like a dragon: pirate yakuza in hawaii - 8/10
CAN'T STOP ... MY MIDNIGHT BURGER
i played this whilst off my ass and then needed to go back and rewatch the last cutscenes of the game just to make sure that i wasn't being influenced in what i was seeing, which is a sentiment that rang true for a lot of the game, moreso than even the other, already outlandish yakuza titles. and when i say it, i mean it in a positive way!
yes, the yang to the man who erased his name's yin, pirate yakuza in hawaii dropped whilst i was on a vacation to america of my own, visiting my polycule, with whom i played through this game... although, admittedly, it was mostly with one of them, as the other two kept dozing off. but me and him, we were glued to this shit. this game is fucking tight, dude.
for starters, let's address the seacow in the room; yes, majima is a swashbuckling pirate captain for the length of this game. i know there will be a very, very outspoken sect of the fanbase who will argue that this is too absurd now. and to that i say... have some fucking fun for once.
i am a staunch yakuza 6 hater. i have no shame in admitting that; i think it plays terrible, because early dragon engine feels bad, and i think that the story and characterization stand to potentially have jeopardized the prior 7 games if the following entries did not immediately course-correct it. so please know that it means something when i say that this game handles this admittedly silly concept with a fair degree of tact, and an understanding of not just majima's character, but also of saejima, and oddly minami and nishida; didn't expect them to make their first appearances in a good while here, but it was very much a pleasant surprise. everybody is written perfectly here. even without his memory, majima is on point here. a kooky, irritating (to others in-game, i mean. i love him), over-the-top guy who will do anything to protect the people he ends up holding dear.
and that, this time around, is not kiryu-chan, but instead noah, a young boy from an island off the coast of hawaii, isolated there from him being a kid due to chronic asthma. (i wish my diseases let me live on a tropical island...) noah saves a shipwrecked, washed-up majima by providing him with water at the very beginning of the journey, alongside his cat (he's a tiger, but noah insists it's a cat), goro. and then, bam, simple as that, pirates show up, majima beats the shit out of them, and after some mild drama with noah's father, jason, and sister moana, majima shacks up in a shed for the night, and then wakes up with a revelation; he's going to be a pirate himself.
so goes the premise. that quickly leads to noah begging to see the world alongside a weary jason, burned by his own past as a pirate, and so we set sail! marked with what is... a musical number that is too damn catchy! seriously, i don't know what spurred them to take this as the intro, but it was awesome - that immediately followed with the ending of that cutscene was a hell of a bookend to the first chapter of the game.
from there, we get embroiled in the drama surrounding a ship graveyard, madlantis, as well as the secret of the treasure of the esperanza, which just so happens to be located beneath nele island from infinite wealth. a lot of colorful characters show up, including samoa joe, who we literally hooted upon seeing because we fucking forgot about him being in this.
so, that's all well and good - fun pirate adventure, silly non-canon affair that can be shrugged off as easy as an ishin or a dead souls, right?
well, now, it wouldn't be a recent yakuza game with at least a tiny bit of gut-punching, now, would it?
the finale of the game, following a boss fight that i would like to have a fucking stern talking to the designers about (seriously, that made me knock the game down a star, it was unfair as fuck), unveils the truth of the game; it's all a movie. majima, ichiban, nishida and minami are all making a movie about this all really happening to majima, which itself is just another silly twist, we get a fun little cameo from ichiban, it's real cute.
and then the post-credits scene plays.
it's entirely without background music. majima and saejima have a long, serious discussion about growing old, and losing memories, but still going on. and then, saejima strikes a nerve; it turns out, the whole reason majima was even seafaring in the first place, was because he was aware of the treasure containing an elixr of eternal life, and after hearing about kiryu's terminal illness, wanted to stop at nothing to get it for him. the two sworn brothers then enter the hospital, entering kiryu's room, where majima begins to tell kiryu the story.
godddddd it hurtttssss. and people say they're not gay lovers.
so, the story was a pretty big "yes" for me - what about the game part of the game?
the ship combat? eh, it's pretty good. it's a more arcade-y take on black flag, with a lot of the seafaring appeal of that game paired with the silly antics of your average yakuza fare. there were times in the boss ship fights where i felt as though i was having to master a tricycle in order to get back to cooking in my kitchen, but those were few and far between; they were still juuust present enough to be worthy of mention, and definitely enough to get on my tits.
but, speaking of cooking... the combat in this game. holy fuck. this has gotta be it, man. so flowy. the air combos feel amazing. so many options. the near-instant style switching allowing for chaining fuckin wild combos the likes of which were previously only possible with immense practice are now easy to learn and super fuckin difficult to hit the ceiling on. i already have a habit of just walking around, fighting for the hell of it in most yakuza games, but this game actively drove me to do it for a good part of my playtime. it feels so incredible.
all in all, pirate yakuza in hawaii is another solid spin-off title in the yakuza series, albeit one that i wish had indulged the fighting more than the sailing. i so wish there was more one-on-one majima fights rather than the ship battles, but when they still kick ass, it's a minor complaint.
please play this shit if you haven't already as a yakuza fan. and, uh, if you're not a yakuza fan, then go play from the start. you'll understand this game when you're older.
