ABC Challenge 2018-2019: Yakuza 0

I finished this game yesterday and boy, was it amazing. I barely knew anything about the game (aside that the games is both serious and wacky at the same time, and Majima is a charismatic nutcase) and I got an engaging story full of plot twists, betrayals, and tragedy. The substories on the other hand were crazier than one would imagine.

I had a hard time getting used to Kiryu’s battle styles. The brawler style felt quite clunky and more often than not I got countered/overwhelmed by multiple targets. Rush was fast but quite weak and suboptimal against crowds (funnily enough I learnt how to use it properly in the fight against Shibusawa. Beast on the other hand was excellent against crowds but way too slow. More often than not I found myself using Rush to well… rush towards a parked bike/motorbike/big sign to then switch to beast and swing it to my foes. Majima on the other hand was a lot easier to manage. His Thug style has a great balance between power and speed and Slugger has a great range (plus the bat nunchaku is broken AF). I didn’t use the breaker style at all because I was just way too used to the previous styles.
Surprisingly what I liked the most were the sidequests. Real Estate was fine and the free time between each payout gave me an excuse to do the substories but the Cabaret Club was really addictive. I spent way more time than I’d dare to admit dressing up the girls and levelling them up to maximize their stats as much as possible. By the time I got challenged by the owner of the Moon Cabaret most of my platinum hostesses and my main 2 gold hostesses were maxed out.

It’s also pretty noticeable they put a lot of care in the OST. Not only pretty much every track iis great but they went the extra mile and gave each minigame at least one unique track (the Catfight minigame (AKA Rigged Button-Mashing) has about 6 tracks!). They even made a track for DELIVERING PIZZA!

To sum everything up, play Yakuza 0 if you have the chance. As Kiryu would say…

On another note, I’m 1 game away from clearing my ABC Challenge. Will I be able to do finish it in less than 9 days or will I succumb to the temptation of playing Kiwami?