YAKUZA 6: THE SONG OF LIFE
Kazuma Kiryu’s final adventure proves he’s Daddy Cool
Sega’s gangster epic ties up some loose ends and makes us cry, just a little bit.
The Yakuza series has proved time and again it can encourage more than a single manly tear from me. Even if you’re a newcomer, the 45-minute recap deftly brings you up to speed on the most salient points of the last game, setting up the core themes for this one too, while also ensuring there won’t be a dry eye in the house. The Song Of Life attempts to be welcoming to both new and old players in a number of ways. The main menu offers short and sweet recaps of each mainline game, plus detailed character profiles you can access from your in-game phone at those times when you find yourself asking, “Hey, what’s the deal with that guy in the grubby hoodie again?” For a game with such a large cast, many drawn together by a tangle of red thread with decades of story between them, these are handy features for fans and newcomers alike.
FEEDING THE DRAGON
Combat follows a classic formula, though still encourages even button-masher me to think a little outside the r. Whether it’s any of a number of random encounters in the street, optional one-on-one bust ups, or a story-based boss, I find myself challenged and rewarded in equal measure.
Variance and depth comes through your upgrades. Alongside completing objectives, eating certain food items won’t only top up your health but will also give you experience points across five different categories. You’ll need a hefty dose of each to upgrade your base stats in addition to unlocking new moves and specialised skills. You’ll be able to bust out a ton of new contextual
or Heat-mode-specific takedowns, such as the ability to disarm blade- or even gun-wielding enemies, if you put points in the right places. Far from creating the mere illusion of a fight system that you’re proficient in, you’re encouraged to experiment with each new move you unlock. I soon find myself learning to block and back-step appropriately. It’s genuinely rewarding to get stuck into, giving you plenty of equally effective or ridiculous ways to finish fights as you go.
DRAMA KING
The plot, too, while making plenty of references to earlier events in the series, is accessible for newcomers. There’s no ignoring that what starts in this sixth instalment is a direct consequence of the (well-exposited) tail-end of the fifth and therefore inextricable from it, but what follows is an absorbing crime drama in its own right: finding himself in a mess of inter-Yakuza clan politics and clashes with foreign crime syndicates while also trying to uncover the truth behind a personal tragedy, Kazuma’s plate is overflowing. Dramatic turns from Takeshi Kitano (yes, Beat Takeshi is in this game) and Tatsuya Fujiwara (of Battle Royale and Death Note fame) help the crime drama earn its chops. Between climactic fist fights and impressive set-pieces, Song Of Life somehow finds the time not only to explore the bonds of non-traditional family units too but also to tell an affecting tale of failed father figures. There are, however, the familiar crime drama tropes of female characters shoved in freezers or otherwise put on ice for large parts of the proceedings. Similarly, fatherhood is explored from a number of angles but motherhood does not get the same nuanced look-in.
FIGHT-SEEING TOUR
But it’s not all doom and gloom – the mood zig-zags throughout. If Song Of Life committed to this with any less sincerity than it does we’d call it a tone problem, but the fact that it shifts so wholeheartedly forms part of what is very much core to this series’ identity. One moment you’ll be fighting through a horde of underlings just so you can get a pointed word in edgeways with the Boss who dared cross your family; the next, you’ll have blown through 100,000 yen playing classic Sega arcade games, hoovering up a Wette burger with fries or trying to max out your relationship with that cute hostess at the cabaret club… okay, maybe that last one was just me but I swear it was only one time! (I didn’t have the funds for another visit…)
Side-stories return too with their trademark absurdity and unexpected poignancy, from helping a girl who has leapt through time help her father rediscover self-respect to battering a clueless content creator who thinks the streets of Kamurocho are little more than his playground. The heart found in these scattered
“KAMUROCHO FEELS MORE ALIVE THAN OPEN WORLDS TEN TIMES ITS SIZE.”
scenes forms much of the series’ appeal. However, longer side-quests, such as that to populate a cat café, fight a war of diminishing returns. Collecting kitties is enjoyable (only battering waves of suited-and-booted Yakuza compares to the rush of hearing a new friend meowing somewhere and retreading the same block in order to find them), but actually returning to the café to see my feline friends’ character models were not exactly the cat’s pyjamas, nor could I interact with them, was disappointing. That said, with so much else to do I was not inclined to visit often anyway…
KA-MORE-OCHO
Yakuza’s approach to an open world is narrow compared to some major titles you could name, but the sixth game proves that sometimes less really is more. As just a heaped handful of streets, Kamurocho in Tokyo and Onomichi in Hiroshima feel more alive than worlds ten times their size. The attention to detail, from the thought and care put into the layers of diegetic sound to the way passersby engage with their surroundings, is admirable. There are moments when the illusion falters, due to occasionally quirky AI NPCs and bizarrely stiff character animation during a few of the fully voiced cutscenes, but the fact the illusion hangs together so well for as long as it does is commendable. Having sniffled through the closing refrain of Kazuma Kiryu’s swan song, I can’t wait to go back through Premium Adventure mode for another wander around those neon-soaked streets.
VERDICT
A fitting end for the tale of Kazuma Kiryu. With so much to see and do on top of an engrossing crime drama, it’s well worth the trip. Jess Kinghorn