole has become as storytellers and developers.

But most obviously addicting was the gameplay. This is probably one of my favorite turn-based RPGs in terms of mechanics and strategy— and I played BG3 this year. It improved everything that was in 7 and added only more things worth liking, especially the inclusion of Kiryu breaking the entire physics and reverting to just pummeling someone. I thought that was a really endearing touch. Also, out of all the games I’ve put on the TV, this was the one my dad enjoyed watching most. For context, my dad is a fifty-three year old man who only plays first-person shooters and has no interest in any other kind of game. I play with subtitles too and he’s usually not a fan of that since he has poor vision but he LOVED watching the silly little “essence of” moves. He genuinely got excited whenever I did a shit ton of damage on an enemy lmao. Also in my dorm I have a poster of Ichiban and my dad pointed at it recently and said “I know that guy! He beats up people with his magical bat!” … literally sobbed.

Besides the gameplay, it had nice quality of life improvements from 7 which was to be expected. Although I am VERY opinionated in terms of the story, my favorite part was Eiji and Ichiban’s development. The ending scene had such a cyclical feel to it that kind of reigned in some of the craziness to remind the viewer that the first “new” character Ichiban met was Eiji and a lot of Ichi’s expository conflicts were the result of his actions. I thought out of all the antagonists, he was the most realized and motivated as well. A lot of the more shocking moments I cared for had him in it— either explicitly or implicitly. Also not to mention the “bon voyage” motif, that was adorable.

Other things I enjoyed a lot were Dondoko Island, what a great in-depth mini game that at times I’d much rather play than the main story, and Chitose and Tomizawa. I liked both of them a lot, I thought the were sweet additions, it’s just Chitose had a lot of bearing on the story in regards to Eiji and I wish I could see it through. She wasn’t in the ending much at all and I feel like since she was so guarded we didn’t see her personality very much. Tomi was a much smaller part of the story which was a bummer but regardless, he certainly didn’t bother me and I like him for what he’s there for! Also he’s the most down-to-earth and relatable character on the team so that perspective was nice.

Okay now onto why I didn’t like this game so much.

I enjoyed this game really up until Kiryu went back to Yokohama and got his own team. Everything I disliked about the plot could be traced back to starting around that chapter. If you boil it down, this game introduces itself as being a continuation of Ichiban’s story and revolving around him. But when we take ahold of Kiryu it reveals itself to be a game centered around both of them. And one side of the story is about a new, fresh, and beloved character we players are always excited to play as… and the other is Kiryu.

I’m gonna rip the band-aid off now: I am sick of Kiryu. Do I think he deserves a better ending than in 6? Yes. Have I played Gaiden? No. Do I think that they should’ve found a way to end his story in Gaiden? Yes.

We as players have spent SEVEN AND A HALF games playing as Kiryu, from 0 to Gaiden. I think it’s not a stretch to say they need to give him a rest. I wish everything that happened with Kiryu at the end of this game was either put into Gaiden and RGG had marketed that game as “the true twilight era and ending of Kiryu Kazuma” or been experienced through the eyes of Ichiban. After all, it felt like Kiryu was upstaging Ichiban more or less in his own game and not in a good way. If this game was supposed to be truly “shared” between the two of them then they shouldn’t have made Ichiban such a focal point and made it like some grand scheme visualized through two different lenses like they did with Kiryu and Majima in 0. Every time I was back at the helm of Kiryu was just biding my time until I was Ichiban again! And call this an original take (sarcasm), but I don’t think a game should be played like that.

Not to mention that RGG now has a habit of making the game unplayable by forcing the player to spend hours leveling up to beat a boss and while I think that’s a clever way to get the player to spend more hours in their game— I definitely think we can all agree that spending time grinding to level up or to get new poundmates was no one’s favorite part of the story. So not only am I trying to rush through Kiryu’s story that I’m bored by, the game forces me to stay playing as him which only makes me hate that half of the game more.

I also think this series has really lost its spark, it set a standard that the conflict has to be so large, so all-encompassing and complex that it doesn’t really know what story its telling. What I mean is done best in 3 which is my favorite game in terms of story, is because of its scope. Sure, the US is involved so the issue is slightly international and there is some silly, yakuza-brand confusion but 3 is solely focused on that little town in Okinawa. Everything came back to Kiryu’s attempt to settle down there and how the Tojo Clan still seemed to follow him all they to his doorstep. The plot was localized and familiar characters like Majima and Dojima made decisions remotely from Kiryu, while new faces like Rikiya and Mine got to shine. In 8, the scale is so large and is trying its best to be so fanservice-y that the story of “Ichiban finding his mom” is lost completely in the cracks.

Also the cult shit. I know this RGG but even for their standards, this was stupid and not in a silly way. I was just groaning.

