Prelude:
I played the first Yakuza when I rented it back when I was younger.
I only made it halfway through the game and I never rented it again, I don't know why I didn't rent it again because I distinctly remember it being one of the most unique games I had played on the PS2, there was no other game that had its atmosphere.
Time passed by and I would always notice Yakuza in the background, occasionally seeing a trailer for the most recent entry and sometimes finding a game in a store and going "I remember playing that on the PS2" and then looking for a different game.
Eventually, I saw a review of Yakuza 0 around the time it came out, I decided "You know what? How 'bout I try a Yakuza game again?".
Cut to three years later and as of a couple of months ago, I've completed every game in the Kiryu saga and I'm here to summarise my thoughts and rank them from best to worst.
Yakuza 0:
This game is amazing.
When I started 0, I was enjoying it well enough but I didn't think it was amazing, but at a certain point after the first few hours, that's when it became great, from that point to the end.
The story is very well done with all the twists and turns and emotional payoffs, the relationship between Majima and Makoto I thought was really touching.
The gameplay was really fun with the different styles, my favourite was Majima's slugger style.
Some of my favourite moments of the game come from the substories, even after playing through the entire series, I still think that 0 has some of the best substories.
I know I'm not being very descriptive but there are only so many ways to say that Yakuza 0 is great and I don't have anything to add to the discussion when practically everyone thinks Yakuza 0 is great.
Starting the series with the prequel was an interesting experience, to most Yakuza fans this game is the backstory to characters they already know, to me, this is my introduction to these characters.
There were only a couple of times where I was confused due to not having played the other games, the part where I was confused the most was at the very end when it mentions the Millennium Tower.
Yakuza 0 is a great game, but you probably knew that already.
And one last thing before moving is when I unlocked the Dragon Of Dojima style, I decided to put on Kiryu's classic suit and went out on to the streets at night, and as I was beating up some thugs, I ended up getting flashbacks to Yakuza 1 on the PS2, it was a cool moment of nostalgia for me.
Yakuza Kiwami:
This game is a mixed bag.
Starting with the story, I don't think it has held up to time, and that's excluding the bits with Majima they added which I'll get to that in a bit.
There's a lot of sections in the campaign where the story digresses from the main plot and spends time on subplots that have very little to do with the main story.
The best way I could explain it is that the story lacks momentum, it constantly stops and starts for detours that it feels less like the story is progressing and more like events just happen.
The stuff added with Majima clashes with what was in the original game, Majima changes from how he is in 1 and how he is in the rest of the series, and considering that they're essentially two different characters, it's incredibly jarring.
I think there are two ways they could have gone, either change the story cutscenes so that Majima acts like he does in later games or don't have the Majima Everywhere system. Having Majima swap between two different versions of himself just adds issues to the story and makes the game inconsistent.
The gameplay is similar to 0, except I didn't like the bosses as much.
There were a lot more moments during gameplay where I would get attacked constantly and would have very little time to react so it felt cheap.
The Majima Everywhere system was fun because of all the different interactions with Majima, one of my favourite moments was when he busted out his karaoke outfit from 0.
The thing I didn't like about it was that after I had finished the Majima Everywhere storyline Majima would still fight me which made finishing up all the substories annoying.
My least favourite part of the game was the presentation, the cutscenes were just the PS2 cutscenes with newer models pasted over them. The low-quality animations and Kiryu's dead eyes were incredibly distracting and took me out of the experience.
I also noticed really bad tree pop-in, not sure if anyone else had that but it was very distracting during the daytime.
I've been crapping on the game for the last several paragraphs, so what did I like about Kiwami?
I liked the connections to 0 and how they felt natural and not forced.
Added substories like pocket circuit and the woman asking about the bubble period were some of my favourite substories from the game.
The line Kiryu says to Haruka, "Something bad happened there a long time ago." acknowledges the events of 0 while being subtle.
Haruka is freaking adorable.
Even though I had issues with the story, I did like the ending, it sorta made up for the story a little bit.
Overall, even though I said more negatives than positives, I didn't hate my time with Kiwami, I liked it as much as I disliked it, it's a mixed bag but I didn't regret playing it.
Yakuza Kiwami 2:
This game is way better than Kiwami 1.
The first thing I want to mention is the presentation, the cutscenes look way better than Kiwami 1, probably because the original Yakuza 2 had better animations, so they don't look half bad with newer models, there were times where I completely forgot that the cutscenes came from a PS2 game so I wasn't nearly as distracted as I was in Kiwami 1.
There were a few times where animations looked robotic but thankfully they were few and far between.
The story is a huge improvement from 1, it fixes the issues I had with 1's story, it's more focused and gets less distracted.
Ryuji Goda is probably the best antagonist of the whole series.
Overall I don't have many issues with the story except for the ending, the fake-out cliffhanger was bizarre, and the after-credits scene of Date going "Boy it sure was a good thing that bomb was fake!".
It was as if they originally intended to kill Kiryu off but they had to change it so he lived.
That's probably not the case but that's how the ending came across for me.
Other than the bizarre execution of the ending, the story was really good.
The additional content that they added to the remake, the cabaret club minigame and the Majima sidestory, are very good additions to the game.
I'd say that stuff between Majima and Makoto is some of the best writing in the series.
The moment when Makoto realises who Majima was on the airplane is great stuff, one of my favourite moments in the series.
The cabaret club was the better of the two sidestories from 0 so I was happy to see it return in this game.
Overall, Yakuza Kiwami 2 is a great game, almost as good as 0, and is a way better remake than Kiwami 1.
Now that I'm done with the remakes, it's on to the Remastered Collection.
Yakuza 3:
This game holds up surprisingly well.
I was pleasantly surprised by how good this game is, I was expecting it to be a bit dated but it didn't feel dated to me.
Starting with what I liked:
I liked the story for the most part.
I liked a lot of the new characters, Rikiya especially, shame he ends up dying, would have liked to see him in later games.
I liked the story of Kiryu becoming a sort of dad for the kids.
I don't know what the consensus on the orphanage kids are, but I liked them, I thought they were fun and well written and they didn't detract from the game for me.
Ryukyu is my favourite location in the Yakuza series, shame it never makes a reappearance, I can only imagine how it would look in the Dragon engine.
My favourite parts of the game were the Revelations, I thought they were a fun way of learning new moves, I liked exploring the world finding all the unique cutscenes.
Overall, the gameplay was fun, I thought the story was decent, the side content was also fun, but what didn't I like about Yakuza 3?
The biggest issue I had with the story was the antagonist Mine.
I couldn't understand his motivations and thought it didn't make sense, even during his villain motivation speech, I couldn't get a grasp on his motivation.
Maybe I wasn't paying enough attention but it did feel like his motivation was overly convoluted.
I think he could have been a good villain had his motivations been clearer.
The twin brother reveal, while I don't think it's that big of an issue, I still think it's a bit far fetched.
The hostesses made completing all the substories a pain in the ass, I must have spent several hours just on the hostesses, easily my least favourite part of the game.
It ends with another fake out death for Kiryu, this one even less justified than 2's.
Other than those things, I think Yakuza 3 is a solid entry that holds up surprisingly well.
Yakuza 4:
This game is terrible
Absolutely terrible.
It's kind of impressive how abysmal it is.
This game has the dumbest plot twist in any story I've ever experienced.
And it wasn't just that twist, it was also another event that came afterwards. The event was Hamazaki landing on Kiryu's beach.
It was that tag team that solidified that this game was a poorly written mess, not that there weren't signs before them, but these two events were what confirmed it for me.
First, the rubber bullets twist because I have a lot to say about how stupid it is.

