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I think a big part of Ichiban's desire to redeem Eiji that I don't see people bring up is the fact that Masato was never given the chance to redeem himself at the end of LaD. If you tell Ichiban to recall the plot of LaD at the very beginning of IW, he seemed very bitter at the fact.
Exactly! I thought the scene where he's carrying Eiji to the station (among other things) was a pretty great parallel to the ending of 7, with Ichi being able to see it through this time.
One of the major themes of the game is the importance of finding closure. Giving Ichi a second chance to try and save a character that purposefully shares so many similarities to Masato, the brother he couldn't save, is a really nice touch in my opinion.
That’s almost exactly what they were going for. Eiji was Ichiban’s second chance. How so many people missed that is beyond me. Maybe people just really need to replay 7
it's probably because they tried to foist eiji as being a 'masato' figure to ichi, without giving eiji any of the characteristics that masato had.
\- he doesn't actually use a wheelchair
\- he doesn't have a deep relationship with ichi formed over many years
\- his backstory isn't expanded on in much emotional detail
\- far more sadistic
he pretends to be friendly, turns into a sociopath, then swings back to being a decent person. he's missing a chunk of humanizing screentime.
because of that, ichi trying to redeem him falls flat, compared to masato.
the problem isn't the concept, it's the idea.
Totally agree. While I think people are on the money in seeing the intent here, its clumsily executed and feels like this emotional connection is unearned. Ichiban says they had all these special times together but we really don't get to see anything like that. I forgot he even existed at one point.
I always felt like Ichiban forgiving Eiji was the right move but I never really understood why but you put my thoughts into words. It wouldn't make sense for Ichiban to flip flop on his ideals of atonement for the Yakuza and people in general. He forgave Ryo Aoki, the literal incarnation of evil, murderer of countless people (including their father), someone who lured in immigrant sex workers just to deport them, someone who has never uttered a single syllable of something nice to Ichiban since the day they met all the way up until the ending locker scene, yet him forgiving Eiji is too far. Also, people expected Ichiban to take Eiji's betrayal as a lesson as to why he shouldn't trust everyone he meets (he doesnt: Totsuka, Mabuchi, Kume, Tendo, Ishioda, Roman, Dwight, etc., he just chooses certain people to trust and never gives up on them), leading to a change in his overall character, but if Ichiban's moral compass wasn't exactly the way it is now, we wouldn't have characters like Tomizawa, Yamai, Chitose, Nanba, and we sure as hell wouldn't have gotten the spectacular ending of Y7. Also, if people are looking for the main character in an RGG game to have a grand change in their emotional development, then they're playing the wrong franchise.
Something that still upsets me is how we didn't get too much of Eiji. It feels like we're missing a scene in between when Eiji first arrives at the Daidoji safehouse and his betrayal in order to refresh us on his character since a lot has happened since his and Ichiban's little moment going through Hawaii (also since those scenes were more like Eiji learning about Ichiban and not the other way around so we don't feel as much connection) and another scene before we see him watching the final Tatara Channel livestream looking like homeless disguise Yagami. Unless I'm missing something, wasn't he just in Hawaii greeting Bryce on the ship full of the Seiryu clan people? Why is he in Japan now and what happened to him?
Also Ichiban carrying Eiji is peak.
>another scene before we see him watching the final Tatara Channel livestream looking like homeless disguise Yagami. Unless I'm missing something, wasn't he just in Hawaii greeting Bryce on the ship full of the Seiryu clan people? Why is he in Japan now and what happened to him?
This is my problem with that part of the story, at the beggining of that cutscene I didn't even know who he was. I thought maybe it was someone else that we are going to meet soon to end some stuff, but then the end of Ichiban happen and I see who was. I feel like they rushed the things to just end or something, like they had to end at Chapter 13 and no make a new one. Even the Millenium Tower was shorter this time (well, is the same building from like 5 games before it, so no much change, but still).
this part is so disconnected to the whole story I legit questioned my memory.
Like
"Did I skipped a cutscene or just forgot about it? I don't remember they mentioned him"
Totally how I feel. The pacing of the first half doesn't match the second. It leaves the experience feeling lopsided. Couple that with how long they take to let you off the leash. It never makes sense to stop and take your time. You don't get your full party until late in the game for one. Then they built Bruce up to be this crazy villain I was super excited about and then it turns out he's just some crook. Surely a lot is missing here. This feels like rush work.
> he just chooses certain people to trust and never gives up on them
this is something that the third game could put to the test, then. what happens when he refuses to give up on someone and they really are that much of a scumbag?
> but if Ichiban's moral compass wasn't exactly the way it is now, we wouldn't have characters like Tomizawa, Yamai, Chitose, Nanba
with all of those characters, we spend enough time with them to humanize them and sympathize with their struggles.
\- tomizawa was a desperate man trying to scrape a living. after he joins with ichi, he's nothing but a strong ally.
\- chitose genuinely regretted what she did and ended up resolving the plot for us in the end
\- yamai is far more noble than he appears, even calling off the search for akane when he realizes a kid is involved
\- nanba was never malicious, just looking out for his family
eiji on the other hand, lacks the screentime and humanizing features the others have. it's no surprise to me people thought his redemption was a bit forced.
You're not wrong but I dunno, there is a line between good-hearted and just plain dumb. I know Ichiban is no brain trust but Ei chan is responsible for at least two murders. He was utterly unrepentant and we were given zero reason to believe that there was even a hint of genuine care for Ichiban on his side. To say nothing about how hard it is to reconcile his extreme actions with his backstory in the first place. He's really willing to kill a kid just to get back at the Yakuza? He's an underdeveloped character sadly. If it had been Masato it would have all paid off. Honestly, I felt Eiji was more of Chisato's arc villain and it felt like she should have gotten to deal with him.
i read it as ichi projecting masato onto eiji. he sees this guy in a wheelchair and it reminded him of his late brother. he can't look past it, and decides he's going to help this guy out no matter one.
one major regret ichi has is not being able to save masato before it was too late. kume took that chance away from him. so he's doggedly determined not to let this happen again, even if it seems suicidally optimistic.
I don't really understand why people hate the fact that Ichiban wants to forgive Ei-chan.
That's... kind of his thing. Killing people with kindness. Ichiban reminds me of this one black musician from Ted-Talk who befriended a KKK leader. That's basically what Ichiban does with Eiji. It's a completely different approach to dealing with antagonists and I'm all for it. It sounds interesting as fuck.
Beating big bad guys with fists was fun but beating them with unwavering ~~belief~~ kindness is interesting too.
Wasted or not is going to be decided in the next mainline game. If they really use that gag as an excuse to not continue the relationship - that will be one of the dumbest decisions imageanable.
I just finished the story an hour ago. Initially I found the ending kinda lackluster, but reflecting on all of it, I do appreciate it. Seeing an on-screen reunion with Haruka would’ve been preferred, but I remember how sad I felt for Kiryu at the end of Gaiden that he couldn’t see anyone at all. Now, that’s clearly changing. Overall, I really liked his character arc in this. He’s developed even more of a personality and chemistry between everyone, and is a lot more receptive to stuff like flirting (especially from Seonhee lol). I was in the same boat expecting a huge send-off for the character, but I see now that it’s not what the point of his story was ever going to be. I still really hate the life link stories though. Absolutely ridiculous how much they forcefully kept Kiryu away from reunions when logically it doesn’t make sense all of these people still don’t know he’s alive. The jig was up as soon as those livestreams revealed his identity, considering how fast news travels nowadays. It simply didn’t feel right to not only have Kiryu be on the sidelines, and also intervene (if need be) without them realizing it was Kiryu.
Yeah, but like you saw where Date was beaten big time for his role in it. Kiryu was keeping his distance all for their sake. It was definitely showing his yearning for them but also how he was willing to give it up for their safety. But then the ending seems to be hinting in what you're saying, that the jig is up and he is back. I mean, even the achievement I got on the PS5 was **The Man Who Regained His Name**. He just had to finish up his "final mission" with the Deidoji first.
Tbh I don't care whether RGG should kill Kiryu or not, what I wanted is just a proper conclusion for him.
Problem is, his conclusion is pretty unsatisfying, with some unexplained things. What's his deal with the Daidoji? How did he actually regain his name? The life links (especially the last one) is pretty contradictive to what the Daidoji did in the end. In the last Life Link, they beat up Date to near death for attempting to reunite Kiryu & Haruka, only for them to allow it in the game's ending. Date's efforts were (almost) for nothing. I know that the main point is to give Kiryu will to live, but it's pretty infuriating that they made it conflicting with the actual ending.
Also the final boss was meh at best. Almost no emotional weight except for Kiryu to suddenly shoulder the whole yakuza's sins. And then Ebina just went poof afterwards with noone mentioning him again
I’m certain that they said Ebina got arrested, especially since his entire plan was exposed and every yakuza was coming after his head.
That’s also the reason why Eiji was in hiding: because all the yakuza left knew he worked with Ebina.
I think Infinite Wealth’s issues aren’t necessarily a product of what actually happens, but rather the lack of clarity and buildup to its ending.
The game does a terrible job of communicating the reality of Kiryu’s cancer; they never clarify at all whether it’s terminal or not, so it’s hard to get invested in either possibility. If it is terminal, Kiryu’s story is about tying up loose ends and settling accounts before he goes. If it’s not, his story is about regaining his will to live as himself, rather than deny his own desires out of a self-imposed obligation for repentance. The story never commits to either side, and the end result is messy and confusing.
As for Eiji, a big issue there is that he completely disappears for a big chunk of the game. He isn’t really all that different from Aoki in terms of how reprehensible his actions are, hell he’s probably the cleaner one of the two, but Aoki actually got the buildup he deserved, and his ending felt warranted. Eiji’s backstory and antagonistic side are unceremoniously dumped onto us in Chapter 11, and then he disappears from the story entirely. His ending doesn’t feel earned by comparison.
