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Platform: PlayStation
2
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Yakuza(Formerly known as Ryu ga Gotoku in Japan)
UPDATE (Feb. 23, 2006) - It was announced today that Sega will be bringing this game to North America and Europe under the name "Yakuza" this Summer.
Late
last year, Sega released a new action adventure game for the PlayStation
2 in Japan called Ryu ga Gotoku. Developed
by Toshihiro Nagoshi, whose work includes both Super Monkey Ball and
F-Zero for the Gamecube, this particular game has proven to be quite the
gritty change of pace for him. Following
the life and times of a member of the Yakuza in Japan, the game combines
the adventure game aspects of Shenmue with the fist-a-cuffs of a street
brawler.
Telling
the story of Kazuma Kiyuu, a former Yakuza member fresh out of prison,
Kazuma finds himself suddenly entangled in the plight of a young woman
named Haruka, who has access to a whole lot of money, and as such
several bad, bad people also want to get their hands on that cash.
It turns out this girl has disappeared, and now Kazuma finds
himself running around Tokyo to find her.
Much like Shemue, the environments look very true to life in Ryu ga Gotoku, although in the case of this game they are not based on a real city, instead going with a fictional entertainment district called Kumarocho, inspired by Tokyo’s Shinjuku ward. As players explore the game looking for clues, they’ll have plenty of opportunities to partake in the various establishments that line the streets of this city. Players can gamble in the pachinko |
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parlors,
try and win a prize from a UFO catcher machine, or buy something to eat or drink
that will temporarily boost Kazuma’s stats.
As players earn money during the game, they can even buy
expensive gifts that can be given to the girls at the hostess clubs. Impress these ladies enough, and they’ll start to send
Kazuma emails.
When players aren’t wandering around, living it up, chances are they’ll be beating down on some of the local street thugs that would like nothing better than to make Kazuma’s life as difficult as possible. It is this fighting engine that most gamers will say is Ryu ga Gotoku’s defining feature, because the thing is so incredibly tight. Firstly, the controls are |
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extremely
solid, and set up in a very intuitive manner.
In hardly takes any time to get a handle on how to fight, and
players will likely never find themselves struggling with the controller
to get a move to come off properly.
Better still is that the AI of the enemies appears to be quite
well-balanced from what I have seen of the game while playing it in
Japan. A lot of other games
in the beat ‘em up genre tend to suddenly become incredibly cheap when
the going gets tough, or they’re just cheap from start to finish
(I’m looking at you Urban Reign). From the levels that I have played, when enemies defeated me
it felt fair and square. There
was no intense frustration, and wondering what the hell just happened.
I knew where I went wrong, and I just had to figure out how to
fix it.
Ryu
ga Gotoku even has some RPG elements in it.
As players beat more enemies in combat, Kazuma will gain
experience points. These
can be used to improve his abilities in three key areas: body, skill,
and mind. Also, the battles
in the game break out similar to random encounters in a RPG.
Unlike standard beat ‘em ups, where players steadily progress
through one wave of thugs after the next, here they can come at any
time, anywhere. It’s an
interesting change of pace, though the load times could use some work.
So
far, Ryu ga Gotoku has been very well received in Japan. It’s hard to blame gamers over there for liking it,
either. The game has a cool
anti-hero, the fighting is incredibly solid, and there is some
adventuring, and, more importantly, tons of mini-games to enjoy.
Only now are we beginning to here rumors that the game will come
to North America, in light of Sega trademarking a Yakuza game only last
month. Hopefully, before long we’ll be able to enjoy Ryu ga Gotoku
on these shores as well.
Mr. Nash (February 20, 2006) |
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