1. He still would have injured someone.

Saejima at a few points sticks his guns directly into the stomach of a few of the people at the ramen shop.
Problem is, if you stick a gun to someone's stomach, you're going to put a hole in them because the force coming out of a gun is enough to put a hole in something.
So everyone Saejima did that to should have holes in their stomachs.
But what about the people that weren't shot directly in their stomachs, they should be fine right?
Neither would they be ok, because Yakuza 4 states that the rubber bullets are powerful enough to knock people unconscious.
If they're powerful enough to knock people unconscious, that would also mean that they're powerful enough to break people's bones.
What would have happened is that they would get shot, it would hurt like a bitch, then they realise that they weren't shot with real bullets.
It wouldn't take until after Saejima left for them to wake up, they would realise it shortly after getting shot.
But okay, let's try to ignore that and take the game at its word, that the bullets just knock people unconscious.

1. How would they knock people unconscious?

I don't see how shooting someone in the stomach or shoulder would knock them out, In the chest maybe you can reason it as the bullets knocking the air out of their lungs or something, I know that's a big stretch but at least it's more than what the game gives.
What would have happened is that they would get shot, it would hurt like a bitch, then they realise that they weren't shot with real bullets, just like with real rubber bullets.
So if the bullets worked as they do in real life, it wouldn't knock people unconscious, if the bullets worked like how the game describes them, it still wouldn't work.
Then there's the third point, which isn't a gun logic issue or bullet logic issue, it's a character logic issue.