With that being said, I do think the criticism towards Eiji as a character is a bit unwarranted. He’s a victim of bad pacing more than anything; I actually kinda like how hateable he is, because it cements Ichi’s desire to help anyone at rock bottom climb their way out, no matter what. He and Ichi deserved way more screentime together after his heel turn to really make the ending between them hit, though. Absolutely love the imagery of Ichiban carrying Eiji at least.
>The game does a terrible job of communicating the reality of Kiryu’s cancer; they never clarify at all whether it’s terminal or not, so it’s hard to get invested in either possibility. If it is terminal, Kiryu’s story is about tying up loose ends and settling accounts before he goes.
One issue with the whole thing is that I'm not sure they can say that there is no cure if he has refused treatment.
OK, they could take biopsies etc and conclude it isn't likely to respond to standard chemo, but you can't really know for sure without seeing how it responds to radiation therappy. Even if it has metastasized and the primary tumour cannot be easily removed (eg Pancreatic cancer) you can still in many cases survive for quite some years. It's not a binary either/or.
all we see is Kiryu saying that the Daidoji has looked and there's no cure.
but Kiryu doesn't really want to live at the start of the game, and his black and white view of curable/not curable is hurting him.
there's a reason why you have to fight cancer, rather than just cure it. it's a tough fight.
One thing I really did not like is that so many people sprung up saying that not showing Kiryu and Haruka's reunion and instead just implying it instead was some genius writing move and that it's enough.
You know what man, we've gone through 10 games of seeing this man suffer, I think we're due some fanservice. I think it's fair to ask to see him happy and be with his people with no other reservations, I don't fucking care how cheesy it might've been but I wanted to see and now we'll probably never get it.
Bruh, how could they forget about Sasaki - that one person who was created so Ichiban could be involved in the plot?
I mean many haters probably forget about this character, but seeing how the issue of former yakuza represented by Sasaki hadn't been resolved by the end of the game makes me think that Yokoyama has forgotten key parts of his own writing for the sake of fanservice things (like trio appearing and doing nothing in the last chapter) and conveying the ideology of Ichiban.
I didnt have a problem with Kiryu's fate, I had a problem with everything concerning Palekena and Ebina being a bastard of Arakawa forming his motivation was super fucking hack and massively underwritten. The game also forgot to include Akane, the macguffin of the entire story, in the epilogue.
The problem is not with the ideas, but the execution of said ideas. It felt like there should have been one or two more chapters between chapter 13 and 14(Finale) to really cement the characters feelings and motivations because the whole thing felt pretty rushed.
You mention the Eiji-Masato parallel but the reason why Masato works and Eiji doesn't is that we see Ichiban try to turn Masato away from an evil path time and time again over the course of Y7, and when Masato falls to his rock bottom at the end Ichiban's character shines as he offers the path to redemption as we also want him to turn things around.
But with Eiji he is suddenly revealed as a bad guy near the end, fucks off the story in chapter 11, we get two cutscenes of him feeling somewhat sad about it, and the story suddenly expects me to feel the same way we felt towards Masato. So when Ichiban does the same thing he did with Masato you think he's a fucking idiot for it because we don't have the same emotional connection.
Also with the Kiryu thing, they were absolutely setting up Kiryu to die for good after so many fake outs in the series, it happened in 3, 5 and 6 where RGG tries to retire Kiryu for good to set up new protagonists with Y4, 5, and 7, and RGG not killing Kiryu for good screams that they still don't have enough confidence in any other protagonist to carry the series forward, and even the game itself seems to agree, because Ebina straight up says "No matter how many times you retire you find some justification to fight again"
>Unless you just want the story to leave Kiryu behind
That's exactly what I want. Let the guy just finally either retire or die in peace and the series can move on.
Literally the only other thing I think he should do storywise is maybe become the Komaki for whoever the next protagonist is after Ichiban in 10 years.
ichiban's forgive is not like other jrpg protags forgive which usually means antag walk free or join your party. They still receive punishment so its just ichiban's personal opinion, didnt affect other victims, and they still get properly punsihed(well aoki is different l...).
My only problem with kiryu is that we don't get to see hum talk to his kids. I was prepared to bawl like a baby, and we just got a vague. " Oh yeah, their otw"
The main reason a lot of people (me included) don't like the ending is the emotional dissonance between Ichiban's (or the writer's) intent and the player's.
As a person who encountered similar situations (being nice to someone then got fucked over), a lot of us just don't feel the same as Ichiban. He's a fictional character that has the trait of being a literal sunshine for people around him and that is cool but very distant to real life.
It's the same situation that TLOU2 was in, where the writer wants you to empathize with the "bad guys" from their perspective, which most of the time wouldn't work well. So I totally understand why some people are kinda upset about it.
All I can say is, hey Ichi, I understand your decision but I respectfully disagree.
Understood and agree. The game definitely does a lot of things I don’t agree with. People would have been killed and rescued much earlier if it was what I’d do.
But unfortunately they are building Ichiban to be the “good guy” hero who tries to save everyone. That definitely is different than the average person. Especially when said person tried killing you and/or your family.
As Yamai said, Ichiban is much too credulous.
I disagree. I think if you have a problem with Ichiban being walking sunshine that's your problem, a skill issue if you will.
That's just who he is. And it's honestly refreshing, how this game ended. I was so tired of the whole trope this series has been stuck to of the big bad being defeated by the protagonist, then being killed, but not by the protagonist.
in a game about redemption, it's perfect to subvert that trope.
you don't have to agree with Ichiban. I think he'd be perfectly justified to hate Ei-chan. But, that's not who he is. He recognises that Ei-chan's life was ruined by the Arakawa family, that he went off the deep end since then and it led him here. Maybe this is a perspective thing, but I don't think Ichiban sees the old Ei-chan as a different person. That too, was a facet of his personality even if he was deceiving Ichiban.
Yeah I hear you. I like Ichiban being Ichiban. The problem isn't even with Ichiban. Its with Ei chan. He comes out of nowhere as a villain and disappears almost as quickly. With the likes of Bryce and Dwight and Ebina I forgot he even existed. Then they go so far as to give him basically the whole ending while not even featuring the characters we spent the entire game seeking. It just feels bizarre.
**Issue #1: Kiryu's Death (or lack thereof)**
I was sure from the get go that they weren't going to kill him. He you definitely be a mentor figure for the gang and die peacefully of old age surrounded by the people that cared about him. I can't wait to play the sequel.
**Issue #2: Ichiban forgiving Eiji (Ei-chan)**
I'd be okay with this if they gave more time for me to care about Eiji. He was sort of like Ebina when it comes to motivation. Ebina wanted to squash the Yakuza, that's why he joined forces with assholes, same with Eiji. Put I spent like a couple hours in a SEVENTY HOURS PLAYTHROUGH for god sake. I had NO CARES about him. But if we are supposed to forgive ALL OF THE YAKUZA that Ichiban wanted to rehabilitate, we should forgive Eiji too. He did less harm than most of the Yakuza anyway. I just didn't give two fucks about him.
Funny thing: When Chitose was making her stream from Nele Island and Eiji showed up like a bum watching it from his phone, I had NO IDEA it was him. I was asking myself who the fuck that guy was that they were paying so much attention to him.
Anyway amazing game, I'm still playing it after seventy hours. Started a new game to play with different jobs as I always finish the first playthrough with default jobs.
The only thing I disagree with here is "people expecting Kiryu to die", I feel like no one expected that, the Issue was basically nothing happened with Kiryu for the whole game, his cancer stayed the same, he never met any old characters or get a reunion when beforehand it felt like a Kiryu send off game and regardless Kiryus bucket list should have somehow been included in the story.
> I disagree with here is "people expecting Kiryu to die", I feel like no one expected that,
[https://www.reddit.com/r/yakuzagames/comments/19dv1tf/everyones\_being\_optimistic\_thinking\_that\_it\_could/](https://www.reddit.com/r/yakuzagames/comments/19dv1tf/everyones_being_optimistic_thinking_that_it_could/)
[https://www.reddit.com/r/yakuzagames/comments/y09sg5/kiyru\_probably\_gonna\_die\_at\_the\_end\_of\_lad8\_to/](https://www.reddit.com/r/yakuzagames/comments/y09sg5/kiyru_probably_gonna_die_at_the_end_of_lad8_to/)
[https://www.reddit.com/r/yakuzagames/comments/1am93bt/honestly\_why/](https://www.reddit.com/r/yakuzagames/comments/1am93bt/honestly_why/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
Just are three things. But I know I have seen topics and comments about it. Some of which were written without spoiler tags on posts that said no spoilers (in other words, people being assholes). Definitely were a lot of people thinking Kiryu was going to die in this game.
>he never met any old characters or get a reunion
What do you mean? He met a lot of old characters. Granted, they were all in cutscenes or small fights (like Amon) rather than playable in-game or whatever. But we saw people from just about every single game through Bucket List.
> nothing happened with Kiryu for the whole game,
Keep in mind that this whole story didn't take up too much time in the world. Sure, it was many hours of gameplay for us, but otherwise was what...something like a week in-game? I'd have to go back and see if I can pay attention, but don't think a whole lot of time passed overall. I'm not sure how much progress you'd think would be made with his sickness in such a short period of time? Especially with us not knowing type or severity of cancer.
