I finished Yakuza 0 !

I initially meant to make a series about all my Yakuza 0 adventures similar to my previous Elden Ring series . But sadly no , I got super busy , playing the actual game , some work stuff , genshin stuff and just sifting through my actual Xbox game captures . Which thank goodness I was able to find some of my favorite scenes.

But nonetheless I’m happy that I was able to complete this game as it normally takes me forever to finish games. The Kingdom Hearts series took almost 2 1/2 years to complete and then they released another game on switch that I have to play as well . Well I think I’ll be adding the Yakuza series in my list of games to play . This game’s story and playstyle were amazing! Also I really liked having two protagonists, both Kiryu and Majima were really cool guys. I honestly was surpised when after I finished a chapter of the game it changed to Goro Majima.

And honestly I was worried I wouldn’t like Majima as much as Kiryu, but learning a bit more of his backstory and doing the mini stories really made me like him. He was originally part of the Shimano Family and was thrown out due to trying to help his brother . He is latter imprisoned and has his eye taken out. It’s pretty brutal backstory , but it was nice to see how he acts in the present day. his main goal is getting back into the Yakuza life while running a very prominent hostess club.  Plus his fighting style is very different than Kiryu’s being more agile , wild and one of his signature styles is using a baseball bat. this was really fun and I leveled up his baseball fighting style the highest, as I could keep enemies away and take out everyone. The breakdancing style was also fun but I sadly don’t have any videos of that. Plus it was a bit more complex than just hitting people with a basball bat. 

Oh and his side stories were really fun too, my favorites being the girl who wants him to pretend to be her boyfriend so her father stops bothering her.

Some how the imaginary boyfriend she describes to her father looks exactly like Majima . 

And hilarity ensues while on the date . Her father kind of knows that it was lie but really likes Majima anyway, he seems like a nice guy.

So much so he begs him to be her real boyfriend lol!

Also he beats up a guy in his underpants !

And later find a little girl who wants some plushies out of the claw machine.

This one was my other favorite as it calls back to Majima’s troubled past. He wins all the dolls for the little girl so she will stop hanging out in a dangerous part of the city. But sadly her Mom is being threatened by othe low level Yakuza , they tear up the place and slash up one of her plush dolls.

This of course enrages him and he beats them up . Later the girl is holding the doll as she feels bad that the doll he had given her is all mangled. 

He of course lets her know it’s okay and that they’re fine as they are and having visables scars is no big deal. After all she’s taking care of the little bird doll.

And even uses himself as an example. I thought this was a really nice call back to his initial backstory, and really helps set up his actual main story really. This of course is the story of the empty lot, and the young woman who unknowingly owns it. I’ll get to that a little later .

And for the last mini story of Majima’s that I thought was pretty funny was the one where he has to help a lady find her daughter. Her daughter joined a kooky religious cult with really suspect leader. Majima of course helps the young lady leave the cult , reminds her of her Mom is worried about her. and proceeds to beat the sleazy cult leader’s ass. 

This is definitely a game where alot of the mini stories , while not exactly related to the main story really do help enrich the character arcs of both protanganists and really shows the type of men they are. While being part of the criminal underworld , they’re still decent and want to help their communities . This is really refreshing as some games that have quests or mini stories are not that well thought out and often can just become fetch quests. Here the mini stories really shine.

Back to Kiryu and his stories are equally entertaining .

Meeting a fortune teller

And mistaking a foriegn ladie’s plea for a work visa and instead bringing her a pizza. Also had to share the music that plays as you deliver the pizza. 

Also I love Kiryu’s voice actor , if anyone here reading has watched Welcome To Demon School Iruma-Kun , he’s the japanese voice actor for Iruma’s demonic father. I noticed more in the karaoke mini game as he was using a goofier voice like in Welcome to Demon School. 

And yes the ladies quest was resolved , I guess she marries her pimp after Kiryu roughed him up a bit, and everyone’s happily eating pizza.  

And back to mini games . I touched on the mini games part as well in my previous post. But this games has a ton of mini games. My favorite being the disco dancing

There’s the little graph that you have to move your little dancing guy across the board and you have to time which buttons to get the right rythm. Plus the music is really good ! I really liked the Queen of Passion song.

The mini cars were also really fun too, You could buy more parts for these racing cars and make them faster, bulkier or get better tires for turning.

There’s also batting cages , a backalley casino ,old school Sega arcade games , dice games ,fishing majong, shogi, pool,darts, bowling, and an underground catfight with women in skimpy outfits fighting. This is a mini game I thought I had taken pics of but I guess I didn’t . While using a rock, paper , scissors system you have to cheer your lady on as she does pile drivers and other crazy wrestling moves . You can also bet in game currency , but I lost a few times and I’m like okay I’m done. Everything in this game requires a bit of money including leveling up your character’s fighting style , buying food to restore your health and the mini games also cost money too. So I would just go around and save people around town who would gift me furcoats, platinum plates and sells those to the pawnshop.  Later in the game both Kiryu and Majima get special unique mini games that help you make even more money. Kiryu’s is Real Estate and Majima’s is managing a Hostess club. Both are pretty fun and another reason completing the mini stories is super important. As Kiryu gains people to help him manage his real estate properties, Majima find more ladies to work at his Hostess club. I sadly didn’t max either character’s mini game , but a friend told me you can gain a secret fighting style for both Kiryu and Majima. I may do this on my second playthrough. 

And finally back to the main story. It was really good and I’ll give a bit of a spoiler warning , so if you want to skip this part thats cool. It’s a really good game and I encourage you to play if you haven’t . Otherwise , the story I thought at first was a bit slow , but interesting, and really it picks up more IMO when you play as Majima. You find out more about the empty lot that the main crime families are fighting over. The Real estate guy who hires Kiryu after he leaves the Yakuza is in fact also the brother to the young woman that Majima was sent to kill and later protects . It really is an interesting turn of events . I inititally thought the Real Estate, Tachibana would be an antagonist, but it was totally different than I expected. 

The Majima side of the quest , where get’s to know Tachibana’s sister, Makoto Makimura and learn that she is a target of the crime families that want to buy the empty lot. Apparently her grandfather owned the lot , died and left it to her , but she went missing after she set out to look for her brother, Tachibana. It does get kind of like Telenovela , which I really liked. Also it was kind of cool to see the story unfold on both sides as you play each character, with Kiryu helping out Tachibana and Majima helping Makoto.  Also there was so many surprises along the way , like how a helicopter chases you while your in the car with Makoto, and you have to shoot the missles. This was insane , or how you would fight a character and later that same character takes a bullet for you.

The last act was amazing and I don’t want to get too into the details, but the fights on par with a movie . 

And while I know this is a prequel to the rest of the Yakuza games which have been around for a while , I’m excited to play through those . Especially seeing how this how the characters started . Like I know Kiryu and his brother’s tattoo are not colored in now , but I can imagine how they look in the rest of the series.

And the very end was kind of nice. It shows what type of man, Kiryu and Majima want to be, why they are staying in their respective families, and thier convictions. The whole time I was like these two have not met yet? Will they, I beat the game? Like they were literally both helping these siblings . How could they not meet, I know they were in different cities , but they eventually had to go fight the main Yakuza family.  But nope I had to wait till the credits were over.

And finally, it happened.

 
Well it looks like I really will have to play the other games to see how these two interact. Will they be rivals ? But overall I really loved this game, it’s story and mini games , plus the characters were really fun. I can see why this series is so beloved. Let me know what your favorite Yakuza game and I’ll eventually play it! Still need to finish and write a review for Pokemon Violet and Scarlet. That will be coming soon.