1. Saejima does not aim for the head, despite having no reason not to.

Saejima knows that he is risking his life and that if he succeeds, he will go to prison.
So why does Saejima half-ass the assassination attempt?
Ueno is sitting down, he's completely powerless in this situation, nothing is stopping him from shooting him in the head, yet he doesn't for whatever reason.
Saejima isn't the only character in Yakuza 4 to make the same mistake, Arai also doesn't shoot Munakata in the head when he has the upper hand.
This is even more egregious when you remember that he shot Ihara in the head at the beginning of the game, so it's established that he does shoot people in the head, but when it came to Munakata he just doesn't for no reason.
I can't even say that this twist has faulty logic, it just has no logic.
The twist depends on guns not working how they should, rubber bullets not working how they should and Saejima half-assing the assassination attempt, had Saejima aimed for the head then the plot wouldn't even happen, and that's why it's the worst plot twist I've ever seen.
Then the final nail in this game's coffin is when Hamazaki somehow survives 3 bullet wounds to the chest, somehow doesn't bleed out, somehow doesn't drown and by pure coincidence lands on Kiryu's beach.
That was the exact moment I checked out and stopped caring about the game.
Let's list off some more issues, shall we?
Saejima by pure coincidence ends up on the beach of the person he was just told to look for, then and even though he is a wanted prisoner on death row, somehow manages to get Kamurocho undetected and the game doesn't explain how he does it.
Akiyama's life is saved due to a wad of cash that was never established.
Arai somehow escapes the police station after shooting Munakata.
The weak attempt at tying the plot of Yakuza 4 to Yakuza 1.
I could on and on about the issues the plot, if I did, I would never get to the gameplay, which isn't much better, to be honest.
The biggest disappointment was the lack of a new location, just Kamurocho for this game.
I didn't have much fun playing with Akiyama's or Saejima's combat styles in this game, I liked Tanimura's focus on parrying but because of the whole debacle with Tanimura's original actor, they couldn't build upon it in later games.
I'll always think of Yakuza 4 as "the bad one", the writing is a massive drop in quality from the rest of the series.
Yakuza 5:
This game is amazing.
While Yakuza 0 is agreed upon by the Yakuza community to be a great game, Yakuza 5 seems more divisive.
I've seen a post stating that Yakuza 5 has the worst story in any Yakuza game. I obviously disagree, but I would say that Yakuza 5 has one of the best stories in any Yakuza game.
The intro to Yakuza 5 is the best in the series in how it effortlessly sets up the main plot.
The mystery of how we ended with Kiryu as a cab driver and Haruka as an idol made it the most intriguing intro in the whole series.
From the first hour, I was hooked.
A major strength of Yakuza 5's story is giving the main characters and their surroundings time to breathe.
The game gives a lot of time to flesh out its characters and not just the main ones but the side characters as well.
For me, Yakuza 5 has the most memorable side characters in the series, I pretty much remember all of them from Kiryu's coworkers to Saejima's prison mates to the employees at the Idol agency to the citizens of Kineicho.
The finale is really good, I love how almost everything gets paid off, like how the prison mates return and save Baba from killing himself, Takasugi calling Shinada, and Watase, Madarame and Kitakata showing up to help Akiyama, it makes the whole game mean something.
Then there's Shinada, I don't know what the consensus on Shinada is, but out of all the playable characters besides Kiryu and Majima, he's my favourite.
Akiyama's philosophy is interesting but in comparison to the rest of the cast he comes off a bit bland to me, Saejima is cool but he's attached to that dumbass twist and Tanimura had very little going on except his combat style.
When I played Yakuza 5 I had no idea what kind of character Shinada was, so I was surprised when he turned out to be a sleazy goofball.
I really sympathised with his backstory, plus, he's a bit of a Crouching Moron, Hidden Badass type, and I have an affinity for those kinds of characters.
Gameplay is way better than Yakuza 4, Akiyama and Saejima were better to play in this game, Shinada being a weapons based character is cool, the sidestories such as Kiryu's racing sidestory, Saejima's hunting sidestory, and Shinada's baseball sidestory were all fun.
That's everything I liked, but what didn't I like?
The Kitakata kidnapping scene is complete bull.
Aizawa being the final boss could have been set up a lot better.
The game is very on the nose with what the theme is.
Haruka becomes part of an Idol group called Dreamline, the track they sing is called dream, the final boss theme is "Battle for the dream", the Japanese subtitle is "Fulfiller Of Dreams" and I'm pretty sure every character says the word dream at some point.
Overall, despite these issues, I still love Yakuza 5, I think it's on par with Yakuza 0, to the point where I can't decide which is better.
Yakuza 6:
This game is alright.
This is the most "ok" game in the series, I did enjoy my time with it, but if there's one phrase that encapsulates my feelings on the whole game, it would be "it could have been better".
Starting with the story.
Something that I noticed is that even though the opening of Yakuza 6 takes place immediately after 5, Shinada and Baba don't even get a mention, which is weird since they were major players in 5's story but they don't even get a throwaway line.
One thing I like about the opening is Haruka facing consequences for the stunt she pulled at the end of 5.
Initially, I was annoyed at that when I was playing 5, but as I thought about it more, it does make sense that Haruka would do that.
Haruka is pure, she has an optimistic view of the world which in the opening of 6 gets shat on by reality, Akiyama even says to her, "This may not turn out the way you're hoping it will".
I've seen some people say that they don't like how Haruka is depicted in 5 and 6, but I didn't have any problems with her.
Also, it was nice seeing the orphanage kids return from 3, even if it was just for a little bit.
The game has some similarities to Yakuza 3, we're back to having Kiryu being the sole protagonist, we're in a small-town setting and a portion of the game is spent on Kiryu befriending the local yakuza.
The mystery of who the father of the baby was I did find to be intriguing and the reveal did surprise me.
Now let's go into what makes the game just okay instead of good.
The Onomichi yakuza, they're fine characters but they mostly made me miss Rikiya.
The letter scene at the very end is really bad, the father and son thing between Kiryu and Daigo was never a thing.
After Yakuza 2, Daigo was done dirty, in 3 he was in a coma for the whole game, in 4 he was a bad guy for some reason and 5 is the best outing he's had and even in that game he only had two scenes with Kiryu.
Subverting expectations doesn't work when the subversion makes less sense than the expectation.
The biggest issue that I left Yakuza 6 with is that it didn't really feel like a finale.
The only thing that makes it a finale to Kiryu's story is the ending, otherwise it's a standard Yakuza story.
Kiryu and Haruka are the focus of the story but a lot of time is spent with the Onomichi yakuza when other more important characters are relegated to cameos.
Majima, Saejima, and Daigo only appear at the very beginning and the very end.
The only other prominent Yakuza characters that have any presence are Akiyama and Date.
The game doesn't feel like the culmination of a story 6 games in the making, it feels like any other game in the series but Kiryu leaves at the end.
By itself it's fine but as a conclusion to Kiryu's story, it could have been better.
Ranking:

1. Yakuza 5/Yakuza 0
   
2. Kiwami 2
   
3. Yakuza 3
   
4. Yakuza 6
   
5. Kiwami 1
   
6. Yakuza 4
   

Summary: I really enjoyed my time with the Yakuza series, it took a while but it was worth it in the end.
I'm excited to play Like A Dragon whenever I get it, I'm curious to see how the team handles an RPG rather than a beat-em-up.
Miscellaneous thoughts:
Favourite battle music:
Force Addiction
One Eyed Slugger
Funk Goes On (Original)
Scarlet Scar
Independence For Violence
Favourite Final Boss Music:
Fly
Favourite Receive You Variations:
Receive You The Madtype
Receive And Slash You
Favourite Box Art:
The Western PS3 Yakuza 4 Cover

Hey all,
So I've been into Yakuza for a couple of years, yet I've really only played 4 start to finish.
The only system I own that can run the games is my PS3, which I barely use anymore, and I don't know Japanese at all, so I'm limited to 3, 4, 5, and Dead Souls.
4 was great, never got around to locating 3 (it's only hard-copy last I checked), 5 was...oof, I kept getting wrapped up in the Substories in 5 (the driving and the hunting) and it just threw off the pacing for me and I never finished the game...and I had no interest in Dead Souls - not big into zombies.
Always wanted to play 0, as well as Kiwami 1 and 2, but I never had enough extra cash in the budget to get a PS4. I did end up with a Switch as a Christmas gift about a year ago but that doesn't have any Yakuza games at all.
And so...with my current laptop on its last legs, I figured if my next one ran games, I wouldn't have to worry about getting a PS4 anytime soon.
And the beauty of that is, if I have a laptop that can run the Yakuza series (specifically the ones focusing on Kiryu, though I'd like to give the newer ones a shot too if possible), it'll probably be able to run other current games as well.
For years now I've been unable to play anything on my laptop that's more graphics-intensive than...Sonic or Among Us. So by using Yakuza as a benchmark, I'm sure my new laptop would be able to run other games I wanted to check out as well!
I bumped my budget up to $700-$900 and got a lot of recommendations here. I really would rather a laptop, since I can pick that up and take it with me when needed. Plus the only TV I have access to isn't very good (if I were to use it as a monitor).
TL;DR, if I wanted to play the Yakuza series on my new laptop and I had a budget of $700-$900 for it, would anyone have any recommendations on which laptop to go with? This is the only info I have to go on at the moment.
Thank you for reading!

