PipOwO finished... Judgment — PipOwO

This spin.off is quite the anomaly. Tecnically speaking it is part of the Yakuza Universe by being located in Kamurocho and having some connections to the mainline story, but you can play it without ever touching the rest of the franchise. Judgment was first and moremost, the passion project of ex-RGG Studio director Toshihiro Nagoshi, in which he wanted to create something thet deviated from the spectacle of the Kiryu games, aiming for a more serious and down-to-earth story. So, after knowing all of this, I began my game with considerably high expectations, and by the end it did meet most of them.

Looking at the past

Judgment's narrative follows ex-lawyer Yagami, which after achieving a non-guilty veredict on a guy that days after would end up killing his girlfriend, would ruin his reputation and force him to abandon his title due to the guilt that incident left on him. After this, he decides to become a detective, and alongside his friend and ex-yakuza Kaiyo, as well as the support of his previous workplace, they form the Yagami Detective Agency.

The case in which the game revolves around is about a killer known as "The Mole", named like that because he always takes the eyes out of his victims. After already finding many bodies in this state, Yagami and Kaito enter the scene to find the true culprit, and what begins looking like a "simple" fight between factions, it devolves into a conspiracy that envelops the future of the country.

This conspiracy not only scales in importance, it also puts on the table a question, would you sacrifice everything so that you can save everyone else? A noble cause on paper, but it's one that if left unchecked, it can cause more bad than good, destroying everything on its path. It's a really well executed case where there are no clear sides, just gray scales that make you cuestion the morality of ii all.

But for ii to become something exceptional, it needs good clues that make you spin every detail to reach a conclusion, but without making you feel silly or that it is too easy. Judgment manages to do it, but I feel it does fall a bit on the "too easy" side. I had many moments where I had already connected the points, but Yagami took a long while to do it when I felt it was very obvious hours prior, which on one side it made me feel really smart, but also I was waiting them to discover it so we could go to the next point. The good thing is that this frustration is compensated greatly thanks to the combat, which I believe it is one of the best from RGG Studio.

With the full force of the law

With this being a title that's part of the Yakuza franchise, Judgment is a brawler as well, where as you progress, you will have to face groups of enemies where you will use all of your skills and what you have on hand or arms reach. Here Yagami has two fighting styles, Crane and Tiger, with both of them having their own use during fights. The first one focuses on broad movements that reach several enemies at once, while Tiger has much stronger attacks with a more limited range, alongside many of the same skills that Kiryu has had in his previous games, such as grabs, objects, weapons and of couse EX Actions.

What makes Judgmente different from the others in this aspect is its flow. Yagami is a lot more agile during fights, allowing him to do various movements like jumping on enemies or pushing yourself from the walls for a stronger blow. It is a combat system that not only looks spectacular, it's also very versatile, allowing you to take any battle in a lot of different ways, being a substantial improvement from its Dragon Engine predecesors.

However, for as good as it is, it ain't perfect and it has two important problems that may hinder your experience. One of these is found in the Crane style, which looks like it would be very useful against groups of enemies, but it's too weak in comparison to the Tiger, making that you keep using this one during almost of the journey, which is a shame because the animation work is phenomenal and the EX actions look increible.

And the second problem relates to a mecanic named "Mortal Wounds", which makes that if an attack of this type hits you, you lose a good chuck of your health that you can't heal like always; instead you will need to use a medkit (which cost like 30K each one) or go to the doctor. The idea is good on paper, forcing you to be more careful with the enemies and take a more defensive approach, but the vast majority of times these attacks are too hard to evade, and when you are in a zone of no return with no medkits, good luck with the boss.

Burocracy

And talking about those parts of Judgment that I didn't really like, now it's a good moment to talk about the elephant in the room. I already talked about how the narrative gets a lot of things right, the drama and its characters make a very intriguing mystery that keeps you glued to the screen while you keep moving foward, and I need to make a big emphasis on this last part, because my biggest problem with this game is that it doesn't move foward, specially during the first hours. While the main case happens, they make you wait and go run errands, deviating completely from the main story constantly so that you "do other things"

This isn't inherently bad, and between the combat and side activities that the game has to offer, the wait is done something pleasant, but you still have to wait. The tension is cut suddenly so that you go resolve semi-related cases and trail someone for ten minutes, making the beginning hours very tiring. In retrospective, maybe it wasn't as bad as I remembered, but it still is something that annoyed me a lot because I just wanted to see how the case would continue.

What doesn't help is that a lot of the ideas they want you to engage with are not that well made as you would expect. Between these are some I already mentioned, the mortal wounds and the trail segments, this last one mostly due to a very simple AI, making it very repetitive, as well as feeling slow, almost as it were filler.

But the aspect that ends up being the most affected by this would be the investigation mechanics, which feel more like set-dressing so that it gets to be a "detective game" and falls short in comparison to its contemporaries. Everytime you need to investigate a scene or a clue, the only thing you need to do is search for points to fill out a list, and that's it, it is just a vehicule to give the illusion of control over what you are discovering. made in favor of a more cinematographic experience.

This is something I noticed during my playthough, it is a lot more cinematograpfic than the rest of RGG Studio projects. The position of the cameras, the use of acclaimed actors, their body lenguaje and even the story makes you feel like you were seeing a movie or a TV show about detectives. It is shielding in the moments that matter most, even if that is at the cost of its performance.

For context, I played the PS4 version on a base PS5, it has a paid upgrade that increases the FPS cap to 60 but changes a lot of the lighting and colors in a way that changes directly the original visual style. Because of that, the version I played had the FPS capped at 30, with one or two drops in chaotic moments. While this is a detail that doesn't really impact in a major way the end product, it would have liked to play the updated version or on PC.

Veredict

When I reached the credits, I left wanting more, but not dissapointed. Althought it has big problems that hinder its chances to be a lot more, the base works increibly well. The Mole mystery is very interesting with an important moral question, supported by memorable characters, a good soundtrack and increible fights. The combat even with those two problems is a lot of fun, being elevated slowly with upgrades, and outside of that the side activites are very entertaining, specially the drone races.

I don't think Judgment has enough to become my favorite in the series, as I said, those problems with the filler and poorly implemented segments constantly sabotage it, but it's not the worst, so I would put it below Yakuza 4 and above Yakuza Kiwami (Legacy). I hope that what Yakuza fans have said about Lost Judgment is true, about how this is one, if not, the best game in the franchise. Honestly, it has big shoes to fill and my expectations are very high, but seeing what they did with Judgment, I have faith that it's going to be something increible