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Yakuza: Like a Dragon | OT | Punching and Brawling Like a G6

Just got to chapter 5 on ps4 pro and I'm loving this game.

I haven't noticed weakness icons either though and was wondering how I was supposed to remember the enemies weaknesses.
 
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Alexios

Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
~40 hours into this so far. It's a pretty great game. Some times it looks very good, most of the time just alright with lod issues and unconvincing lighting and other stuff that bring it down. The cut scenes don't have too high quality a lot of the time, just average motion capture without care to make every action look good or precise cuts and beats but I guess it makes sense given there are so many and many of them of little significance overall, this game is really packed with content. I wonder if I'm close to the end, the story keeps throwing curveballs as shit escalates further.
 
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Fat Frog

I advertised for Google Stadia
Just a quick question on this game as well as others in the series: Are all the Sega arcade games available in the Yakuza games full versions of the arcade counterpart, or are they cut down mini games experiences?
They are full arcade games, not cut down mini games.(but for VF5 don't expect the extra content of the PS360 versions)
 

SkylineRKR

Member
Did the management minigame which is kind of addicting. Doesn't take that long (much shorter than the hostess stuff in 0). Didn't understand it at first, didn't meet the top 100 in time, doesn't matter at all. From there it got ridiculously easy. You get a huge investment, wages aren't an issue anymore. Just buy properties, fill them, upgrade them, promote the guys, level them (best is when a coach is around for multiplier), Kick them out if you can get a higher tier. And I just used Square to max motivation of the entire squad after each round. I didn't bother with investments, and always did the commercial.

The shareholders, dunno how it works. I mashed with the chicken mostly. He costs only 5 per answer. Chickens can convince shareholders, its Yakuza alright. Eventually put the cards with highest charisma and lowest answer cost in them and did w/e. Its easy as fuck.

The minigame started out great, with not enough funds so you couldn't constantly heal all, etc. But soon it ends up being brainless. Ichiban is loaded now though, 20 million ish. Not bad for a bum.
 
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Alexios

Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
Man, Goro just kicked my ass (edit: pwned the fight, yay). Also in this new area I saw the stores are selling items that heal like 800 hp and my party has like ~400 hp max, am I super underleveled or something? Should I just stick around and improve everybody instead of move forward or what?
Hahah the anti prostitute rally is 100% based on Reseterans 😂😂
I mean, they're deep in the government, work with the yakuza as seen fit and do awful crap like mass deportations of non citizens like the prostitutes (given many of them were poor immigrants/refugees that had no other means to make a living) to "clean" the country! Evil fuckers for sure!
 
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JORMBO

Darkness no more
Just picked up this game for Series X. It's going to be my first Yakuza game. I'm not a huge fan of brawlers, so the change to turn based combat made me want to try it out.
 
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SkylineRKR

Member
So wait.

Enemies are supposed to have weakness above their head much like Persona 5. My version does not have this. Its no issue at first but at the halfway point I started to struggle in some fights.

I looked it up and it doesn't show if you play with English text. wtf. It works in other languages.
 

Alexios

Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
So wait.

Enemies are supposed to have weakness above their head much like Persona 5. My version does not have this. Its no issue at first but at the halfway point I started to struggle in some fights.

I looked it up and it doesn't show if you play with English text. wtf. It works in other languages.
Really? Wow. I thought I have to remember/test every fight and check my sujimon database for that. I'm probably nearly done with the game, lol, Chapter 13. Where does it show it normally, do you have pics?
 
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Freeman76

Member
The management game is super complex. I made it past the first stage (rank 100) but brute forced it by recruiting all dlc staff at 150k yen salary each, i barely broke even lol. I have to hit rank 50 next, and have a 50 mill cash bonus from Nick. I bought the bar as well so have 2 properties staffed by 6 expensive rare staff...any tips on how to do better?
 

RNG

Member
Really? Wow. I thought I have to remember/test every fight and check my sujimon database for that. I'm probably nearly done with the game, lol, Chapter 13. Where does it show it normally, do you have pics?
So apparently there is supposed to be a Weakness/Resistance indicator when targeting an enemy. Is this working on console versions? How did this shit fly-by through QA testing!? lol

 

Alexios

Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
Neat. Does it show that every time or only after having found a weakness for that enemy in the past, or within that fight only or? So it's not the weaknesses shown above their head like he said but if the targeted enemy is weak to the currently chosen attack.
 
