Yakuza 6: The Song of Life Reviews

I’ve been playing all in order, just finished this one. I have to say of all the games this one came closest to topping 0 for me. The gameplay and graphics miles better that 5, it plays and looks like Kiwami 2. By far my favorite aspect of this game is how phenomenal the story is. Kiryu’s relationship to the Hirose family and watching it grow was so heartwarming. There are a million twists in this game, but that ending, that ending was so bittersweet. I think it was a perfect send off for Kiryu. While at the same time leaving room for future storylines. If you have been playing the series all the way through this is one of the best. My ranking on the games in my opinion: Yakuza 0 Yakuza 6 Yakuza Kiwami 2 Yakuza Kiwami 1 Yakuza 5 Yakuza 4 Yakuza 3

A short, but sweet experiment. The dragon engine is goofy, and so is Kiryu's new moveset. It can definitely be improved, and I'm sure it does later on, but I still loved this game for the refresher it brings outside of Kamurocho.

This game is peak yakuza and although the gameplay is a bit limited due to it being the first Dragon Engine Yakuza game, the story is just incredible and really emotional. Also, Akiyama is really handsome thanks to the power of the Dragon Engine.

Whoever thought anyone would want to comfort a crying baby repeatedly in a video game should get a lobotomy

The worst combat in the series. Yes, even worse than in 3. It just feels so sluggish. And for whatever reason, enemies' blocks completely stop you in your tracks, which wasn't the case everywhere else in the series. But it still isn't a bad game. It has a fun story (also the substories are a blast), and it's an absolutely gorgeous game. Just the combat sets it back a lot.

Yakuza 6 is the first game in the series to use the dragon engine, many people don't like the new combat, but I enjoy it. This game looks gorgeous, the lighting is perfect, and the characters look stunning. (Akiyama) The story is okay, the middle feels sort of padded out, but I don't expect much from what is supposedly Kiryu's swan song. One of the better main line entries. 7.5/10

I cannot truly lie - this game is not the greatest solo Kiryu game at all, but it is safe to say that it was enjoyable and OK. I despised the early parts of this game and put it off for weeks, but around the mid-game, I began to enjoy it more. It was super easy to get attached to characters like Nagumo, but it was very difficult to come with terms that they replaced dialogue boxes with just subtitles. I'm glad they went experimental for this game, but that isn't my type of experimental. The substories were nice, though. A lot of them went back to previous games, like Yakuza 0, or Yakuza 5, which were released before but close to Yakuza 6. I did hate the fact that substories were a pain in the ass to come across (unlike Yakuza 5, which would pinpoint them on the map for you). The clan creator was AWESOME, though. I did enjoy that part of the game a lot. Other than that, the story of this game is extremely good. I did get bored around the penultimate chapter and the finale though. The combat is... okay. You can tell the Dragon Engine is fresh as could ever be (due to funny glitches, ragdolls, whatever). I truly hated that enemies would not go over 1 health bar (I do like watching the huge health bar go down...) and that most fights felt incredibly easy. Besides minor flaws that I can go on a tangent on for hours (like finding the scattered locker keys was a true pain in the ass, or the skip button pisses me off for some particular reason), there's not much else to say about this game. I just think it's OK. No more, no less.

Yakuza 6 has the best karaoke song in the SERIES. I SAID IT. TODAY IS A DIAMOND IS AMAZING. Oh also the game is fantastic. You will cry, you will spearfish, you will comfort a baby. You're the baby. 'cause you're crying. Also there's a baby in the game. JUST PLAY THE GAME IT'S YAKUZA YOU NERD.

