Yakuza -- Final Opinion.

Roughly thirty-four hours later and the credits have rolled on Yakuza to arguably one of the strangest staff roll music selections. The third aspect of Yakuza that makes the game tick is the story. It's easily the best aspect of Yakuza. The game was created by Toshihiro Nagoshi of Daytona USA, Virtua Striker, Spikeout, F-Zero GX, and Super Monkey Ball fame. Nagoshi enlisted the Japanese novelist Hase Seishu to pen the story of Yakuza. The story is a well written and gritty crime drama filled with detailed and vibrant characters. It's a story about honor and loyalty. The story takes some expected twists, and more importantly, it throws in a few you won't be expecting. It doesn't pull any punches either. The use of a nine year old girl to provide the heart of the story is a brilliant move. It separates Yakuza from just the standard video game crime story into something special. The voice acting deserves mention as it's quite impressive. Especially for the main characters. There isn't a single bad voice in the entire game. I'm greatly impressed with the story of Yakuza and I can't wait for the sequel. I would say Yakuza is a must play game for the story alone. You'll have the wonderfully atmospheric adventure mode and the brutal combat to go along with it. All wrapped up in a realistic and good looking PlayStation 2 game that's overflowing with production value. You will have some technical issues with the load time and the collision detection. But they won't matter in the face of such a strong story. I'm giving Yakuza an 8.5.