I’m currently playing through the entire series off the back of a recommendation my friend made me - and I’m thoroughly enjoying the series so far. I’d go as far as saying it’s definitely kickstarted my gaming hobby back up again after years of “open world fatigue” and gaming fatigue in general.
I actually went into the series with somewhat low expectations - it was an open world game with a lot of substories. I was so tired of big sprawling open worlds at this point. I did have to push myself a bit at the start of 0 - but then it just completely captured me and I started really enjoying the game.
Anyhow, to Yakuza 3! I’d heard from a lot of sources that it was one of the “weaker” games in the series, but even by that standard it was still a very solid game. I very much enjoyed it - it was a nice change of pace from 0/1/2 from a story standpoint - seeing Kiryu talk about his orphanage and seeing him do anything to protect it sticks out in particular. Going from Kiwami 2 to 3 in terms of pace and storytelling felt like a good choice IMO.
The setting was, again, a nice change of pace from its predecessors. Okinawa has a very nice “chill” vibe to it and I really appreciated the departure from the more bustly and busy Kamurocho and Sotenbori. That’s not a slight against those locations by any means - it’s just good to see a change.
I think the only major gripe I had with this one was its gameplay - I expected it to be PS3-like, however my major issues lie with the combat. Enemies constantly blocking attacks made combat maybe a bit more tedious than it should have been. I did also miss the styles from the previous games here. I also notice I did far fewer substories than that of 0/1/2 - possibly because of the combat.
Overall, whilst not as strong as 0 and Kiwami 2, I had a good time with this one. Although I don’t think I’ll ever be over Rikiya’s death. Seeing Kiryu break down over this drew a few tears out of me too - heartbreaking stuff. Its a shame I don’t see him mentioned too often, because he was definitely a highlight of this game and very likely my favourite side character introduced in this game.
I definitely hope for a Kiwami release, as unlikely as it seems.

I thought going into this that the quirks of the first game being remade with the Y0 architecture would grow on me but it hasn't at all. Unless something completely changes I'd say I was completely let down by this one. I guess it's unfair to compare what is basically the first game in the series to the last ones, but if you're coming off of 0 and going into kiwami 1, temper your expectations because it's not nearly as entertaining as 0.
The combat is identical to 0 but way more annoying. Enemies are more aggressive and, especially in the beginning, kiryu will get knocked on his ass way more than in 0 because of it. He also does way less damage, especially in the beginning. You start off with the styles from 0 and the dragon of dojima style, which is supposed to be the most powerful of kiryu's styles. But once the game actually starts, you're given a gimped version that is completely worthless until later on in the game. So far, I've used the dragon style maybe twice, excluding the komaki training sessions. I find it just completely backwards to have kiryu's best style be completely useless until you grind it back to full strength, all the while never actually using it or getting used to it. By the time dragon style is even remotely useful, you'll probably have already completely mastered 1 if not all 3 of the other styles. And even then, it's only good for tiger drop which is very powerful but really annoying to get the timing down for. You'd think the komaki training sessions and the Majima fights would be training you to get better at using the dragon style, but neither really make you better at the style, they just unlock moves in the dragon style tree (komaki doesn't even allow you time to practice the parry or the tiger drop and I found myself on multiple occasions having to look up how to actually perform the moves komaki is supposed to be teaching you)
So far the bosses have been the worst part of the game. It's because of them that all the other styles are basically worthless except for rush, since it's the only one that can move fast enough to hit any of the bosses reliably. Since the bosses can guard practically infinitely, can dash faster than you can react, and stun lock you with a 20 hit combo that you can't interrupt, the best way to deal with every boss is to just wait till the tail end of their combo, dash behind them, punch a couple times with rush and use your heavy punch and hope they get knocked down so you can use a heat attack. And once you have a ton of health upgrades, these fights aren't even hard, they're just so boring since you can only reliably damage them one way and they have an insane amount of health. Not to mention they can regenerate health and if you don't already have heat built up and aren't already in the style required to do the kiwami attack (which the game also doesn't explain you need to upgrade first to even be able to use) then the kiwami attack is rendered completely moot since the boss just healed the same amount of health you took off. The last boss I fought boiled down to a staring contest where I waited for his combo to end, hit him a couple times and went back to waiting. It's boring.
The narrative isn't any better. There were so many times in the game I was thinking "why am I here, what is the point of this", it feels like the story just goes in circles around the same plot point the entire game. And then there were the parts where I run across town saving date's daughter and the fat dude (can't remember his name, doesn't matter anyway) in purgatory's son. Just so many parts of the main story just feel like kiryu running around solving other people's problems that have nothing to do with the main overarching plot. I was actually far more interested in progressing to see the flashbacks with nishiki, which would've made for a much better game honestly. And the substories are even worse, with the majority of them basically going like this: someone tries to scam kiryu, he kicks their ass, they give him money and run away. There's 3 substories in particular, a trilogy I guess, where this exact scenario plays out, with the same characters saying the same thing in the same location. It gets annoying super quick since the game has you stop what you're doing to have these people heckle you. Someone could be dying all the way on the other side of the map, but kiryu now has to drop everything he's doing to hear about how he accidentally stepped on some dudes designer contacts and he better pay up or he'll be sorry! All in all, a huge let down.
Then there's just quality of life stuff. After playing through YLAD, I noticed just how tedious everything is in this game. The story has you running from one end of the map to the other multiple times just to say a few words to a character and go back (in an age where kiryu has a cell phone). The taxi system is not any better than in 0 and you're still going to be running everywhere. Kiryu doesn't have an infinite sprint which gets annoying after awhile since you're having to run everywhere. Eating gives you exp but so little that it might as well give you none at all. Squads of enemies are way more frequent, so many times now I'll get out of a fight, walk 5 feet and get right back into another, which makes getting around even more tedious. Because of bosses essentially requiring you to have enough heat to do a kiwami attack at any given time you always need to carry items that restore heat, which means you're constantly running across town to the drug store which gets super annoying. Losing in the coliseum throws you out with 1 health left, and there's nowhere to heal anywhere in purgatory so you have to, again, run across town and stock up before coming back. The game gives you so much money, but only one thing you ever really need to buy. I have 3 million yen that is going towards buying drugs to beat bosses quicker, and my lady Goromi ofc.
Also I'd say half the mini games that made 0 a blast are either recycled or just completely gutted. No dancing, no property management, no outrun, etc. There's absolutely nothing new to this game, it's essentially 0 but worse.
Tl;dr : Yakuza 0 >>> power gap >>>> yakuza kiwami. At this point, I'm only playing because I've got nothing better to do. Huge disappointment.