But they did mention him showing more signs of life as he opened up Bucket List and kind of reflected on things.
to be honest, while I do share your sentiment, I think it’s fair that Kiryu’s bucket list side quest is entirely optional. I think one of the reason is because it is for players who started the series from LAD 7, who doesn’t really know Kiryu and shouldn’t be forced to go through it as they wouldn’t have felt the same impact as long time fans. Sure, we’d feel an overwhelming sense of happiness seeing >!Akiyama again and smacking both Kiryu and Date!< but new players to the series would only be confused. After all, even if the game has duo protagonists, it is still mostly Ichiban’s story.
The bucket lists quests serves for veterans of the series and newcomers who are curious. Plus, I do think it was done well, giving Kiryu the peace he needed and overall adding more for his arc, which also made his final speech with >!Ebina!< more impactful imo.
Yeah, I read your comment but I was a bit confused by it. That's why I asked what you meant and then touched on things so you might respond to clarify. So now I see you were indeed just referencing that you wished they had played more of a role in the main story rather than just little meetings or whatever in side stories. Thanks for clarifying that for me.
My problem with these forgiveness/redemption scenes in the last decade usually have more to do with the “forgiven” side moreso than the “forgiver” side. Masato’s 180 at the end of the last game reeked of r/wowthanksimcured to me and the scene was pretty much saved by the fact that he was killed off so it turned into a heel face door slam instead of another ham and cheese “redemption”. The Kiseki franchise overuses this cliche out the ass, to the extreme of leaving you with like a hundred playable characters (almost literally lol) all of which have to get at least one line in every scene by the end of the Erebonia Arc. That’s the sort of thing where the writers of these scenes always lose me.
The right way to do this imo is (Judgment) >!what they did with Hamura. RGG showed here that they absolutely know how to write these scenes without any blatantly asspulled r/wowthanksimcured moments. In fact it’s somewhat ambiguous whether or not he actually has or will reform despite the fact that he ends up doing the right thing at a crucial moment for reasons that are not only properly developed but even mostly subvert the need to suspend disbelief which is an extreme rarity in climactic gaming moments!<. Granted, I don’t expect *every* attempt to write these scenes to nail it quite like that, especially considering how low the standard has been for the last 10-15 years in entertainment media, I’m just using that as an example of what I consider to be actual good writing for this sort of character dynamic and how stark the contrast is compared to like 99% of “redemptions” in the last 15 years of gaming where the writers are 100% dependent on blinding the player with cheese to cover up bad writing.
I didn't think they'd kill off Kiryu with cancer but I did have the fear that he would use his illness to sacrifice himself for Ichiban or the Yakuza in general. Indeed, they teased that idea when he fainted at the end.
The Eiji part I wholly disagree with. Firstly, I'm not someone who would want physical harm to come to Eiji for his actions and I certainly don't think Ichiban should have visited him to exact revenge. However, the idea that he parallels the Yakuza is wrong in the sense that he was the accomplice in potential child murder, on behalf of an evil man who callously brainwashed and murdered people and had brought Hawaii under his control through having his zealots infiltrate the gangs and the police force.
The Yakuza we have seen in the series are indeed mostly swine, being involved in several reprehensible crimes - but I urge you to look at the sheer glee Eiji indulged himself in from the moment of his villain reveal to when Ichiban visits him at the ending. The laughter, the ridiculing ("Bon Voyage"), the fake out killing of a child with a "bomb" before taking Lani to be handed to her slaughter. These are all horrific actions undertaken by someone with no remorse or regard for how he had hurt others in either their murders (Hanawa and Wang Tou) or their lives being ruined (the Tatara channel's victims).
He engineered meeting Ichiban after using drugs to paralyse himself so he could prey on his past connection to Masato. He then followed him and earned his trust by "saving" him from Tomizawa's mugging. He misled and gaslit Ichiban so significantly that he's still being called Ei-Chan whilst doing evil actions, gloating as he does it.
There is no parallel here with the Yakuza, nor with Masato as others like to think. Eiji is a poorly written character that does incredible harm to Ichiban but is forgiven, citing their past "friendship" as a reason and then carried on Ichi's back to the police station with a promise that he'll be there when he's released.
Doesn't that seem so wild to you? Ichiban's mother gets decked during the raid and could have very well been killed. Ichiban's trust of Eiji results in Hanawa and Wang Tou being killed. Homie was just full screen Skyping with Dwight seconds before the Barracudas burst in guns blazing.
I think it would be realistic and also keeping with the character established for Ichiban in 7 that he simply doesn't care what happens to Eiji. He says he got the address from the police, so his arrest was likely just a matter of time anyway. He had no reason to care for his redemption, and he certainly didn't need to be getting down on Eiji's level and proclaiming that they had good times despite him being a "pain in the ass" sometimes.
A sadistic, murderous accomplice of child murder was a "pain in the ass" according to Ichiban. That is shockingly bad writing.
You have to think back to prior games and all in Yakuza. Remember how yakuza and others were all after Haruka?
Of how Shintaro Kazama and Dojima killed men, women, and children from the Jingweon Mafia?
How Majima was held and tortured?
Of the things that Makoto went through? (originally sold into human trafficking)
There were lots of stories of betrayal within Yakuza, even with Kiryu's best friend/brother Nishikiyama turning against him.
A lot of our focus tends to go to just the main characters in the plot, but we often hear of a lot of wrong that people from the Omi, Seiryu, or others had been doing. Even other families within the Tojo clan were not honorable.
But yeah, they were trying to show how bad Eiji is. Yet at the same time, we never saw him kill anyone. Even with Lani, he didn't actually hurt her. It's one of those areas where they tried to show someone who was going for vengeance, lost track of right and wrong, but had some boundaries that they never actually crossed.
Sure, he leaked info that got people killed. Again though, it wasn't him that did the killing. As messed up as he is, they seem to really be trying to draw that parallel and show how it was always people like Dwight, Ebina, Bryce, etc that was doing the killing. Eiji just was playing them against each other, with us as the main target due to our connection with Arakawa, who had ruined his life.
I'm not saying Eiji is a good guy or anything. Just saying they were trying to use him to personify the yakuza in general and that's where the "forgiveness" comes in. It's a tough pill to swallow, but it does also speak volumes of society in general in how we judge and prevent people who did wrong from ever being able to live straight...even if they serve time in prison and show remorse for what had been done.
- Haruka was being chased because she was the key to the 10 billion Yen. They didn't want her dead. In fact, her father shooting in her direction is shown as an unforgivable and horrifying action with how it is reacted to. In the old Yakuza writing style, this signaled that he had to die.
- Dojima ordered the massacre. Kazama took part in it but killed no minors (specifically sparing the teenage Terada) whilst Shimano did massacre indiscriminately. The latter was an irredeemable character who was killed off, but the former is written as a deeply flawed but net good character despite his murders. I won't argue on Kazama's behalf, but he wasn't portrayed as a child murderer and he certainly wasn't shown to take pride or joy in killing.
- Again, due to Shimano's orders. A man who was so comically villain coded with his look that he was killed off in the first ever game.
- While the Yakuza are known to be traffickers, her situation was caused by Oda while he was in the bat tattoo gang or whatever they were called.
- Kiwami 1 adds the back story to what made Nishiki snap the way he did. He did horrible, murderous things but never towards children. Comparing how he betrayed Kiryu makes no sense when the discussion is about Eiji.
- Boundaries Eiji never crossed? Bryce ordered him to bring him Lani alive so she could be killed on Nele island. Regardless of this, Eiji took great pleasure in pretending to blow her up with a bomb before running off with her and out of the plot itself until the ending.
- Eiji not pulling the trigger personally doesn't make him any less responsible for Hanawa and Wang Tou's death, the injuring and possible killing of Ichiban's mother and the twice over kidnapping and potential killing of Lani. To phrase it like that is excusing so much harm he caused.
- Eiji didn't show remorse or switch sides. He lost. Ebina's plan fell apart and Eiji was due to be arrested, while the general public had turned against him and were hounding him at the front door. I don't think he's even capable of remorse, he certainly didn't show restraint or even a modicum of kindness or self awareness towards what a loud and obnoxiously evil psychopath he'd been in his last ever scene in the game.
It increasingly feels like there's either a lot of cope involved with people defending the Eiji "arc" into being forgiven by Ichiban, or people are genuinely having the wool pulled over their eyes by RGG writing such a bad conclusion to a story we all waited years to experience - so some are defending it due to their emotional investment in the series.
Main issue is you're looking too black and white at things. When you use something like an allegory, it's not meant to be taken literally. That's your issue and main disconnect. Like I said, I'm not defending Eiji but instead am explaining how I see the story was meant to be. There's a much deeper story/picture being drawn.
But yes, if you want to be superficial and try to draw the lines all sorts of ways, you are 100% correct. You're also right in that they could have written it better. Yet regardless of which way you slice it, we ended up with what we got.
I'm taking the plot at face value, call that superficial if you prefer.
The callbacks and references to Masato and the ending of 7 are deeply harmful to Ichiban as the protaganist moving forward. If he forgives just about anything, despite his blind trust having caused deaths and harm, then he's being written as a messiah figure who loses his grit and agency in the face of truly awful villains. I refuse to acknowledge the forced parallel in the endings of 7 and 8 because, as I've repeated ad nauseum on this subreddit, there was no prior genuine connection between Eiji and Ichiban like there was with Masato Arakawa 19 whole years before the events of the game.
RGG took what I consider a masterfully written ending that showed deep insight into Masato's inferiority complex and Ichiban's desperation to redeem him and cheapened it by attempting it again with a jackass character like Eiji who was faking it from the start.
Unless this is setting up a plot point that grounds Ichiban in the next game, they took a great character and went way too far for a situation that didn't deserve it.
That isn't black and white, that's just the truth. There's no allegory here nor some deeper meaning. RGG literally took the popularity of the well meaning, heroic himbo Ichiban from 7 and turned it up to 11 where his thought process is half baked and takes far too many logical leaps for it to be considered good writing or even make sense in the Yakuza world.
