Man. These videos aren't just reminding me why I love the Yakuza series, they're bringing out amazing stuff from Vinny, Dan and Alex as well. I finished the game last week and it's tremendous. It might be the best as far as writing goes, and its setting is also my favorite - although that was a given since I made a big deal over it before this started. (Nice work getting that self-promo in there WG, textbook!) I also didn't know much about telephone clubs until I played this, and hope the guys manage to spend some time on them.
I also want to thank Dan for not zipping through the dialogue - the writing is top class, and the way the text is paced as if it was being spoken - with slight delays for emphasis and "breath" - is pretty cool. Whoever was in charge of localization did a fantastic job of keeping this intact.
It's been really cool reading the comments and having people point out videos of the guest stars like Riki Takeuchi (who has an awesome set of LINE stickers). Nice one to all those that spotted the karaoke kappa - I totally thought it was a duck.
@2-d "I've played every game in the series and I never knew you could flip a dude while holding him by pressing R1. I am ashamed."
No worries - I didn't know about dashing. Is that in other games too? I was wondering why I was pouring CP into that...
And now, here's their cover of "Summertime Blues" in a video by Adam Buxton and Garth Jennings. Subtitles may not show up here, (Looks like they do!) but if you go to the YouTube page you can turn them on and see what Adam thinks they're singing.
Sorry it took a bit...I found the episode I was thinking about, along with another one I didn't even know I had. I've decided to post in the general forum here.I hope people find them useful :)
I figured at this point it was a given that Schrödinger's Cat would mean more to an actual cat.
I apologize for this. It came off more mean-spirited than I meant it to be.
I always think of Dan's questioning like kayfabe, but it does grate sometimes when it happens over key events in a game and then everyone gets upset because they don't know what's happening...
@gondokasa: Since you seem to know about this stuff, are there any decent pieces of long form journalism/documentaries/books you'd recommend? It's really fascinating.
A good starting point is a book called Tokyo Vice, written by an American who was (shockingly) granted permission to tail the police beat in Tokyo, and eventually became cozy with and well respected by the yakuza. He also wrote an article where he sat down with some yakuza chiefs and played the first Yakuza game for them, getting their comments as to its authenticity.
I see gregalor beat me to it :)
I've heard good things about Tokyo Vice but haven't read it yet. I know a bit about the yakuza, but I especially know about the recent split. A friend in Japan practically advised me to stay in my hotel during my vacation, but he lives in Kobe which is Yakuza HQ so I don't blame him for being worried.
Actually, my big interest is in Japan during the mid-1970s to 80s, so I'm really looking forward to Yakuza 0. The country was getting more and more prosperous after World War 2 before stiff import taxes from the US and the "Oil Shock" in the Middle East hit them hard. They had a massive overhaul of their industries, quickly adopted robot technology and had their top electronics companies join forces to beat America in creating the first "superchip", among other things - becoming a world superpower from almost nothing in a decade.
I don't know if the English version will get it across, but I bet the setting of Yakuza 0 is symbolic. December 1988 was the last month of the Showa period (1926-1989). Emperor Hirohito died days into January and his son Akihito started the Heisei Era. Japan was richer than ever and people were throwing money around left and right before the real estate bubble burst and sent everything south again in the early 90s. Japan still hasn't recovered.
There was a great BBC documentary about all this which must have been made just before the second crash. It was on YouTube for a while; luckily I recorded it and stashed it somewhere. If people are interested, I could pop it on my own channel and post the link in the forum.
@dr_mel: A big thing with the Yakuza, as I understand it, is that they essentially get to run their protection racket, own companies, be chummy with politicians, and do all manner of shady shit with little official censure, but their side of the bargain is to keep their crews in line. Guns (and murder in general) is way too loud for them.
That's mostly true - gangs do get into fights but it usually involves swords and bats at the most. However, in 2015 there was a big shakeup within Yamaguchi-gumi, Japan's biggest yakuza group, with several new rival groups now running around on their own. There's been a few shootings since then and members have been found beaten to death. I wanted to visit Kabukicho, the red-light district that Yakuza's Kamurocho is based on (near-identically!), and people were warning me not to stick around past 9PM. I didn't go in the end, but I'd like to someday, even if things are dicey.
I was just thinking about the trailers for Ryu ga Gotoku/Yakuza 6 and thought I'd post the features trailer here. This runs through new and updated features including full voice dialogue for all encounters, managing your own baseball team, building your own clan using real New Japan Pro Wrestlers, and the ability to drag fights into stores and trash everything. It also now lets you jump and vault over things - I bet the Endurance Run will show what a big deal that is :)
(P.S. RIZAP is a personal fitness training studio that's been getting a lot of attention lately. In the Ryu 6 demo you can play the Rizap Challenge minigame, and if anyone here remembers the eating and exercise parts of GTA San Andreas...well, here's more of that...)
@samcotts: I agree. Yakuza 3 was my first time with the series since I wasn't able to play the previous games on PS2. The recap videos in that were a big help story-wise and I'm pretty sure the games after 3 have recaps as well.
The Yakuza/Ryu ga Gotoku series is one of the best I've played, and Yakuza 0 and 6 are the reasons I finally bought a PS4. I bought 6 in Japan but I hadn't finished 5 at the time and now THIS is coming in a few days, so I'm going to play in release order. If there's a Yakuza Endurance Run coming up, I don't know if I'll see it as I'm starting to think I may actually need a Dan break, but I hope everyone enjoys it and that the Run does for Yakuza what it did for Deadly Premonition. :)
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