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RNG

Member
Neat. Does it show that every time or only after having found a weakness for that enemy in the past, or within that fight only or?
I have no idea because it never shows up for me :LOL: , I only stumbled upon this while browsing through the Steam bug reporting thread. If it wasn't for that I would never have known that a weakness indicator even existed.
 
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Alexios

Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
I do have a weird issue. I have two weapons of equal attack power at their current upgrade tier, one of them also says it increases damage from fire based attacks, the other has no specials at all but the former does more damage in practice even though the auto best gear thing equips the latter.

Also I don't think that class has any fire attacks to begin with (Hero) so what's the point of such bonuses in weapons? Or are they badly translated and it's meant to say that it does do elemental damage of that type so that's why it does more damage usually even though the attack is the same?

The game has lots of errors in the text, bad grammar syntax and spelling here and there, but nothing to the degree that makes the above a very likely possibility. Still, that's what happens in practice. But I have weapons that say they do more ice damage for the cop and he doesn't have ice moves.
Edit: I'm dumb, weapons also have that element icon and I guess more enemies are resistant to the lightning than the fire when I tested the weapons. Makes sense, lmfao, nearly finished with the game and just discovering the basic battle features at this point through my screenshots, rofl, man.

Still, the special of "boosting" damage from fire attacks makes no sense unless it means it will boost damage if the character is left with a burning status from it or whatever, if that happens with fire weapons like that? I dunno. But yeah I totally missed the element of each basic attack until now.
 
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nowhat

Gold Member
So I didn't manage to score a PS5. But we'll always have Pari... I mean, Yakuza. I bought it on a Pro. I'm at chapter 9, so I guess I'm a bit over halfway through the story? So far:

I like Kasuga as the main character. Kiryu was great, sure, but as a character he was quite done with, I'd argue before Yakuza 6 even. So a new main character is completely fine with me. The change into a turn-based combat system - not the greatest implementation out there, but as far as mechanics go, it's something different. The "job system" is nice. And there's the (perfect) guard mechanic, which makes the gameplay not so "static". And as far as the plot goes, "grinding at 40" had me both laughing and hit home pretty hard, as that is what I am - scratch that, it's my birthday today so I'm 41 now, close enough anyway.

The problem is, the camera can be so infuriating there can be instances where it's practically impossible to do a perfect guard, because you never see the attack happening. Sometimes even without camera issues looking at you wrecking ball. And yeah, this indeed is a JRPG. I know I need to grind for quite a bit before progressing the story, because ATM it just cannot be done.

Which brings me to the "dungeon", and... yeah. Like the most uninspired, grindy thing ever. Leveling/ranking up there is easy, sure. It's also mind-numbingly boring. How the studio couldn't come up with, well, basically anything better is beyond me.

I'm not certain how I'll feel about this in the end, but so far my it's a very mixed experience. Even moreso than Kiwami, which so far is my least favourite of the series. On the plus side though, I've never cared that much about the arcade games. They're a nice distraction, and I'm glad they're there, but they haven't never really grabbed me. Until "Virtua Fighter 5: Final Showdown". Ho Lee Fuk. That game is legit.
 
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Alexios

Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
Never went to the dungeon to level, I did it once when it took me there by itself and once when I went to check it out much later and never beat the boss there, just don't avoid every street fight while doing stuff and you should be good for level. Perfect guard is hard on some moves, yes, not like it has to be made easy every time, especially when only few and far between enemies use it themselves, it's just a bonus and you can get it done much of the time, yeah the camera might obscure it once or twice in a fight if there are many enemies far apart but it won't be what makes you lose.
 
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SkylineRKR

Member
Really? Wow. I thought I have to remember/test every fight and check my sujimon database for that. I'm probably nearly done with the game, lol, Chapter 13. Where does it show it normally, do you have pics?

It works if you change text. I changed to German and it showed weak right above the enemy heads. It makes some annoying bosses who seem to counter you every time easier, as they won't counter if you manage to down them with the correct attacks. Though you will eventually find the right move, and its absolutely not impossible without the indicator but it can be annoying.

 
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SkylineRKR

Member
The management game is super complex. I made it past the first stage (rank 100) but brute forced it by recruiting all dlc staff at 150k yen salary each, i barely broke even lol. I have to hit rank 50 next, and have a 50 mill cash bonus from Nick. I bought the bar as well so have 2 properties staffed by 6 expensive rare staff...any tips on how to do better?

