Like A Dragon: Ishin Remake (PS4/PS5 - Feb 23)

[Hero-of-Time]

Finally getting a release over here! I never thought it would happen.

Strange they've dropped the Yakuza branding though.

 

 

Edited September 13, 2022 by Hero-of-Time

[drahkon]

I don't know what this is, but I must play it.

[Hero-of-Time]

 

[drahkon]

So this is just a spin-off game with characters from the "main show"? A completely separate story, I assume?

[RedShell]

No way?!  

Better check my PS4 still works.   Scratch that, it's also coming out on PC.

 

Edited September 14, 2022 by RedShell

[Hero-of-Time]

 

[drahkon]

On 9/14/2022 at 12:30 AM, drahkon said:

I don't know what this is, but I must play it.

I still stand by it  
Looks awesome!

[Julius]

Combat demo shadow drop on all launch platforms:

 

[RedShell]

Checked out the demo on PC. First impressions were unfortunately not good though as it seems they're using unreal engine (instead on the dragon engine) for this game, and that in combination with DX12 means performance is all over the shop. So much stuttering!

After a bit of research I discovered how to force the game to run using DX11 though, and that sorted the problem completely, the game ran silky smooth afterwards. Quite why it isn't set up like that by default I have no idea, but it has put me off picking this up at launch quite a bit.

Also, the enemies in the second section of the demo are serious damage sponges, fighting them was actually pretty frustrating and a reminder of some of the notorious bosses in previous Yakuza games that had like a thousand health bars! Pretty sure these are just a standard enemy type though, which will no doubt be annoying if you have to encounter them regularly in the full game.

So yeah, bit of a disappointing demo really. I imagine I'll still pick this up, just at a later date once it's on sale.

[martinist]

Forgot this was comming out. Was a nice surprise when it dropped through my door.

Played the other yakuza games to death so this should be a nice change of setting.

[Ashley]

The Guardian has a feature about it which has this wonderfully honest quote:

Quote

“Making games is horribly difficult. I can’t think of anything I especially enjoy about it,” he [Hiroyuki Sakamoto] tells me, deadpan. (He’s been in game development since 2000, when he worked on Sega’s arcade games.) “Every aspect of it is difficult. I try not to think, ‘this is fun’, because actually this is all hard work.”

 

[RedShell]

I started playing this about a month ago and finished the story last night. The final product was a lot better than the demo implied, and those annoying UE4 stutter issues have been (for the most part) completely fixed.
They say you shouldn't judge a book by its cover, well I guess the gaming equivalent is don't judge a video game by its demo. If you look back a few posts you'll see that I did exactly that earlier this year, but it was a mistake. The reality is that Sega just put out a really bad demo for Ishin, on PC at least. That, or they sorted it via patches since, either way, the game is all good now.

So yeah, I ended up enjoying yet another Yakuza game, what a surprise! Was great to play one with real-time combat again as well, as it's been a long time since Kiwami 2. Anyway, there are a total of 4 different play styles available in Ishin, but I mainly stuck with the swordsman style for my entire playthrough and just dabbled with the others. Each has its own unique weapons/skill tree and it's easy to switch between the various styles at any time, but the katana just felt the most appropriate given the setting of this game. Definitely looked the coolest too, some of the moves were super flashy and blocking bullets with a sword is always entertaining.

As for the story, it was fun seeing so many familiar faces from across the Yakuza series pop up, but everyone (well, almost) having different names than usual made it incredibly confusing, and I struggle to follow the plot on these games as it is!
It's cool how the Yakuza cast of characters are portraying historical figures and that it's based on a true story though... I imagine quite loosely. Yep, pretty sure they added some zazz here and there! But regardless, the main story is still often slow paced and dramatic, perhaps more so than any of the games from the main series.

Luckily the substories are here to provide comedic moments, and there are some absolute doozies in this, like...

Spoiler

The sexy madam who's interested in obtaining vegetables of substantial length and girth for... "cooking".  

This clumsy cat that keeps falling into a river and therefore needing to be cleaned at a bathhouse.

A woman that tells ridiculously long-winded stories and then quizzes you on them (this one felt like the devs or translation team taking the piss out of the often very lengthy dialogue sequences in Yakuza games).

Minigames are on point too, you get all the usual stuff like Karaoke, fishing, gambling etc. but also cooking (it's Yakuza x Cooking Mama ) and farming! Which comes in handy for making extra cash or satisfying the vegetable lady.

 

Spoiler

My first attempt at that song was catastrophic, for some reason I just couldn't seem to concentrate on the button prompts.

And there's quite a bit more content that I've not really had the chance to properly check out yet, but with Like a Dragon Gaiden having just launched I'll be turning my attention to that for a while now.

[Hero-of-Time]

That karaoke song! Haha.