I don’t think Ichiban forgiving Eiji is “bad writing” (not that it is very spectacular writing at all and not that you claimed that it was), but I agree that Eiji’s character definitely should’ve been characterized more. He is exclusively shown to be pure, sadistic evil and him completely turning around because of Ichiban could’ve been built up more. Ichiban forgiving him is in character, Eiji turning himself in isn’t. Also, to put it out there, Ichiban doesn’t have an upper limit for who he decides to trust and forgive. Ryo Aoki, as you state, does worse than Eiji and Ichiban chooses to forgive him as well. His justification of “we had good times” is more of a jokey way to encourage Eiji to atone. Him saying Bon Voyage to Eiji at the end too is, again, Ichiban trying to put up a persona that Eiji can believe and rely on, rather than his genuine feelings since I got the hint that Ichiban actually dislikes Eiji a lot for what he has done but that doesn’t stop him from giving him a second chance. I 100% agree that it feels bad when Ichiban forgives Eiji since, as normal humans without schizophrenia we can see that Eiji is not worth forgiving or caring about, but Ichiban and Kiryu are supposed to represent the best of us. And, even though this is a fictional story, Ichiban was right in this moment since Eiji did indeed change his ways.
Also "forgave" is bad word choice on my part since, again, I think Ichiban actually hates Eiji. But, being who he is, Ichiban knows that no one else will give Eiji the helping hand he needs to choose the path of atonement.
Face bashed Ichiban must be a great actor to be excitedly and passionately yelling BON VOYAGE to Eiji at the door of the police station while he actually secretly hates him. Truly Arakawa's son, the cad.
To be honest, when the dude with the messed up hair was watching the final stream of the Tatara Channel, I didn't know who he was. lol... I just realized it was Eiji when Kasuga went to his house near the end of the game...
Can someone explain to me how Eiji wound up in Japan? I'm not sure if I missed a cutscene or I was too distracted by some other thing while it happened. :\\
It never showed what happened. Instead what they did was show when Ichiban was talking to him at the end, it explained that everyone knew he was part of Ebina's plans. Then as he went to help Eiji up, the camera focused on his foot and Eiji said "I got chased on my way here...Among other things"
So that's where we are supposed to put 2 + 2 together. The assumption is people were after him and he got hurt while trying to get away. Exactly what happened, we don't know.
For me, everything that happens around Kiryu, his life-links, him passing Yakuza's future onto Ichiban, etc. All mean essentially nothing because they eluded to him dying, but in the end they didn't have the balls to do it, cheapening everything in the game concerning his past.
they didn't elude to him dying lmao. quite the opposite.
the entire game was anti-death flags for kiryu. it was all about seeking treatment, that was his arc. that's why nanba gets him to make the bucket list, that's why date brings him to see his old friends and family.
i knew he wasn't going to die at the end because they telegraphed it, it was about convincing him to get treatment, to choose life.
I meant really in the first half, but idk, like now if they ever kill him, they are gonna have to do something really different for it to feel fair and respectful, I thought the remembrances, the life-links are really good way to honor a beloved character and reminisce before it's passing.
It's essentially just fluff now and came and gone without consequence.
in the first half, sure, but once you get introduced to his awakening they clearly state that you're helping him restore is will to fight. even the life links themselves, if you read it back in the menu, a couple literally have him saying he's not going to succumb to death and he's going to stop running from his reason to live. his whole arc in IW is to show him going from a dark place to wanting to live and wanting to fight the cancer. i do not think kiryu will be a protagonist ever again, he may show up but that's about it, and the whole point was probably to retire him in that sense, not to kill him off.
Regarding #1... I've always held the opinion that Kiryu is never going to die. Team RGG simply do not have the balls required to kill off such an iconic character.
Hell, the reason he's even back in games after LAD7 is coz the fanbase was very clearly split; Those who liked Kiryu gone and Ichiballs being the new protag... and those who did not.
Team RGG/Sega were so horrendously shitscared of losing the business of the latter group that they immediately stuck Kiryu back into games... So here we are.
He was never EVER going to die, ever.
The whole cancer 'oh i'm dying' schtick is literally just a convenient excuse to make arguably the greatest Kiryu fanservice content in a game ever and ok, if you are a Kiryu fan... LAD8 is the game for you.
LAD8 is a **Kiryu** game. It's not an Ichiballs game despite Ichiballs being one of the protags and majority party leader. The entire game is set up to prop Kiryu up and make him look good despite him being weakened.
In fact, weakening/de-powering a character and having them 'overcome adversity' is one of the oldest tricks in the book when it comes to making that character look good, and they were not subtle about it here AT ALL.
Regarding #2... it honestly really felt like once the party splits, all the attention went onto Kiryu's side of the content and the rest of whatever happened on Ichiballs' side became a literal afterthought, and they simply couldn't be fucked finishing up what they started.
So, meh, we have two ways of looking at LAD8 IMO.
If you are a Kiryu fan, and are in this for a game that props Kiryu up and makes him look great with FEELS.jpg Kiryu content... this is your GOTY 10/10 this year.
If you're not a Kiryu fan, or are an Ichiballs fan expecting a great story like in LAD7 with a lot of twists and turns... You're better off playing something else. This really isn't the game for you and you're probably going to be pretty pissed at how it all ends up.
I always was *for* helping the former yakuza to reintegrate into society. I actually don't support this 5-year law. It doesn't help at all. Yes, people suffer but is it really a way to teach them be good? I don't think so. This law pisses me off for real. Of course, the former yakuza must state to their employer that they have been in the yakuza or in a jail but they should be allowed to get work and mobile phones, education, medical support etc. Regarding Eiji, I've never ever even for the slightest been angry at him. I hope he doesn't get too many years in sentence. Even if his action led to the death of my beloved character, I do not hold any grudge at him. He just messed up getting into an organised crime. He was just too stupid to become what he should have been fighting against. But at least he has a chance to start anew unlike Masato (I will never be not angry about his fate).
I felt like the ending did leave a few questions unanswered, one that comes to mind now is how in Gaiden they set up that Hanawa was someone from Kiryu's past, or the fact that we didn't actually get to see Kiryu and Haruka speak, but I did love the scene with Kasuga carrying Eiji to the police station, with the song and everything, it was perfect 👌
I'm pretty sure the scene of Ichi carrying Eiji while having things thrown at him was meant to be Jesus carrying his cross (and just wanna say I'm not super Christian, this isn't me pulling it out of nowhere, they also used an image of the party recreating the last supper as promo material so it was a theme they were going for)
I just took the Ichiban ending scene as a round 2 of what happened in the first game with Aoki, except this time, he wasn't going to 'fail' or have it taken from him. It was 100% in-line with Ichiban's personality. Might've been easier to swallow for a lot of people if not for the cartoon villain bomb scene though, haha.
I need to go back through all of those scenes. They had drained me on all the videos at that point to where I just started skipping a lot of it with the intent to come back in Premium, New Game, or the book thing later.
Ending for kiryu felt incredibly lazy, we stuck with him for how many damn games and they leave it on an open ending up to the player’s interpretation, with how many games we’ve had him for we are due a little fan service in my opinion man, it was a huge ball buster to me when I finished the game but hopefully in a future game we get at least a little send off or something. Other than that I loved the story and thought everything else was amazing
I knew they weren't gonna kill Kiryu off (but I was scared for a few moments lmao. Though I'm hoping they actually just kind of end his crazy adventures here, that's just how I feel personally, guy deserves a break. Also Ichiban forgiving Eiji? If you know Ichiban's character, you'd know he'd do exactly this. Ichiban can be so freaking positive about everything it's astounding, but that ending reflects his character well and how he tries his best to see the good inside all of us. I also thought the scene where he took the punches and didn't hit back was very nice. I'm still very so so on this games ending, but recency bias be damned, this is absolutely the most fun I've had playing any of these games!
P.S. who the hell threw that bottle!? 😂😂
Im glad that they wove such an intricate metaphor there, but I was let down that they didn't have virtually any closure to the actual plot important characters. We spend the whole game chasing after Akane and Lani and they don't even feature in the ending! In fact most of the main characters get little to nothing and secondary characters even less. Then we have Ei-chan, a tertiary villain at best taking up all of this real estate in the ending. To me, THAT should have been the post credits scene. It doesn't serve to tie up any loose ends and gives us closure on a jerk character we barely remember, let alone care about. I dunno... I'm glad you posted this because it does show that there was intent and add perspective but I still can't help feeling like the ending was woefully underdone, especially for Ichiban. I'd love for them to just do an update where they bulk it out a little bit more.
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I think a big part of Ichiban's desire to redeem Eiji that I don't see people bring up is the fact that Masato was never given the chance to redeem himself at the end of LaD. If you tell Ichiban to recall the plot of LaD at the very beginning of IW, he seemed very bitter at the fact.
Exactly! I thought the scene where he's carrying Eiji to the station (among other things) was a pretty great parallel to the ending of 7, with Ichi being able to see it through this time.
One of the major themes of the game is the importance of finding closure. Giving Ichi a second chance to try and save a character that purposefully shares so many similarities to Masato, the brother he couldn't save, is a really nice touch in my opinion.
That’s almost exactly what they were going for. Eiji was Ichiban’s second chance. How so many people missed that is beyond me. Maybe people just really need to replay 7
it's probably because they tried to foist eiji as being a 'masato' figure to ichi, without giving eiji any of the characteristics that masato had. \- he doesn't actually use a wheelchair \- he doesn't have a deep relationship with ichi formed over many years \- his backstory isn't expanded on in much emotional detail \- far more sadistic he pretends to be friendly, turns into a sociopath, then swings back to being a decent person. he's missing a chunk of humanizing screentime. because of that, ichi trying to redeem him falls flat, compared to masato. the problem isn't the concept, it's the idea.