Nah, its brainless.

I mean the road to 100 is hard and indeed complex, but after that its ridiculously easy. Which is a shame because micromanagement goes away. I didn't recruit anyone on the street, I did the minigame to rank 1 in one sitting. Maybe the DLC ones are too expensive for the first part of the minigame, mine were 30-60k and mostly Bronze still.

All you have to do at first, is just assign your shitty bronze people to your property and never loan. In fact, I didn't even reach rank 100. I was 102 (And why? because I failed the first 2 board meetings). But I just got a 100k fine from Nick and everything continued. With his investment, easy mode begins. Buy another property, fill it up with guys. Just always get better guys if possible (bronze to platinum, as usual) and I think it helps if they're specialized in that branch. Upgrade the properties so the bars increased. I don't know if it was correct but I just made sure they were blue and not red. I would upgrade until I felt it was too expensive, wanted 10-20 mil to spare. Promote the guys that are best at that moment, and level them up when a coach visits. If you get offered a better employee, Silver if you have bronze still, get him/her and level up (spam promote a few times, and then training). I didn't even go out of my way leveling, I finished the entire thing with my highest employee being 19 or something? Always do the promotion/commercial. And I basically never invested, its pocket money soon enough anyway. After every round, use Square/X to insta make the whole squad happy.

When you get further you get much more cash, sell old properties and buy the more expensive ones with some cash to spare for upgrades and salary (I usually kept half of my wealth, then upgraded until I had 10-20 ish million left). Upgrade those. You have so much cash soon enough, that salary doesn't matter a fuck. I did kick surplus people, but I wouldn't feel it if I didn't. You'll rake in 150 million per run eventually. So a 150k salary a pop is nothing.

For the board meeting, most I did was spam with the chicken, he's only 5 per answer (this works for a good half of the minigame). But what you need to do is place people with highest charisma (its the attack level in this minigame), and lower answer cost. Some are 14 for example, I mainly had 5-8 answer cost people.
 
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TintoConCasera

I bought a sex doll, but I keep it inflated 100% of the time and use it like a regular wife
Just beaten this game. Took me a bit less than 80 hours, and I completed the optional dungeon, the management mini game and most of the side stories.

The game has some downsides, like the camera and general jankiness during combat, and although it gets harder later on the start of the game is just too easy. Also yeah, the management minigame could be much harder, it's brainless at some points.

But nitpicks aside I just loved it. The story kept me hooked like a TV series, curveball after curveball I've never knew what was coming next, and many times I thought the game was near the end when it was not. Also the side quests are just a joy to complete only for the stories they told and all the humor they have.

Yakuza 8 needs to be another JRPG with Ichiban as the main character. If it maintains all the great things of this one and just adds a little bit more of polish it could be a really great game.

Oh and Yakuza 7 GOTY 2020 :messenger_sunglasses:
 

Alexios

Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
Spoke too soon, dude is really kicking my ass after I thought I was hot shit from the last boss, guess I'll visit the dungeon a 3rd time. Probably not and just wander around the higher level areas to complete more side stuff but I've done pretty much everything that doesn't require shitty gambling mini games, I don't have any hero job/dialogue map icons (but loads of empty slots in the database so I guess there are ways to unlock more, maybe I need to get specific items for delivery like the old tv and whatever other thing from the can quest). Should try some different classes too I guess.
 
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TintoConCasera

I bought a sex doll, but I keep it inflated 100% of the time and use it like a regular wife
Alexios Alexios dude you really should start putting some things inside spoiler tags. :messenger_grinning_sweat:

And yeah, switching jobs is the fastest wsy to level up, as each job levels grants you stats points. Also some skills are permanent, so even if you switch jobs those skills are kept.

Edit: thanks for changing your post mate. :]
 
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Alexios

Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
Well I don't think it will ever have the budget to have so much content all polished up, like all the different cut scenes there's several different cut scene methods based on importance or whatever they used to decide, some with voice overs, some without, some dynamically directed, others still, etc., so many dialogue styles too. And even those with motion capture are often not very well animated, like the devs just did the capture themselves and barely had time to clean it up. Still a very good and charming game and yeah I guess I'm not opposed to getting more but bring ugpraded old Yakuza gameplay and style in some series/games too (hopefully with more defensive options this time, didn't really like it remained all beat em upy since the PS2 days with little evolution, I'd like a mix of that and Sleeping Dogs maybe, just not to the point of the Batman win button counter skill). And I mean other than the combat style having a full party everything else is stuff you could have had in previous Yakuza games, it's not all that different, but somehow it works as a classic JRPG just great after all, I really didn't expect it to be this good and mainly got it for VF5 but it's GOTY tbh.
 