Not to mention, Lani is a character I felt no emotion towards. I wish the story was solely been about Ichiban finding his mom and it had spanned the entirety of the story, rather than the player being told “well, Akane isn’t the important one that Palekana is looking for it’s actually this random kid she’s protecting that you don’t know anything about or have an attachment to instead.” I think if they had, again, narrowed the scope and simplified the plot to be Ichiban searching for his mom— it could’ve been way more emotional and impactful. They could’ve even tried to achieve that Twin Peaks “who killed Laura Palmer?” vibe. Be which I mean, a very simple question or sentence could’ve been expanded upon tenfold.

I don’t know, this has gone on long enough. What do you think?

[eli-artsblog]

LaD8 Kiryu (i'm not ok after gaiden and the demo 😭)

I accept commissions in this style btw (charcoal drawing, A5 format) - message me here or check out my Ko-fi comm. page <3

[kronim195]

I am currently playing through every mainline Yakuza game - main story, all substories and major sidequests included - before I get to Gaiden and LaD8. Feels like this could be Kiryu's last adventure (for real this time) so I wanna see all of his story to make that feel even more rewarding.

I'm gonna be at this for like 6 months lol

[gamerism]

Majima Goro • Like A Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii

[gensokyogarden]

Beat LAD8. Gonna briefly ramble about my feelings on it now, since this is a place where I ramble at my friends. I am not going to talk about the plot in any great detail so consider this to be spoiler free (unless you consider me saying that content was in the game to be a spoiler in which case some spoilers).

Throughout the vast majority of the game I greatly enjoyed it, feeling it was a great sendoff to a lot of things in the franchise. To some extent it also addressed some of the qualms I had to Y6. In particular I found the Memoirs of the Dragon side objective taking you through a walk down memory lane of the entire Kiryu saga (non canon spinoff games included) to be really touching. I personally have played every mainline game and what side content I could get a hold of so I felt quite nostalgic and rewarded over this.

In general I feel that it managed to hit many emotional high points. Being honest though, I do feel that the very last segment of LAD Gaiden set the bar so high that this game never touched it, but standing on its own I think they managed to jam a lot of pathos into the game.

I found the final boss and, to some extent, the ending to be a bit underwhelming. The final speech that he gave really did not seem to be much in line with his motivations up to that point at all and instead of adding some sympathy I felt that it only made the plot of the game make less sense. I am not really some sorta expert on narrative design and character motivation though so maybe I'm just being foolish. In prior games whenever I felt the main antagonist didn't quite have the energy, I felt that the intensity of the final boss battles did a lot to bring me around to them. After the swap to turn base (a choice that outside of this issue I'm fine with) though I feel there's been a bit of a final boss problem. If anyone's interested in what I mean I could probably ramble on that separately but suffice to say that I think that the turn base final bosses have less oompth (though I still have a lot of positive feelings about the ones from LAD7).

But I do think that they vastly improved the turn based mechanics from 7. I thought they did a lot to make this game really fun and I had a great time with it. Outside of the above mentioned qualms, I did enjoy both the story and gameplay quite a lot. Often in my first playthrough of one of these games I primarily focus on just the main story and hardly touch side stories, saving them for the post game or a second playthrough. This time, however, I was so drawn in by the writing that I just had to stop and do them all. Plus Hawaii is just a really fun setting.

All in all I would say it's a great game and encourage fans of the series to play it. Given much of the game, however, is rooted in nostalgia for the whole Kiryu saga I don't think I'd do the same for someone that hasn't played most of the games.

[chainreh]

no gaiden no lad8 who even cares

[zaddyazula]

as this is now actually real/mostly proven, let’s look at it

the key to regaining his memory is through yakuza tattoos (where are we gonna see them??? how are they gonna come up?)

i think it’s safe to say we’ll most likely see kiryu’s and saejima’s (due to how closely linked they are to majima’s story) but who else? (ryuji… mine…) maybe daigo or even shimano (? reaching a bit here) but i can’t think of anyone else. i’m guessing this is gonna work like the memories/memoirs of a dragon in lad8.

we’re gonna see parts of the story FROM MAJIMA’s POV

the fucking POSSIBILITIES here. imagine if we get a pov of 1995 from him. insane. 3 could also be an interesting one, as well as 5 (considering how little his side is shown in it) or 7/gaiden, or even pre-7, with how him and the other two left the tojo. or maybe even more on the company they had after the dissolution. there’s so many points in the story that could really be expanded on here. i’m not actually sure when the game is gonna be set, this says after 8, but at the start of the summit he said to go back 6 months, so we might have to wait a bit for definite confirmation.

obviously i’m just going off everything else being true, it could totally turn out to be wrong here. these are just very early on predictions.

[cominy-kiwami]

kiryu is gonna be a dual protagonist with ichiban in lad8. gotta say i dont like that! 100% ichiban is gonna be gradually pushed to the sidelines and they're just gonna do Kiryu Again. fuck off!

these trailers show one thing above anything else to me. the studio is SO afraid to let go of their established material. unless kiryu dies in lad8 theyre just gonna continue to stagnate until theyre making the same game every year.

[zaddyazula]

the return of goromi is making me so happy

[zaddyazula]

i am so glad the majima drought is ending, starting the series last year with him as one of the protagonists and then ending it with him barely managing 20 minutes of screen time as a majima fan was fucking torture