Just finished Kiwami 2 and I have a fews thoughts as well as questions about it!!
I didn't enjoy it as much as Zero and Kiwami because the story didn't appeal to me that much. Some parts of the main story felt more appropriate as substories (Haruka being scouted by a talent agency, I'm looking at you) and most felt dragging and predictable. I only got really hooked to the story towards the end.
I also feel like there are a lot of plot holes, so I'll ask here to maybe make the story clearer for me:

1. Why was Sayama's foster mother angry at the Dojima family during that call? Imo if the Dojima family didn't massacre the Jingweon Mafia, Sayama wouldn't exist at all. Is this just bad writing to have an excuse so Sayama can have motive to be interested in the yakuza? Kawara did mention that Sayama only got dragged back to the mess because of her overhearing that call
2. How did Kazuki even overhear the info about the bombs in Kamurocho? The mafia is Korean and multiple times it has been mentioned that some of them are from the mainland. It doesn't make sense that they would speak Japanese instead of Korean
3. Date, as a wanted man, gave info to the cops about the bombs and he even casually waltz into the Tokyo PD HQ towards the end. Why was he not arrested? I don't want him behind bars but it just doesn't make sense.
4. Why did Kiryu handle the Go-Ryu invasion instead of Daigo? I understand a lot of men are needed to find and diffuse the bombs, but wasn't one of the reasons why Daigo was chosen to lead the 300 yakuza is because Kiryu wanted them to believe Daigo is fit to become the next chairman? On that note:
5. Why did didn't the Florist just point the location of the bombs to the police? The cops wanted more than just an overheard info and the Florist can provide it. They don't have a reason to not believe him especially since he even worked for them for a while.
6. How long was the timeline of Kiwami 2? Is it enough for Kiryu and Sayama to actually fall in love?

I play on PC and buying a console for the other Yakuza games isn't an option. Please don't spoil if a question is answered in other installments! Thank you

