I know, it took me a while to make this, but here it is. My first impressions of the first part of Yakuza/Like a Dragon 5. I won't go deep into the lore here, as I don't want to spoil anything, this is just stuff I decided would be worth making a post about.
Yakuza 5 begins with Kiryu this time around, with him having left Asagao (morning glory) to work as a taxi driver under the pseudonym of "Suzuki", going on to live in Nagasugai, all the way down in Fukuoka, in the south of Japan.
Being a taxi driver doesn't mean he's free from fights, as right in the beginning of the game we already have our first one after a night's drinking with our boss at Nagasu Taxi with some Yakuza thugs.
If you've played any other Yakuza game, you likely know Sotaro Komaki, the crazy old guy who teaches you new moves. Well, here we have Sosuke Komaki - his grandson.
He does pretty much the same thing as Sotaro, but with more of an attitude.
The coolest new mini-game so far to come out of Yakuza 5 for me has been this.
Taxi driving and "vehicle combat."
Basically there's a gang of speeders who try to win races against you and knock you off the road, so you just gotta outrun them.
You'd think this be illegal, but a police officer sanctions you to do this. I thought this was pretty funny, and yeah, it's a fun game mode.
After messing around with taxis for a while I met Mack again! I don't know how he's everywhere Kiryu is, but it's good to see him.
He says he misses Kiryu's blogs and wishes he would post more, this introduces Revelations to yet another Yakuza game.
Anyway, back to the plot... Daigo Dojima (the Tojo Clan chairman) is missing! A detective tells us Masaru Watase from the Omi alliance may have something to do with it, so we confront him - but he doesn't seem all that interested.
Honestly I'm loving Watase so far. He's Omi, but the things he does in the game and the way he acts are just pretty awesome.
Nagasugai isn't too big, but I still found time for some digital tourism.
I specially liked the product placement.
More NicoNico Douga! Always cool to see this.
Some Pepsi alongside a Video Store app or website from BeeTV.
And this is kinda funny because you can buy what seems to be Coca-Cola mixed with whisky from the in-game shops.
This is where Kiryu works for now, Nagasu Taxi.
And looking at Google, it seems there's a similar company in Kumamoto... With a 2 star score on Google reviews. Oof.
Anyway, after 4 chapters, Kiryu's story ends with some sad news, that apparently a Tojo Clan friend of his has been killed.
I won't spoil who that is, but it's quite a big surprise and I have my reasons to believe he's still alive - like him showing up in later games (lmao).
Kiryu then punches the car's horn out of frustration and the first part is over!
I'm sorry if this was less detailed then other parts, but I just wanted to post some screenshots I took along the way (and talk about the taxi minigame, the Japanese screenshot is from a Youtube video).
Overall, I'm really enjoying Yakuza 5 so far and it's still way better than 3 so that's a plus.
It seems to be a way bigger game though, Kiryu's part alone took me around 8 hours and I didn't even do that many substories. But still, it was 8 hours that I barely noticed were passing, so this is probably a good sign that this is a good game.
Anyway, thank you for reading! Soon enough I'll be posting about Part 2 with Taiga Saejima.
