Yakuza 3 - short review

Doing it for the kids

Foregoing its Japan-only side-story Kenzan!, Yakuza 3 marks itself as both an improvement and a departure from the first 2 episodes in the series. On the one hand, it’s bigger and better than it’s ever been, with an environment that while completely familiar and related to the series, is now incredibly more detailed, and whose exploration is much facilitated by the use of a 3rd person perspective and a very immersive 1st person view mode; the fighting sequences are more refined and varied and the series’ staple sidequests are plentiful (even to an excess) and creative as ever. On the other hand, Yakuza 3 delves deep through more sentimental grounds in terms of story and characters, a slight rift from its previous racier “crime-thriller” episodes. This is perhaps much owed to a change in writers. Thus, there’s noticeably less emphasis on crime family politics and war mongering, and more on life values. While the characters certainly feel much more interesting, and the new graphics’ engine allows for a lot more expression, in the end it seems all that potential wasn’t fully utilized. The game rewards us with some great directed cutscenes right at the start involving charismatic characters that unfortunately end up not being completely relevant to the tale, or are brushed aside too early (Tsuyoshi Kanda, Goh Hamazaki). While what ends up being the main antagonist is an interesting choice, American Psycho-like (sans the sexual bits, at least) Yoshitaka Mine, he too is under-utilized. In the end, the game ends up having too many characters that, for the game’s overall length, just aren’t developed enough.
Gameplay-wise the scale has too been upgraded, although always maintaining familiarity with the series.
While giving players and fans more of the same though, it did manage to convey what was undoubtedly the best experience in the series, simply due to its enormous depth and variability. Even if the story was shallow and unfulfilling, sometimes bordering on the inane, it never took away from the core experience of the series in providing an immersive and detail-attentive experience in modern Japan, with its tradermark humour and violence intact.
After this, and with Yakuza 4 out in Japan, it might seem that the formula is drying up. Only time will tell, but it’d be a shame to see this great series and current pearl of historic company SEGA be reduced to ridiculous expansions and sidestories in the vein of Metal Gear Solid and Resident Evil.