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TintoConCasera

I bought a sex doll, but I keep it inflated 100% of the time and use it like a regular wife
Yep, agree. In fact aside from this one I've only played Yakuza 0, and that game already felt a little JRPGey so the transition to full JRPG felt quite natural.

I wouldn't say no to another brawler, but man, after all the fun I got with Like a Dragon I just want more of the same.
 

SkylineRKR

Member
I love the story so far, its top tier even within this franchise. I also like the cast.

But I think the game lacks a certain polish. The weakness bug aside, I think it should be visible on the skill list already. Another thing is what skills carry over to another job, idk? Elements aren't always clear as well, I think some have elemental properties in the description. Same as stab moves, or punches. Some give weakness others not. But thats also the bug, i can't remember it all. Jesus, what a shitty bug.

Also the game is deceptively challenging past chapter 7. I grinded for hours just to make it past chapter 12. A certain fight there is ridiculous if you aren't at least 45 and have invested in Jobs.
 

TintoConCasera

I bought a sex doll, but I keep it inflated 100% of the time and use it like a regular wife
I love the story so far, its top tier even within this franchise. I also like the cast.

But I think the game lacks a certain polish. The weakness bug aside, I think it should be visible on the skill list already. Another thing is what skills carry over to another job, idk? Elements aren't always clear as well, I think some have elemental properties in the description. Same as stab moves, or punches. Some give weakness others not. But thats also the bug, i can't remember it all. Jesus, what a shitty bug.

Also the game is deceptively challenging past chapter 7. I grinded for hours just to make it past chapter 12. A certain fight there is ridiculous if you aren't at least 45 and have invested in Jobs.
When picking a job at the office you can see the full skillset for that job. The skills marked with a red dot and not a green one are the ones that carry over. This is explained nowhere I'm afraid.

Also yeah, THAT fight is hard as all fuck, but I think the idea is to, before facing said fight to complete all the levels of the Sojenbori battle arena. I did that and went from level 38 to 45, which made the fight more bearable.
 

SkylineRKR

Member
Ichiban is great. He's less carbon than Kiryu. More goofball. But he's not a wus either.

The characters are simply top tier yet again. I love the local ring leaders.

When picking a job at the office you can see the full skillset for that job. The skills marked with a red dot and not a green one are the ones that carry over. This is explained nowhere I'm afraid.

Also yeah, THAT fight is hard as all fuck, but I think the idea is to, before facing said fight to complete all the levels of the Sojenbori battle arena. I did that and went from level 38 to 45, which made the fight more bearable.

Even that wasn't easy, some nasty one shots and modifiers. You can't just blind attack your way anymore. This is an absolute wake up call, you want good gear, good stats, a balanced setup. And use the right moves.

I did spec on a party with Ice, Fire, slash, AoE etc. Debuffs and statuses help a lot as well. I did that boss fight by putting poison on the boss, and defensive buffs here and there. Regen from the homeless is a great skill too.

I thought i was vastly underleveled, and wondered why, its not that I ran from battles. I was 36 ish. I grinded 10 levels in the arena. Which is also a good source of income by the way. I already had 10million+ from chapter 5, but I got some millions from there as well.
 
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TintoConCasera

I bought a sex doll, but I keep it inflated 100% of the time and use it like a regular wife
Ichiban is great. He's less carbon than Kiryu. More goofball. But he's not a wus either.

The characters are simply top tier yet again. I love the local ring leaders.



Even that wasn't easy, some nasty one shots and modifiers. You can't just blind attack your way anymore. I did spec on a party with Ice, Fire, slash, AoE etc. Debuffs and statuses help a lot as well. I did that boss fight by putting poison on the boss, and defensive buffs here and there. Regen from the homeless is a great skill too.

I thought i was vastly underleveled, and wondered why, its not that I ran from battles. I was 36 ish. I grinded 10 levels in the arena. Which is also a good source of income by the way. I already had 10million+ from chapter 5, but I got some millions from there as well.
I think the game is designed so you get to that fight way underleveled, so the game can:
  • Let that awesome boss kick your ass.
  • Pad the game by making you go through that battle arena.
 