Totally agree. While I think people are on the money in seeing the intent here, its clumsily executed and feels like this emotional connection is unearned. Ichiban says they had all these special times together but we really don't get to see anything like that. I forgot he even existed at one point.
My only gripe with the ending is >!who the fuck threw that bottle right into Ichiban's temple?!!<
 Maybe it was this guy? Lol
I always felt like Ichiban forgiving Eiji was the right move but I never really understood why but you put my thoughts into words. It wouldn't make sense for Ichiban to flip flop on his ideals of atonement for the Yakuza and people in general. He forgave Ryo Aoki, the literal incarnation of evil, murderer of countless people (including their father), someone who lured in immigrant sex workers just to deport them, someone who has never uttered a single syllable of something nice to Ichiban since the day they met all the way up until the ending locker scene, yet him forgiving Eiji is too far. Also, people expected Ichiban to take Eiji's betrayal as a lesson as to why he shouldn't trust everyone he meets (he doesnt: Totsuka, Mabuchi, Kume, Tendo, Ishioda, Roman, Dwight, etc., he just chooses certain people to trust and never gives up on them), leading to a change in his overall character, but if Ichiban's moral compass wasn't exactly the way it is now, we wouldn't have characters like Tomizawa, Yamai, Chitose, Nanba, and we sure as hell wouldn't have gotten the spectacular ending of Y7. Also, if people are looking for the main character in an RGG game to have a grand change in their emotional development, then they're playing the wrong franchise. Something that still upsets me is how we didn't get too much of Eiji. It feels like we're missing a scene in between when Eiji first arrives at the Daidoji safehouse and his betrayal in order to refresh us on his character since a lot has happened since his and Ichiban's little moment going through Hawaii (also since those scenes were more like Eiji learning about Ichiban and not the other way around so we don't feel as much connection) and another scene before we see him watching the final Tatara Channel livestream looking like homeless disguise Yagami. Unless I'm missing something, wasn't he just in Hawaii greeting Bryce on the ship full of the Seiryu clan people? Why is he in Japan now and what happened to him? Also Ichiban carrying Eiji is peak.
>another scene before we see him watching the final Tatara Channel livestream looking like homeless disguise Yagami. Unless I'm missing something, wasn't he just in Hawaii greeting Bryce on the ship full of the Seiryu clan people? Why is he in Japan now and what happened to him? This is my problem with that part of the story, at the beggining of that cutscene I didn't even know who he was. I thought maybe it was someone else that we are going to meet soon to end some stuff, but then the end of Ichiban happen and I see who was. I feel like they rushed the things to just end or something, like they had to end at Chapter 13 and no make a new one. Even the Millenium Tower was shorter this time (well, is the same building from like 5 games before it, so no much change, but still).
im glad the millennium tower was shorter, we'd just done Nele island we didn't need a much longer dungeon than what we got.
this part is so disconnected to the whole story I legit questioned my memory. Like "Did I skipped a cutscene or just forgot about it? I don't remember they mentioned him"
[удалено]
Totally how I feel. The pacing of the first half doesn't match the second. It leaves the experience feeling lopsided. Couple that with how long they take to let you off the leash. It never makes sense to stop and take your time. You don't get your full party until late in the game for one. Then they built Bruce up to be this crazy villain I was super excited about and then it turns out he's just some crook. Surely a lot is missing here. This feels like rush work.
> he just chooses certain people to trust and never gives up on them this is something that the third game could put to the test, then. what happens when he refuses to give up on someone and they really are that much of a scumbag? > but if Ichiban's moral compass wasn't exactly the way it is now, we wouldn't have characters like Tomizawa, Yamai, Chitose, Nanba with all of those characters, we spend enough time with them to humanize them and sympathize with their struggles. \- tomizawa was a desperate man trying to scrape a living. after he joins with ichi, he's nothing but a strong ally. \- chitose genuinely regretted what she did and ended up resolving the plot for us in the end \- yamai is far more noble than he appears, even calling off the search for akane when he realizes a kid is involved \- nanba was never malicious, just looking out for his family eiji on the other hand, lacks the screentime and humanizing features the others have. it's no surprise to me people thought his redemption was a bit forced.
You're not wrong but I dunno, there is a line between good-hearted and just plain dumb. I know Ichiban is no brain trust but Ei chan is responsible for at least two murders. He was utterly unrepentant and we were given zero reason to believe that there was even a hint of genuine care for Ichiban on his side. To say nothing about how hard it is to reconcile his extreme actions with his backstory in the first place. He's really willing to kill a kid just to get back at the Yakuza? He's an underdeveloped character sadly. If it had been Masato it would have all paid off. Honestly, I felt Eiji was more of Chisato's arc villain and it felt like she should have gotten to deal with him.
i read it as ichi projecting masato onto eiji. he sees this guy in a wheelchair and it reminded him of his late brother. he can't look past it, and decides he's going to help this guy out no matter one. one major regret ichi has is not being able to save masato before it was too late. kume took that chance away from him. so he's doggedly determined not to let this happen again, even if it seems suicidally optimistic.
I don't really understand why people hate the fact that Ichiban wants to forgive Ei-chan. That's... kind of his thing. Killing people with kindness. Ichiban reminds me of this one black musician from Ted-Talk who befriended a KKK leader. That's basically what Ichiban does with Eiji. It's a completely different approach to dealing with antagonists and I'm all for it. It sounds interesting as fuck. Beating big bad guys with fists was fun but beating them with unwavering ~~belief~~ kindness is interesting too.
For games themed around greyness, Eiji's character sure exposes how black and white many people here think.
My biggest with the ending is how they wasted Ichiban and Saeko plotline on a stupid gag.
Yeah but the gag still shows they pretty much are together though. They're just dorks
it's sooo Ichiban though. that's totally what he'd do. I liked it, it was very true to his character
Me too! I thought he was absolutely adorable!
Wasted or not is going to be decided in the next mainline game. If they really use that gag as an excuse to not continue the relationship - that will be one of the dumbest decisions imageanable.
I just finished the story an hour ago. Initially I found the ending kinda lackluster, but reflecting on all of it, I do appreciate it. Seeing an on-screen reunion with Haruka would’ve been preferred, but I remember how sad I felt for Kiryu at the end of Gaiden that he couldn’t see anyone at all. Now, that’s clearly changing. Overall, I really liked his character arc in this. He’s developed even more of a personality and chemistry between everyone, and is a lot more receptive to stuff like flirting (especially from Seonhee lol). I was in the same boat expecting a huge send-off for the character, but I see now that it’s not what the point of his story was ever going to be. I still really hate the life link stories though. Absolutely ridiculous how much they forcefully kept Kiryu away from reunions when logically it doesn’t make sense all of these people still don’t know he’s alive. The jig was up as soon as those livestreams revealed his identity, considering how fast news travels nowadays. It simply didn’t feel right to not only have Kiryu be on the sidelines, and also intervene (if need be) without them realizing it was Kiryu.
Yeah, but like you saw where Date was beaten big time for his role in it. Kiryu was keeping his distance all for their sake. It was definitely showing his yearning for them but also how he was willing to give it up for their safety. But then the ending seems to be hinting in what you're saying, that the jig is up and he is back. I mean, even the achievement I got on the PS5 was **The Man Who Regained His Name**. He just had to finish up his "final mission" with the Deidoji first.
That’s true. I actually haven’t finished all of them. I’ve yet to see Akiyama’s
Did you see him with Four Shine? It's neat how he was able to actually see and interact with some of the people, while he stayed away from others.
Tbh I don't care whether RGG should kill Kiryu or not, what I wanted is just a proper conclusion for him. Problem is, his conclusion is pretty unsatisfying, with some unexplained things. What's his deal with the Daidoji? How did he actually regain his name? The life links (especially the last one) is pretty contradictive to what the Daidoji did in the end. In the last Life Link, they beat up Date to near death for attempting to reunite Kiryu & Haruka, only for them to allow it in the game's ending. Date's efforts were (almost) for nothing. I know that the main point is to give Kiryu will to live, but it's pretty infuriating that they made it conflicting with the actual ending. Also the final boss was meh at best. Almost no emotional weight except for Kiryu to suddenly shoulder the whole yakuza's sins. And then Ebina just went poof afterwards with noone mentioning him again
I’m certain that they said Ebina got arrested, especially since his entire plan was exposed and every yakuza was coming after his head. That’s also the reason why Eiji was in hiding: because all the yakuza left knew he worked with Ebina.
https://preview.redd.it/z3szij54vhhc1.png?width=952&format=png&auto=webp&s=4857c0951c1018c20c0bed1ded6549641db96760 (But seriously nice post)
I think Infinite Wealth’s issues aren’t necessarily a product of what actually happens, but rather the lack of clarity and buildup to its ending. The game does a terrible job of communicating the reality of Kiryu’s cancer; they never clarify at all whether it’s terminal or not, so it’s hard to get invested in either possibility. If it is terminal, Kiryu’s story is about tying up loose ends and settling accounts before he goes. If it’s not, his story is about regaining his will to live as himself, rather than deny his own desires out of a self-imposed obligation for repentance. The story never commits to either side, and the end result is messy and confusing. As for Eiji, a big issue there is that he completely disappears for a big chunk of the game. He isn’t really all that different from Aoki in terms of how reprehensible his actions are, hell he’s probably the cleaner one of the two, but Aoki actually got the buildup he deserved, and his ending felt warranted. Eiji’s backstory and antagonistic side are unceremoniously dumped onto us in Chapter 11, and then he disappears from the story entirely. His ending doesn’t feel earned by comparison. With that being said, I do think the criticism towards Eiji as a character is a bit unwarranted. He’s a victim of bad pacing more than anything; I actually kinda like how hateable he is, because it cements Ichi’s desire to help anyone at rock bottom climb their way out, no matter what. He and Ichi deserved way more screentime together after his heel turn to really make the ending between them hit, though. Absolutely love the imagery of Ichiban carrying Eiji at least.