So technically it isn't Yakuza, buuuuuuut it is made by the same people with a very similar style to the Yakuza series, and it features many of the Yakuza series voice actors if you play the Japanese dub, aaannndd there's a flair for it on this sub (obviously the most important criteria I know) so therefore, I'm reviewing it. Also, it'll be a change of pace from the bombardment of Yakuza 7 stuff (which I can't wait for release date please RGG studios)
So before we start, quick note. I don't know much about FOTNS. I haven't watched the show or read any of the manga, a majority of my knowledge comes from various miscellaneous clips on Youtube that looked kinda cool (some of which were, indeed, that one meme). Therefore, if anything I say is a bit inaccurate, or if anything is brought up in more depth in other forms of media, feel free to correct me. That being said, let's get started.
So first off, story. It's super simple, and I liked it for that. The motivation for our main protagonist, Kenshiro, is that he wants his girl back. Simple as simple gets. To achieve this, he heads towards the city of miracles- Eden- and the story unfurls from there. I was engaged with the story, in most part thanks to how likeable Ken was. Basically, for the uninitiated, he's an enormous hunk of masculine energy who gets his way by poking people until they explode in hilariously graphic ways, all while mumbling to himself with his absurdly gravely, masculine voice. Which is a clever way to quickly segue to this games dub.
So I played with the English dub, and this was for two reasons. One, it felt a bit weird to have Kiryu's VA talking over, well, not Kiryu (although I am planning a second playthrough using the Kiryu skin using the Japanese VA) and two, the English sub was honestly fine. Everyone's got a slightly goofy, toned up to 11 voice, but it works for the exaggerated feel of the source material. Xsana is super delicate yet has that commanding tone when necessary, Kenshiro is just DEEP, Lyra is seductive to hell and back, Jagre... is Jagre.
Alright back to the story. Again, I liked it, but there were a couple of problems when it came to advancing the story. Especially in the second half, so many sections just involve you wandering around talking to people. Two example stick out as really bad design. Firstly, chapter 8, when you're looking for Jagi. You go to these places, with Rei tagging along with you (quick side note, Ken and Rei were super cool and I wish there was more of their bromance) investigating where to find Jagi. You're told THREE TIMES to go back and wait for time to pass while Rei sits there twiddling his huge thumbs. What is the point? it became ridiculously tedious. Another awful section was chapter ten. You have to go and find the Sage of the Desert in order to track down the Army of Ruin. Let's bullet point how this goes...

• You go to look for the sage south of Eden. It's blocked. You go back to Eden.
• Bat gives you a rock smasher thingy on the front of your car to get through, but it needs repairs, so you drive back to where the path is blocked to pick up a bunch of shit that isn't challenging or engaging in the slightest. And then you drive back again...
• You fix the thing. And then you drive back again...
• You finally get to the Sage. He tells you he has no idea, but people in Eden might. Are you fucking kidding me? all of that just for another dull 'go and talk to people' section?!

It's a textbook example of AGL's- artificial game lengtheners; the only purpose of which is to drag the game out because it'd be too short otherwise.
Last point on story, the ending. It was pretty great. There were a lot of pretty surprising twists, although not all of them had satisfying conclusions. Basically, it turns out that Jagre and Lyra were working with Targa, the big baddy at this point, in order to get into Sphere City (which was a really cool location, btw). Targa has his own plans (world domination muhahahahahahahaha) but he gets Jagre and Lyra in his side with the prospect of revenge against Nadai, because Nadai killed Jagre and Lyra's parents years ago to protect the secret of Sphere City. Targa eventually asks Jagre to kill Xsana, but he can't because this big doofus developed a little crush on her, and he can't pull the trigger. Targa shoots Jagre, then Lyra, and then Nadai, basically his whole world domination plan unfurls and he's duped them all. It was an engaging scene, if anything because Targa's VA fucking killed it as the suave, flamboyant villain. It was a treat to watch him finally unleash his true potential.
So to talk about the bits that didn't make much sense, we have to get to the very ending. Ken beats Targa, the nukes go off but Sphere City's dome closes and shields the blast, presumably killing Ken and Yuria (whose reunion was super sweet, and it was nice to see Ken actually be tender for once). And then the post credits happened, and questions need to be asked.

1. So Jagre and Xsana seem to get together, or are at least super close friends (c'mon don't do my boy like that). How? I guess Jagre taking the bullet for her was meant to be super heroic and stuff, but he's conspired against your entire civilisation, and threatened to kill your father. Seems a bit of a stretch, but oh well.
2. Ken and Yuria get saved when Nadai pushes them into the Chamber of Miracles, saving them from the nukes. How do the nukes not obliterate everything in Sphere City? It's made a point that Sphere City powers Eden, and provides tons of clean water, how the hell do 6 super powered nukes going off not affect this?
3. The big one. So Yuria wakes up and delivers the cardinal sin of storytelling- "it was all a dream". I refuse to believe this is true, so here's some rationalising. She was knocked out during the explosion, Ken carried her out, drove her away, and she woke up dazed and confused. That's my head-canon at least. Ken's got a big ol' crate of fresh fruit he's delivering to that little town from the start (I believe) which also leads me to believe that Ken stopped off in Eden to grab some supplies, presumably out of good will for, y'know, not letting a nuclear holocaust happen again. If it actually turns out, either through the manga or anime, that this really was a dream, I'm going to be very sad.

