A potentially great game that is marred by some frustrating camera issues and inconsistent voice acting.

User Rating: 7.8 | Ryuu ga Gotoku PS2
By FallenAngel | Review Date:
Yakuza had the potential to be one of the best action/adventure games this year. However, it falls just a little short. Let's see first what it does right. The story, an epic (for a action game) tale of friendship, betrayal, love, yada yada with more than a few twists along the way is one of the game's stronger points. It isn't particularly original, but a few plot holes aside the story does catch your attention and is compellin enough to make you play on to see what happens next. Another plus point is the combat in the game. I know a lot of people have complained about the abundance of console RPG style 'random' encounters, but IMO the combat engine is solid enough so that the fights never seem too repetitive. In fact, random encounters are a necessity if you want to build up Kazuma's list of fighting moves, and as you learn new moves, the fights game that much more interesting. The music is good too, it's nothing special, but they fit the atmosphere of the game and there aren't any really bad tunes.
Now for the bad. The camera in Yakuza is absolutely horrendous. Most of the time in fights, you're attacked by hordes of enemies who really love to gang up on you, and in the heat of the battle it's really easy to lose track of the enemy you were fighting and then get triple or even quadruple teamed while you're trying desperately to center the camera using R1. This can make for some frustrating fights, especially in the latter boss fights when you nearly always find yourself surrounded by enemies brandishing either guns or knives. It's a testament to how good the combat engine is overall that despite the abysmal camera issues I still enjoyed the game enough to gut through the frustrating stuff and beat the game. The other gripe I have is with the voice acting. Both the main female characters, voiced by Eliza Dushku and Rachel Leigh Cook were horrible. Their line deliveries were devoid of any emotion whatsoever, and they sounded thoroughly bored. This could get particularly distracting, especially since the characters voiced by them, Yumi and Reina respectively, take part in some of the most dramatic and emotional scenes in the game. The actor for Kazuma Kiryu was decent, but even his delivery was uneven at times. The best works were done by Michael Madsen and Mark Hammil. Hammil, in particular, as the psychotic but honorable yakuza lieutenant Goro Majima stole the show for me. Despite the shortcomings, I still had a good time with Yakuza. It's a reasonably lengthy game, particularly for an action game, the story was decent, and the combat never got boring. It's just a pity that this game had the potential to be so much more. Still, Yakuza is recommended, particularly for fans of action games who can tough out the camera issues and suspend disbelief through the sometimes horrible voice acting.

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