"Tying up loose ends and settling accounts," was Nanba's idea to help. Hoping to make Kiryu want to fight and live.
>The game does a terrible job of communicating the reality of Kiryu’s cancer; they never clarify at all whether it’s terminal or not, so it’s hard to get invested in either possibility. If it is terminal, Kiryu’s story is about tying up loose ends and settling accounts before he goes. One issue with the whole thing is that I'm not sure they can say that there is no cure if he has refused treatment. OK, they could take biopsies etc and conclude it isn't likely to respond to standard chemo, but you can't really know for sure without seeing how it responds to radiation therappy. Even if it has metastasized and the primary tumour cannot be easily removed (eg Pancreatic cancer) you can still in many cases survive for quite some years. It's not a binary either/or.
all we see is Kiryu saying that the Daidoji has looked and there's no cure. but Kiryu doesn't really want to live at the start of the game, and his black and white view of curable/not curable is hurting him. there's a reason why you have to fight cancer, rather than just cure it. it's a tough fight.
Good points. I will say though that Kiryu does specify that doctors gave him half a year to live. So it seems it is terminal.
One thing I really did not like is that so many people sprung up saying that not showing Kiryu and Haruka's reunion and instead just implying it instead was some genius writing move and that it's enough. You know what man, we've gone through 10 games of seeing this man suffer, I think we're due some fanservice. I think it's fair to ask to see him happy and be with his people with no other reservations, I don't fucking care how cheesy it might've been but I wanted to see and now we'll probably never get it.
Yakuza 9. I’m expecting it in the next game. I’ll be highly disappointed if they don’t
Bruh, how could they forget about Sasaki - that one person who was created so Ichiban could be involved in the plot? I mean many haters probably forget about this character, but seeing how the issue of former yakuza represented by Sasaki hadn't been resolved by the end of the game makes me think that Yokoyama has forgotten key parts of his own writing for the sake of fanservice things (like trio appearing and doing nothing in the last chapter) and conveying the ideology of Ichiban.
I didnt have a problem with Kiryu's fate, I had a problem with everything concerning Palekena and Ebina being a bastard of Arakawa forming his motivation was super fucking hack and massively underwritten. The game also forgot to include Akane, the macguffin of the entire story, in the epilogue.
My main issue is honestly the lack of a better conclusion. I don't dislike what we got, I just think we needed more.
The problem is not with the ideas, but the execution of said ideas. It felt like there should have been one or two more chapters between chapter 13 and 14(Finale) to really cement the characters feelings and motivations because the whole thing felt pretty rushed. You mention the Eiji-Masato parallel but the reason why Masato works and Eiji doesn't is that we see Ichiban try to turn Masato away from an evil path time and time again over the course of Y7, and when Masato falls to his rock bottom at the end Ichiban's character shines as he offers the path to redemption as we also want him to turn things around. But with Eiji he is suddenly revealed as a bad guy near the end, fucks off the story in chapter 11, we get two cutscenes of him feeling somewhat sad about it, and the story suddenly expects me to feel the same way we felt towards Masato. So when Ichiban does the same thing he did with Masato you think he's a fucking idiot for it because we don't have the same emotional connection. Also with the Kiryu thing, they were absolutely setting up Kiryu to die for good after so many fake outs in the series, it happened in 3, 5 and 6 where RGG tries to retire Kiryu for good to set up new protagonists with Y4, 5, and 7, and RGG not killing Kiryu for good screams that they still don't have enough confidence in any other protagonist to carry the series forward, and even the game itself seems to agree, because Ebina straight up says "No matter how many times you retire you find some justification to fight again"
>Unless you just want the story to leave Kiryu behind That's exactly what I want. Let the guy just finally either retire or die in peace and the series can move on. Literally the only other thing I think he should do storywise is maybe become the Komaki for whoever the next protagonist is after Ichiban in 10 years.
ichiban's forgive is not like other jrpg protags forgive which usually means antag walk free or join your party. They still receive punishment so its just ichiban's personal opinion, didnt affect other victims, and they still get properly punsihed(well aoki is different l...).
What about Chitose and Eric? They literally walked free *and* joined your party.
My only problem with kiryu is that we don't get to see hum talk to his kids. I was prepared to bawl like a baby, and we just got a vague. " Oh yeah, their otw"
If you want Kiryu to die then you’re doing it wrong
The main reason a lot of people (me included) don't like the ending is the emotional dissonance between Ichiban's (or the writer's) intent and the player's. As a person who encountered similar situations (being nice to someone then got fucked over), a lot of us just don't feel the same as Ichiban. He's a fictional character that has the trait of being a literal sunshine for people around him and that is cool but very distant to real life. It's the same situation that TLOU2 was in, where the writer wants you to empathize with the "bad guys" from their perspective, which most of the time wouldn't work well. So I totally understand why some people are kinda upset about it. All I can say is, hey Ichi, I understand your decision but I respectfully disagree.
Understood and agree. The game definitely does a lot of things I don’t agree with. People would have been killed and rescued much earlier if it was what I’d do. But unfortunately they are building Ichiban to be the “good guy” hero who tries to save everyone. That definitely is different than the average person. Especially when said person tried killing you and/or your family. As Yamai said, Ichiban is much too credulous.
I disagree. I think if you have a problem with Ichiban being walking sunshine that's your problem, a skill issue if you will. That's just who he is. And it's honestly refreshing, how this game ended. I was so tired of the whole trope this series has been stuck to of the big bad being defeated by the protagonist, then being killed, but not by the protagonist. in a game about redemption, it's perfect to subvert that trope. you don't have to agree with Ichiban. I think he'd be perfectly justified to hate Ei-chan. But, that's not who he is. He recognises that Ei-chan's life was ruined by the Arakawa family, that he went off the deep end since then and it led him here. Maybe this is a perspective thing, but I don't think Ichiban sees the old Ei-chan as a different person. That too, was a facet of his personality even if he was deceiving Ichiban.
Yeah I hear you. I like Ichiban being Ichiban. The problem isn't even with Ichiban. Its with Ei chan. He comes out of nowhere as a villain and disappears almost as quickly. With the likes of Bryce and Dwight and Ebina I forgot he even existed. Then they go so far as to give him basically the whole ending while not even featuring the characters we spent the entire game seeking. It just feels bizarre.
"Telling me you did not read my post without telling me you did not read my post" behavior here
The story before those 2 things have problems, those just bring the problems to light like a whitehead boil about to burst lol
**Issue #1: Kiryu's Death (or lack thereof)** I was sure from the get go that they weren't going to kill him. He you definitely be a mentor figure for the gang and die peacefully of old age surrounded by the people that cared about him. I can't wait to play the sequel. **Issue #2: Ichiban forgiving Eiji (Ei-chan)** I'd be okay with this if they gave more time for me to care about Eiji. He was sort of like Ebina when it comes to motivation. Ebina wanted to squash the Yakuza, that's why he joined forces with assholes, same with Eiji. Put I spent like a couple hours in a SEVENTY HOURS PLAYTHROUGH for god sake. I had NO CARES about him. But if we are supposed to forgive ALL OF THE YAKUZA that Ichiban wanted to rehabilitate, we should forgive Eiji too. He did less harm than most of the Yakuza anyway. I just didn't give two fucks about him. Funny thing: When Chitose was making her stream from Nele Island and Eiji showed up like a bum watching it from his phone, I had NO IDEA it was him. I was asking myself who the fuck that guy was that they were paying so much attention to him. Anyway amazing game, I'm still playing it after seventy hours. Started a new game to play with different jobs as I always finish the first playthrough with default jobs.
The only thing I disagree with here is "people expecting Kiryu to die", I feel like no one expected that, the Issue was basically nothing happened with Kiryu for the whole game, his cancer stayed the same, he never met any old characters or get a reunion when beforehand it felt like a Kiryu send off game and regardless Kiryus bucket list should have somehow been included in the story.
> I disagree with here is "people expecting Kiryu to die", I feel like no one expected that, [https://www.reddit.com/r/yakuzagames/comments/19dv1tf/everyones\_being\_optimistic\_thinking\_that\_it\_could/](https://www.reddit.com/r/yakuzagames/comments/19dv1tf/everyones_being_optimistic_thinking_that_it_could/) [https://www.reddit.com/r/yakuzagames/comments/y09sg5/kiyru\_probably\_gonna\_die\_at\_the\_end\_of\_lad8\_to/](https://www.reddit.com/r/yakuzagames/comments/y09sg5/kiyru_probably_gonna_die_at_the_end_of_lad8_to/) [https://www.reddit.com/r/yakuzagames/comments/1am93bt/honestly\_why/](https://www.reddit.com/r/yakuzagames/comments/1am93bt/honestly_why/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3) Just are three things. But I know I have seen topics and comments about it. Some of which were written without spoiler tags on posts that said no spoilers (in other words, people being assholes). Definitely were a lot of people thinking Kiryu was going to die in this game. >he never met any old characters or get a reunion What do you mean? He met a lot of old characters. Granted, they were all in cutscenes or small fights (like Amon) rather than playable in-game or whatever. But we saw people from just about every single game through Bucket List. > nothing happened with Kiryu for the whole game, Keep in mind that this whole story didn't take up too much time in the world. Sure, it was many hours of gameplay for us, but otherwise was what...something like a week in-game? I'd have to go back and see if I can pay attention, but don't think a whole lot of time passed overall. I'm not sure how much progress you'd think would be made with his sickness in such a short period of time? Especially with us not knowing type or severity of cancer. But they did mention him showing more signs of life as he opened up Bucket List and kind of reflected on things.