A bittersweet Conclusion to the Kiryu Saga. Yakuza 6 was a great game that concludes the long running Legend of the Dragon of Dojima. The menu music alone gave me chills and is by far one of my favorite Video Game Menus. Now Normally I would say to not Play this game if you haven't played the previous ones but the game includes a section in the menu where you can read up on what happened in the previous 5 games in a summarized form with the important plot points mentioned. The only one I would say you should play is 0 as that game takes place before all the events and it does not cover that. I would also recommend to play Kiwami 1 and 2 just because those were remade and Kiwami 2 specifically is like an upgraded version of this game as it was released after 6. So if this is your first Yakuza game, Definitely try out 0, then try Kiwami, Kiwami 2 if you really enjoyed Y6 and wanted more or an "upgraded" version of this game. Gameplay wise this game nails it, the combat is fun, there are fun side activities to do in the city and overall the leveling up system feels fair and as if you do not need to do so much grinding. I always love the dragon engines capability of me starting a street fight and being able to throw my opponents through a shop window and then proceeding to use the chairs inside as weapons. It never gets old being able to just walk into a store without there being any loading screens, the world feels seamless and flows into itself nicely. The substories were entertaining with them having the classic yakuza ridiculous scenario where Kiryu somehow get dragged into situations without him able to back out. Although some of the substories were recycled from the other games as I remember getting in the same situations for certain substories but they did try to make those specific ones a little different. The sub stories and activities are also all voice acted which gives it a sense of quality that the others didn't have as for the previous games they were all dialogue boxes with your occasional grunting. The Main Story was incredibly well written, the game kept me so engaged that I barely focused on side activities as much and decided to focus on the story first in this game because I just really wanted to know what was about to unfold; the ending was also something very gut wrenching and made me cry. This game also includes "Mini" Games; they have a Clan Creator Mini game that was available in Kiwami 2 where you create a clan and fight other clans in a top down perspective. Think of it like an RTS where you spawn units and they go forward to fight the enemy units but you can spawn captains that consist of the main cast of the game that are much more powerful and have special abilities. I actually Enjoy this version of the Clan creation much more than I did the one from Kiwami 2 because this one kept things simple and straight forward where as the one in Kiwami 2 made things a bit more complicated, because of that it made the experience worse, sometimes simpler is better and that was the case in this situation. As well as this game was made, there were some issues in it that I feel like hold it back. There are some problems with the combat. This is the first game they made in the dragon engine, so there are quirks that they were not able to figure out entirely, such as when you grab enemies sometimes they do not get thrown the direction you aimed or they get thrown early. Other times enemies are able to cancel your powerful overcharge heat mode with a simple punch when you're about to trigger the last button press of the combo which can cut the flow of combat and does not feel great. There isn't as many side activities to do as other games. Don't get me wrong, there is still plenty of activities to do, but there are certain ones missing that I feel like they were a core part of the of the Series, such as the claw machine games, you cannot play any claw machines in this game. Bowling is also missing completely from this game as well as Pool. We did get a few new side activities like the Live chat, but that one was incredibly short and once you do it twice (the two different options) you are done with it. It felt like Kiwami 1, where there isn't many side activities but there is enough for you to do if you really are up for it. The story, although this might be a positive for some, was probably the shortest out of all the games I've played. I personally did not mind this as I said the story was expertly written, but to some this might be an issue. Im not sure if time constraints affected this but Kamurocho is probably the smallest version in this game. You cannot access the back part of the map (West Park) at all, it is completely blocked off, they also did not include the underground sections or the roof tops except for 2 areas that are very small. This means that there is no Purgatory you can access so there is no Colosseum. You do get to go to another city but that city is also not as big and does not have much to do besides plot related issues, sub stories and some activities. There is no way to know where you have sub stories, the game doesn't tell you where you can run into them so for the most part you have to run around until you eventually trigger one, sometimes they are obvious but other times they are hard to find as it requires you to play a side activity or go into a specific shop. This is the same for the Troublr missions which are like sub stories but more to the point. The fact that there are more games after this one makes the ending not as impactful, it was still very effective and makes you feel a lot of emotions, but knowing that there are more games just undermines it. Overall this was one of the more Solid Yakuza Games from the series. It has enough side activities to do although it was missing a few fun ones; however, the story was great and the gameplay was fun and engaging. So far Yakuza 0 Still stands as my favorite game of the series even if that game was not made with the dragon engine, Kiwami 2 comes to a close second and this one I would place it in third place. Although it had a few shortcomings, Y6 was still a solid game with a ton of fun things to do that will keep you engaged in the story from the very beginning and in the world you inhabit. Like a Dragon has been an exciting journey that I was able to be a part of and I would recommend anyone to experience it for themselves. Pick the ones that interest you the most but overall I would implore you to play most of them as I had an amazing time going through what this franchise has to offer.

Apparently they did not give a f*ck 'bout boss fights till and after 0, forget about patterns bosses don't even have a couple of different ways of attacking, they have a big health bar so they're boss fights lol. When it comes to the plot, it is ok, nothing's captivating 'bout it. Yakuza deserved a more extraordinary final but however 6 is still a good game, way better than 3 and 5. I think plot should be focused on less characters, I am so sick of Yakuza's unnecessarily too many plot twists and characters. Shun Akiyama deserves his own game, a trilogy actually. 7/10