So that's the story done with, let's move on to this game's strongest suit- combat. The combat might be some of the best the series has to offer, both dragon engine or otherwise. The main differences compared to Yakuza are that instead of building heat, you build up the 7 stars to charge up burst mode, this games equivalent to the EX heat mode of Yakuza 6, Kiwami 2, and Judgment. Secret techniques (heat moves, basically) don't use any type of resource and can be used indefinitely, assuming you've filled the parameters. Finally, after hitting enemies enough, you place them in Meridian shock, allowing you to do big damage (or insta-kill basic dudes), stun enemies, and unleash secret techniques. These factors allow the combat to maintain a distance from the usual Yakuza combat, while still feeling familiar to fans of the series.
Another big change is the sense of verticality in this game, which I'd argue is it's strongest feature. Being able to juggle enemies, and most importantly bosses, is unbelievably satisfying and can lead to some badass combos, especially when combined with some really fluid dodge cancels.
Buuuuttt, it is RGG studios. Combat isn't perfect, and there are some gripes I had with it. Firstly, big enemies. Not the giant dudes you fight in the coliseum, but the guys usually wielding some big hammer or something. They're not fun at all. No juggling, no nice combos, just walls you have to force your way through which slow down the pacing of the combat to a crawl. And they appear in almost every random encounter in Eden. Next, burst mode. Burst mode allows you to jump super high and do special attacks, ranging from AOE's to more direct hits. The tracking on these direct hits is, well, hit or miss (mostly miss). They're super inconsistent to land, and even when locked on you end up flying past people and wasting valuable burst mode time. Finally, hard knock-downs. This is when you have to mash X to stand up from taking damage. There's so damn many in this game, especially in huge group fights that it becomes kinda laborious. Even with the skill to recover quickly from them, that's only if you get knocked flying away, and not counting various other instances (like when Ken kinda pirouettes and lands face first).
OK, last but not least, side content. It was great! There was a surprising amount of variety compared to the Yakuza series, with some old favourites tossed in for good measure. Baseball is now replaced by swatting away motorcycle driving bandits, which is great. Karaoke is replaced by a rhythm mini game at the clinic, which is pretty goofy and fun. You get to be a barkeep, which works two fold. Not only do you get to learn more about the citizens of Eden, but you get to unlock more items from shops by serving shopkeepers, which is an engaging and satisfying way of earning goodies. The coliseum is back, and you can re-match reskinned bosses, which is super cool. The cabaret is back, but rather than just rinse and repeating the same (although admittedly stellar formula) of Yakuza 0 and Kiwami 2, they mix things up a bit, with only 4 tables, an ability for 2 hostesses per table, a greater emphasis on special abilities, and cleaning up trouble, it was a refreshing take on a really fun mini game.
Substories really played on what makes Yakuza's, especially Kiryu's, substories so great. Ken is a badass, he hits things, they explode. So when you take this character and put them into various quirky situations, it makes for enjoyable side content that really develops Ken's character. Sometimes he's a slightly awkward goof, sometimes he's put in tender and emotional situations, sometimes he's playing hide and seek with random kids. Of course, some substories do fall into the category of 'something went wrong, punch dudes, problem solved' but for the most part, they were enjoyable.
Now, not all of it was perfect. I wasn't at all bothered by racing, mostly because the car physics in this game are, to put it politely, fucking horrendous. This criticism is two-fold, not only for the car physics, but by extension the exploration of the wasteland, and why it wasn't very fun. The car physics are dreadful, if you bounce off of any sloped surface you jerk around, turning is so slippery it makes GTA IV look tame, boosting over a hilly surface, I kid you not, has the same physics as fucking Big Rigs Over the Road Racing (and if you don't understand what I'm referring too ,https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sCW1QaOH1Y8 ,enjoy) By that I mean, you don't actually bounce around the hills, you just stick to them awkwardly and it looks dreadful. If I have to compare your game to BIG RIGS OVER THE ROAD RACING you've fucked it up majorly. Therefore, when you're forced to drive around the wasteland for various menial tasks, it leaves a real sour taste in your mouth. I really didn't enjoy these sections at all.
And I think that about does it. Overall, a great game with a simple yet engaging story, satisfying combat and great time wasters, that is only occasionally let down by tedious, janky gameplay sections. As always, if you made it this far (without skipping to the end) well done. I swear these get longer each time...

I haven't played them all yet so my ranking isn't that important, but I'm curious about the community favorites.
For me:
Yakuza 5
Yakuza 0
Yakuza 4
Yakuza Kiwami
Yakuza 3
I haven't played 2, or 6. And my feelings on 4 and 3 are based only on other halfway point (I've got work to do). But Yakuza 5 was my favorite experience by far. The side content is not only the most plentiful, but the most meaningful. I loved all of the locations, and thought the game's enormous length made it a life experience.
Yakuza 0 had the best main story, but I didn't like the real estate minigame at all and there were too many substories tied to minigames. The cabaret club was fun but you had to grind it 2x past maxing it out to finish all of the girl substories. What a grind. And finishing the rally racer required luck at the Gatcha machines.

In Yakuza Kiwami I bought a Substory locator with CP I believe. I can’t see one on the list for 0. Does it exist in this game and if so where?