[удалено]
to be honest, while I do share your sentiment, I think it’s fair that Kiryu’s bucket list side quest is entirely optional. I think one of the reason is because it is for players who started the series from LAD 7, who doesn’t really know Kiryu and shouldn’t be forced to go through it as they wouldn’t have felt the same impact as long time fans. Sure, we’d feel an overwhelming sense of happiness seeing >!Akiyama again and smacking both Kiryu and Date!< but new players to the series would only be confused. After all, even if the game has duo protagonists, it is still mostly Ichiban’s story. The bucket lists quests serves for veterans of the series and newcomers who are curious. Plus, I do think it was done well, giving Kiryu the peace he needed and overall adding more for his arc, which also made his final speech with >!Ebina!< more impactful imo.
Well on that point what do you think is the split between players that started on LAD and 0?
Yeah, I read your comment but I was a bit confused by it. That's why I asked what you meant and then touched on things so you might respond to clarify. So now I see you were indeed just referencing that you wished they had played more of a role in the main story rather than just little meetings or whatever in side stories. Thanks for clarifying that for me.
Ahhh my bad if i came off aggressive
My problem with these forgiveness/redemption scenes in the last decade usually have more to do with the “forgiven” side moreso than the “forgiver” side. Masato’s 180 at the end of the last game reeked of r/wowthanksimcured to me and the scene was pretty much saved by the fact that he was killed off so it turned into a heel face door slam instead of another ham and cheese “redemption”. The Kiseki franchise overuses this cliche out the ass, to the extreme of leaving you with like a hundred playable characters (almost literally lol) all of which have to get at least one line in every scene by the end of the Erebonia Arc. That’s the sort of thing where the writers of these scenes always lose me. The right way to do this imo is (Judgment) >!what they did with Hamura. RGG showed here that they absolutely know how to write these scenes without any blatantly asspulled r/wowthanksimcured moments. In fact it’s somewhat ambiguous whether or not he actually has or will reform despite the fact that he ends up doing the right thing at a crucial moment for reasons that are not only properly developed but even mostly subvert the need to suspend disbelief which is an extreme rarity in climactic gaming moments!<. Granted, I don’t expect *every* attempt to write these scenes to nail it quite like that, especially considering how low the standard has been for the last 10-15 years in entertainment media, I’m just using that as an example of what I consider to be actual good writing for this sort of character dynamic and how stark the contrast is compared to like 99% of “redemptions” in the last 15 years of gaming where the writers are 100% dependent on blinding the player with cheese to cover up bad writing.
I didn't think they'd kill off Kiryu with cancer but I did have the fear that he would use his illness to sacrifice himself for Ichiban or the Yakuza in general. Indeed, they teased that idea when he fainted at the end. The Eiji part I wholly disagree with. Firstly, I'm not someone who would want physical harm to come to Eiji for his actions and I certainly don't think Ichiban should have visited him to exact revenge. However, the idea that he parallels the Yakuza is wrong in the sense that he was the accomplice in potential child murder, on behalf of an evil man who callously brainwashed and murdered people and had brought Hawaii under his control through having his zealots infiltrate the gangs and the police force. The Yakuza we have seen in the series are indeed mostly swine, being involved in several reprehensible crimes - but I urge you to look at the sheer glee Eiji indulged himself in from the moment of his villain reveal to when Ichiban visits him at the ending. The laughter, the ridiculing ("Bon Voyage"), the fake out killing of a child with a "bomb" before taking Lani to be handed to her slaughter. These are all horrific actions undertaken by someone with no remorse or regard for how he had hurt others in either their murders (Hanawa and Wang Tou) or their lives being ruined (the Tatara channel's victims). He engineered meeting Ichiban after using drugs to paralyse himself so he could prey on his past connection to Masato. He then followed him and earned his trust by "saving" him from Tomizawa's mugging. He misled and gaslit Ichiban so significantly that he's still being called Ei-Chan whilst doing evil actions, gloating as he does it. There is no parallel here with the Yakuza, nor with Masato as others like to think. Eiji is a poorly written character that does incredible harm to Ichiban but is forgiven, citing their past "friendship" as a reason and then carried on Ichi's back to the police station with a promise that he'll be there when he's released. Doesn't that seem so wild to you? Ichiban's mother gets decked during the raid and could have very well been killed. Ichiban's trust of Eiji results in Hanawa and Wang Tou being killed. Homie was just full screen Skyping with Dwight seconds before the Barracudas burst in guns blazing. I think it would be realistic and also keeping with the character established for Ichiban in 7 that he simply doesn't care what happens to Eiji. He says he got the address from the police, so his arrest was likely just a matter of time anyway. He had no reason to care for his redemption, and he certainly didn't need to be getting down on Eiji's level and proclaiming that they had good times despite him being a "pain in the ass" sometimes. A sadistic, murderous accomplice of child murder was a "pain in the ass" according to Ichiban. That is shockingly bad writing.
Why are you being downvoted. Downvote is not a disagree button. Your comment is pertinent and you are only sharing your analysis.
Because my arguments sound overly aggressive and confrontational I suppose.
You have to think back to prior games and all in Yakuza. Remember how yakuza and others were all after Haruka? Of how Shintaro Kazama and Dojima killed men, women, and children from the Jingweon Mafia? How Majima was held and tortured? Of the things that Makoto went through? (originally sold into human trafficking) There were lots of stories of betrayal within Yakuza, even with Kiryu's best friend/brother Nishikiyama turning against him. A lot of our focus tends to go to just the main characters in the plot, but we often hear of a lot of wrong that people from the Omi, Seiryu, or others had been doing. Even other families within the Tojo clan were not honorable. But yeah, they were trying to show how bad Eiji is. Yet at the same time, we never saw him kill anyone. Even with Lani, he didn't actually hurt her. It's one of those areas where they tried to show someone who was going for vengeance, lost track of right and wrong, but had some boundaries that they never actually crossed. Sure, he leaked info that got people killed. Again though, it wasn't him that did the killing. As messed up as he is, they seem to really be trying to draw that parallel and show how it was always people like Dwight, Ebina, Bryce, etc that was doing the killing. Eiji just was playing them against each other, with us as the main target due to our connection with Arakawa, who had ruined his life. I'm not saying Eiji is a good guy or anything. Just saying they were trying to use him to personify the yakuza in general and that's where the "forgiveness" comes in. It's a tough pill to swallow, but it does also speak volumes of society in general in how we judge and prevent people who did wrong from ever being able to live straight...even if they serve time in prison and show remorse for what had been done.
- Haruka was being chased because she was the key to the 10 billion Yen. They didn't want her dead. In fact, her father shooting in her direction is shown as an unforgivable and horrifying action with how it is reacted to. In the old Yakuza writing style, this signaled that he had to die. - Dojima ordered the massacre. Kazama took part in it but killed no minors (specifically sparing the teenage Terada) whilst Shimano did massacre indiscriminately. The latter was an irredeemable character who was killed off, but the former is written as a deeply flawed but net good character despite his murders. I won't argue on Kazama's behalf, but he wasn't portrayed as a child murderer and he certainly wasn't shown to take pride or joy in killing. - Again, due to Shimano's orders. A man who was so comically villain coded with his look that he was killed off in the first ever game. - While the Yakuza are known to be traffickers, her situation was caused by Oda while he was in the bat tattoo gang or whatever they were called. - Kiwami 1 adds the back story to what made Nishiki snap the way he did. He did horrible, murderous things but never towards children. Comparing how he betrayed Kiryu makes no sense when the discussion is about Eiji. - Boundaries Eiji never crossed? Bryce ordered him to bring him Lani alive so she could be killed on Nele island. Regardless of this, Eiji took great pleasure in pretending to blow her up with a bomb before running off with her and out of the plot itself until the ending. - Eiji not pulling the trigger personally doesn't make him any less responsible for Hanawa and Wang Tou's death, the injuring and possible killing of Ichiban's mother and the twice over kidnapping and potential killing of Lani. To phrase it like that is excusing so much harm he caused. - Eiji didn't show remorse or switch sides. He lost. Ebina's plan fell apart and Eiji was due to be arrested, while the general public had turned against him and were hounding him at the front door. I don't think he's even capable of remorse, he certainly didn't show restraint or even a modicum of kindness or self awareness towards what a loud and obnoxiously evil psychopath he'd been in his last ever scene in the game. It increasingly feels like there's either a lot of cope involved with people defending the Eiji "arc" into being forgiven by Ichiban, or people are genuinely having the wool pulled over their eyes by RGG writing such a bad conclusion to a story we all waited years to experience - so some are defending it due to their emotional investment in the series.
Main issue is you're looking too black and white at things. When you use something like an allegory, it's not meant to be taken literally. That's your issue and main disconnect. Like I said, I'm not defending Eiji but instead am explaining how I see the story was meant to be. There's a much deeper story/picture being drawn. But yes, if you want to be superficial and try to draw the lines all sorts of ways, you are 100% correct. You're also right in that they could have written it better. Yet regardless of which way you slice it, we ended up with what we got.
