Ranking the Yakuza Series: ‘Judgment’
Judgment is the biggest disappointment in the Yakuza series since my transition from Yakuza Kiwami 2 to Yakuza 3. Of course, you might already be shaking an angered fist at the computer screen, objecting to whether Judgment even constitutes a mainline entry in the Yakuza series — “it doesn’t even have the word ‘yakuza’ in the title!” — but I think that case is incredibly pedantic, given what this experience actually offers. Surely, as my definitely-scientific Twitter poll confirmed, Judgment does basically everything that a Yakuza game does: it’s in the exact same city, rendered by the same assets, programmed in the same game engine, using identical combat animations, and explicitly makes references to features of the Yakuza universe such as the Tojo clan, etc. The biggest remix Judgment makes on the Yakuza formula is its presentation of a new protagonist, Takayuki Yagami, whose profession serves to increase ludonarrative consonance through an addition of new gameplay mechanics.
Judgment’s new gameplay mechanics are as mixed a bag as its ragtag crew of new protagonists. Nothing in Judgment is fundamentally broken, but so much of it comes across as an inferior version to the triumphantly struck balance that’s to be found in games like Yakuza 0 or Yakuza: Like a Dragon — games that can vacillate between tense and ridiculous without ever feeling internally dissonant. Judgment fails as often as it succeeds, where its story never quite takes off, its characters are never quite established, and its gameplay additions feel superfluous in that they are all unanimously tedious. (I didn’t even enjoy finding the game’s cats, which, as an obsessively enthusiastic cat person, is alarming news.) Searching around in an “investigation” scene either feels like simply swirling around the camera until a button prompt lights up or playing a scavenger hunt oriented at kindergarteners. Chase sequences are frustrating in all the ways that instant-fail stealth mechanics can be. And sadly, Judgment’s protagonist also fails to ever emote beyond a simple chuckle or scowl, which leaves these disconnected interactions feeling stale and lifeless, as though these events are scarcely impacting him. All of Judgment’s failures detract from the series’ promised charm in the ways any Yakuza fan (and likely many newcomers) would be seeking.
Occasionally Judgment swells into something meaningful, an attempt at something profound, and I felt myself caring for side characters like Kaito and Saori, key companions in Yagami’s journey. I was willing to accept the radical tone shift even as I begrudgingly accepted many of the uninspired implementations of this series’ new ideas, and thus I was invested in the main story by the end. It’s a shame, however, that I was never compelled to seek out much side content in Judgment, because the side cases in Judgment — or “substories,” as they are commonly called in the Yakuza games — never quite captured me. I think there’s potential to have fun here if you’re feeling homesick for a new Yakuza game or are brand new to the franchise. But if you feel like you’ve largely exhausted what those earlier Yakuza games individually have to offer, as I tend to feel these days, then Judgment is largely skippable in the way that Yakuza 3 remains.
Thank you for reading. Your Patreon support keeps our community entirely Ad free.
