yakuza restored - 9/10
hey when that dogshit english dub isn't on this game is actually fire
wholly seriously the definitive experience of yakuza 1. once you get accustomed to the combat, making your moves deliberately and with planned precision, you become dangerous, and when gaining upgrades, that only intensifies. it feels great to master these systems; unlike later games which go a bit wacky in many regards, yakuza 1 has a lot of grounded, crunchy blows that feel absolutely amazing to hit that truly feel impactful when you land them, doubly so due to you needing to ensure that they do in the first place with great deliberation.
as for the story, yup, it's pretty easy for me to say that as a cohesive experience, this stands head and shoulders above kiwami. as much as i appreciate the new nishiki scenes, they confuse the pacing of the plot in some areas, and are almost too shallowly melodramatic for my tastes, giving nishiki little more motivation that we weren't already aware of implicitly far more screen presence than was required. if you are paying attention, that fat has been trimmed, but the information is still present throughout. it made me feel more captivated in this sense; whilst in kiwami i can rest easy knowing that the story'll probably spoonfeed me motivations and key characters time and again, i actually had to pay attention and remember and recall with this ps2 original. something that made me connect way deeper with these characters once again, and appreciate the plot itself all over again.
this ps2 original also features a heavily different tone; as i alluded to in the mentions of combat, this game has a far grittier and more serious tone than kiwami does. it's not without it's comedy, of course, but it's significantly less prevalent and in-your-face than the remake, and it's for the better. it allows for yakuza 1 to feel like a serious, strong beginning point to the series due to it's tone departure, whereas i feel if somebody was to just play kiwami instead, they'd likely forget about it, due to the gameplay and tone being too similar to yakuza 0.
yakuza 1 benefits greatly from being played in this method; as you play the games in release order, you get to feel kiryu growing stronger and honing his skills as a fighter more, refining them from scrappy street brawling into being a pureblooded flashy fighter. kiwami has no such progression to me, as he has three styles that are strong to begin with, and dragon just kind of sucks in the newer engine-style combat. it's a very odd halfway-house solution that stays too close to 0 whilst trying to staple on the dragon style awkwardly, changed from 0 thankfully, but still nowhere near the strength that it should be, the strength that it could be and indeed is in this ps2 iteration.
such a wonderful game, and this wonderful modification allows us to experience it with english subtitles and japanese audio; the dub is humorous, yes, but it's also ruinous to any ability to take the story seriously. not to mention - this original japanese recording is LEAGUES better than the kiwami recordings, like, significantly? everybody has so much more range and emotion in their voices, likewise with the models, there's so much more animation and expression in their faces and motions that just was not translated across in kiwami.
that feels like the perfect sum-up, really; lost in translation. a lot of what made this game really really click with me and had me enjoy it so very much is simply just not there in kiwami, which in turn makes it feel lacking. if you experience the ps2 game, you will get the best version of this story and this game, if you can stomach the combat having a touch more settling-in time than the later games in this series, but i'd wholeheartedly say that it's worth it to immerse yourself in this game.
truly wonderful.