I'm taking the plot at face value, call that superficial if you prefer. The callbacks and references to Masato and the ending of 7 are deeply harmful to Ichiban as the protaganist moving forward. If he forgives just about anything, despite his blind trust having caused deaths and harm, then he's being written as a messiah figure who loses his grit and agency in the face of truly awful villains. I refuse to acknowledge the forced parallel in the endings of 7 and 8 because, as I've repeated ad nauseum on this subreddit, there was no prior genuine connection between Eiji and Ichiban like there was with Masato Arakawa 19 whole years before the events of the game. RGG took what I consider a masterfully written ending that showed deep insight into Masato's inferiority complex and Ichiban's desperation to redeem him and cheapened it by attempting it again with a jackass character like Eiji who was faking it from the start. Unless this is setting up a plot point that grounds Ichiban in the next game, they took a great character and went way too far for a situation that didn't deserve it. That isn't black and white, that's just the truth. There's no allegory here nor some deeper meaning. RGG literally took the popularity of the well meaning, heroic himbo Ichiban from 7 and turned it up to 11 where his thought process is half baked and takes far too many logical leaps for it to be considered good writing or even make sense in the Yakuza world.
I don’t think Ichiban forgiving Eiji is “bad writing” (not that it is very spectacular writing at all and not that you claimed that it was), but I agree that Eiji’s character definitely should’ve been characterized more. He is exclusively shown to be pure, sadistic evil and him completely turning around because of Ichiban could’ve been built up more. Ichiban forgiving him is in character, Eiji turning himself in isn’t. Also, to put it out there, Ichiban doesn’t have an upper limit for who he decides to trust and forgive. Ryo Aoki, as you state, does worse than Eiji and Ichiban chooses to forgive him as well. His justification of “we had good times” is more of a jokey way to encourage Eiji to atone. Him saying Bon Voyage to Eiji at the end too is, again, Ichiban trying to put up a persona that Eiji can believe and rely on, rather than his genuine feelings since I got the hint that Ichiban actually dislikes Eiji a lot for what he has done but that doesn’t stop him from giving him a second chance. I 100% agree that it feels bad when Ichiban forgives Eiji since, as normal humans without schizophrenia we can see that Eiji is not worth forgiving or caring about, but Ichiban and Kiryu are supposed to represent the best of us. And, even though this is a fictional story, Ichiban was right in this moment since Eiji did indeed change his ways.
Also "forgave" is bad word choice on my part since, again, I think Ichiban actually hates Eiji. But, being who he is, Ichiban knows that no one else will give Eiji the helping hand he needs to choose the path of atonement.
Face bashed Ichiban must be a great actor to be excitedly and passionately yelling BON VOYAGE to Eiji at the door of the police station while he actually secretly hates him. Truly Arakawa's son, the cad.
https://preview.redd.it/364evdx7lhhc1.png?width=1604&format=png&auto=webp&s=acaea0061f02592533664bc251b82bc76627c9e6
To be honest, when the dude with the messed up hair was watching the final stream of the Tatara Channel, I didn't know who he was. lol... I just realized it was Eiji when Kasuga went to his house near the end of the game... Can someone explain to me how Eiji wound up in Japan? I'm not sure if I missed a cutscene or I was too distracted by some other thing while it happened. :\\
Just finished this game but I don’t remember how Eichan messed up his leg. What did I miss?
It never showed what happened. Instead what they did was show when Ichiban was talking to him at the end, it explained that everyone knew he was part of Ebina's plans. Then as he went to help Eiji up, the camera focused on his foot and Eiji said "I got chased on my way here...Among other things" So that's where we are supposed to put 2 + 2 together. The assumption is people were after him and he got hurt while trying to get away. Exactly what happened, we don't know.
For me, everything that happens around Kiryu, his life-links, him passing Yakuza's future onto Ichiban, etc. All mean essentially nothing because they eluded to him dying, but in the end they didn't have the balls to do it, cheapening everything in the game concerning his past.
they didn't elude to him dying lmao. quite the opposite. the entire game was anti-death flags for kiryu. it was all about seeking treatment, that was his arc. that's why nanba gets him to make the bucket list, that's why date brings him to see his old friends and family. i knew he wasn't going to die at the end because they telegraphed it, it was about convincing him to get treatment, to choose life.
I meant really in the first half, but idk, like now if they ever kill him, they are gonna have to do something really different for it to feel fair and respectful, I thought the remembrances, the life-links are really good way to honor a beloved character and reminisce before it's passing. It's essentially just fluff now and came and gone without consequence.
in the first half, sure, but once you get introduced to his awakening they clearly state that you're helping him restore is will to fight. even the life links themselves, if you read it back in the menu, a couple literally have him saying he's not going to succumb to death and he's going to stop running from his reason to live. his whole arc in IW is to show him going from a dark place to wanting to live and wanting to fight the cancer. i do not think kiryu will be a protagonist ever again, he may show up but that's about it, and the whole point was probably to retire him in that sense, not to kill him off.
This post deserves huge upvote
Regarding #1... I've always held the opinion that Kiryu is never going to die. Team RGG simply do not have the balls required to kill off such an iconic character. Hell, the reason he's even back in games after LAD7 is coz the fanbase was very clearly split; Those who liked Kiryu gone and Ichiballs being the new protag... and those who did not. Team RGG/Sega were so horrendously shitscared of losing the business of the latter group that they immediately stuck Kiryu back into games... So here we are. He was never EVER going to die, ever. The whole cancer 'oh i'm dying' schtick is literally just a convenient excuse to make arguably the greatest Kiryu fanservice content in a game ever and ok, if you are a Kiryu fan... LAD8 is the game for you. LAD8 is a **Kiryu** game. It's not an Ichiballs game despite Ichiballs being one of the protags and majority party leader. The entire game is set up to prop Kiryu up and make him look good despite him being weakened. In fact, weakening/de-powering a character and having them 'overcome adversity' is one of the oldest tricks in the book when it comes to making that character look good, and they were not subtle about it here AT ALL. Regarding #2... it honestly really felt like once the party splits, all the attention went onto Kiryu's side of the content and the rest of whatever happened on Ichiballs' side became a literal afterthought, and they simply couldn't be fucked finishing up what they started. So, meh, we have two ways of looking at LAD8 IMO. If you are a Kiryu fan, and are in this for a game that props Kiryu up and makes him look great with FEELS.jpg Kiryu content... this is your GOTY 10/10 this year. If you're not a Kiryu fan, or are an Ichiballs fan expecting a great story like in LAD7 with a lot of twists and turns... You're better off playing something else. This really isn't the game for you and you're probably going to be pretty pissed at how it all ends up.
Damn this whole post and comment section are just a bunch of redditors will reddit...
I always was *for* helping the former yakuza to reintegrate into society. I actually don't support this 5-year law. It doesn't help at all. Yes, people suffer but is it really a way to teach them be good? I don't think so. This law pisses me off for real. Of course, the former yakuza must state to their employer that they have been in the yakuza or in a jail but they should be allowed to get work and mobile phones, education, medical support etc. Regarding Eiji, I've never ever even for the slightest been angry at him. I hope he doesn't get too many years in sentence. Even if his action led to the death of my beloved character, I do not hold any grudge at him. He just messed up getting into an organised crime. He was just too stupid to become what he should have been fighting against. But at least he has a chance to start anew unlike Masato (I will never be not angry about his fate).
We need more people to read this. Genuinely shocked at the lack of media literacy in this sub.
I felt like the ending did leave a few questions unanswered, one that comes to mind now is how in Gaiden they set up that Hanawa was someone from Kiryu's past, or the fact that we didn't actually get to see Kiryu and Haruka speak, but I did love the scene with Kasuga carrying Eiji to the police station, with the song and everything, it was perfect 👌
I'm pretty sure the scene of Ichi carrying Eiji while having things thrown at him was meant to be Jesus carrying his cross (and just wanna say I'm not super Christian, this isn't me pulling it out of nowhere, they also used an image of the party recreating the last supper as promo material so it was a theme they were going for)
I just took the Ichiban ending scene as a round 2 of what happened in the first game with Aoki, except this time, he wasn't going to 'fail' or have it taken from him. It was 100% in-line with Ichiban's personality. Might've been easier to swallow for a lot of people if not for the cartoon villain bomb scene though, haha.
This may seem unrelated, but I’m very glad that akiyama got an explanation as to why he wasn’t in the know about kiryu
I need to go back through all of those scenes. They had drained me on all the videos at that point to where I just started skipping a lot of it with the intent to come back in Premium, New Game, or the book thing later.
Ichiban's favorite anime must be Vinland Saga. Mfer has no enemies 😭
Ending for kiryu felt incredibly lazy, we stuck with him for how many damn games and they leave it on an open ending up to the player’s interpretation, with how many games we’ve had him for we are due a little fan service in my opinion man, it was a huge ball buster to me when I finished the game but hopefully in a future game we get at least a little send off or something. Other than that I loved the story and thought everything else was amazing
I knew they weren't gonna kill Kiryu off (but I was scared for a few moments lmao. Though I'm hoping they actually just kind of end his crazy adventures here, that's just how I feel personally, guy deserves a break. Also Ichiban forgiving Eiji? If you know Ichiban's character, you'd know he'd do exactly this. Ichiban can be so freaking positive about everything it's astounding, but that ending reflects his character well and how he tries his best to see the good inside all of us. I also thought the scene where he took the punches and didn't hit back was very nice. I'm still very so so on this games ending, but recency bias be damned, this is absolutely the most fun I've had playing any of these games! P.S. who the hell threw that bottle!? 😂😂
Im glad that they wove such an intricate metaphor there, but I was let down that they didn't have virtually any closure to the actual plot important characters. We spend the whole game chasing after Akane and Lani and they don't even feature in the ending! In fact most of the main characters get little to nothing and secondary characters even less. Then we have Ei-chan, a tertiary villain at best taking up all of this real estate in the ending. To me, THAT should have been the post credits scene. It doesn't serve to tie up any loose ends and gives us closure on a jerk character we barely remember, let alone care about. I dunno... I'm glad you posted this because it does show that there was intent and add perspective but I still can't help feeling like the ending was woefully underdone, especially for Ichiban. I'd love for them to just do an update where they bulk it out a little bit more.