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Alexios

Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
Has anyone managed to run Virtua Fighter 5 Final Showdown outside the game with the files from it? Emulated elsewhere or natively? Seems they're all nice and tidy in a vf5fs folder but there's no exe (duh). Same for Virtua Fighter 2/2.1, it's in m2ftg. The rest arcade oldies are in segaages_w64.
 
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Alexios

Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
Saeko's Jewel Breaker was a fun move to try when you first got it in the game, it was pretty dang powerful though few (none if your accuracy is not afflicted?) enemies really ever dodge and stuff to care about the lowered evasion status effect it adds on top, kind of a shame. Sarah demonstrates:
yakuzalikeadragon_202tdkl3.png
 
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Alexios

Cores, shaders and BIOS oh my!
Just finished this, it took me ~68 hours while doing much of but not all of the side stuff and after the final ordeals the party came out at lvl ~59. What a ride. I won't be going back too much probably, there's not as much incentive when the story's all told but yeah, this is the real GOTY everyone:messenger_fire:
yakuzalikeadragon_202x5kx9.png
 
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SkylineRKR

Member
I'm eyeing Iroha as well.

I must say the high level on some late game bosses is cheap, but its not _that_ hard to level up. I went into the sewer, found a special enemy and was pretty much strong enough after one fight.

No my biggest annoyance is the lack of weakness indicator still. I did kind of memorize the enemy types by now, but they're harder to distinguish than in a FFX or DQ. And move properties are so too (some punch combos work, others don't.. not entirely sure what the parameters are). Mostly I go for AoE opener anyway.

I have to wrap up some shit and do the finale. And my thoughts are that Ichiban is great. The story is great (its top 5 probably, with 6, 0 and 2, and Judgment being my other faves). The soundtrack is good, but nothing like Kuze. But then again, no one in gaming is as bad ass as Kuze. The combat is very good, its not that easy past the halfway point, I found myself switching out members and changing jobs more frequently. But I do miss the classic combat. The heat moves in older games are just much more bad ass and you could almost feel the pain. I think Judgment was on the right track, it was more nimble, had wall jumps and the best non-combat gameplay of all Yakuza games. But if i'm honest, Judgment is my overall number one. I just loved the whodunit story, the atmosphere, the side characters, the arcade games (FV, Motor Raid on top of the rest) hell, even the English VA was top notch.

I hope the next Yakuza is a brawler again.
 
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SkylineRKR

Member
Beat the game, yeah, this was rather powerful.

I mean come on,

How can you not like Ichi? The guy essentially never had a family, and was desperately longing for one. And then he gets one and the guy has to do time and even gets shot. But he still doesn't give up on humans.

The final dungeon theme and the final boss themes are also some sick shit. Hype as fuck.



Love the game, but some of these 'cutscenes' really go on far longer than is necessary. Like, holy shit.

It comes together beautifully. Its one of the best gaming stories I've seen in ages.
 
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GymWolf

Member
I think i'm gonna save this one for christmas after cyberpunk.

Is this one piss easy like the other yakuza games on hard??
 

SkylineRKR

Member
Dat Charisma grind. But I did it before the final area. Iroha was mine for the taking.

I think i'm gonna save this one for christmas after cyberpunk.

Is this one piss easy like the other yakuza games on hard??

I felt the first half of the game is even easier, but the second half is harder than old Yakuza games on Normal. There are some brick walls here if you played normally until that point.

I think the patch that dropped last night fixed this. I'm seeing weakness indicators when I target enemies now.

You're right, I was probably watching the ending. It works now in Premium adventure. Oh well.

Club Sega games still broken. Outrun just crashed my Xbox. And when I get into a game and quit, well, it crashes too and doesn't save the high score. This is easily the most broken Yakuza game. Which is weird. Was this also the case with the JP PS4 ver?
 
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GymWolf

Member
Dat Charisma grind. But I did it before the final area. Iroha was mine for the taking.



I felt the first half of the game is even easier, but the second half is harder than old Yakuza games on Normal. There are some brick walls here if you played normally until that point.



You're right, I was probably watching the ending. It works now in Premium adventure. Oh well.

Club Sega games still broken. Outrun just crashed my Xbox. And when I get into a game and quit, well, it crashes too and doesn't save the high score. This is easily the most broken Yakuza game. Which is weird. Was this also the case with the JP PS4 ver?
So basically i need to grind a little to go forward with the story? i'm ok with some grind in rpgs.
 
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