Majima's weird pirate adventure is fun BUT are the waters it's treading deep or shallow?
PROS:
★ Pirate's Coliseum. It's underground coliseum but for your ship and your crew. Highlight of the game and hella' fun.
★ Hawaii's Honolulu hub recycle BUT it is a big place to explore. Also, almost all minigames from 8 are present which is another highlight of the game (i.e. dragon kart, perv pictorial, food delivery, etc)
+ Substories are still really fun, memorable, and did I mention fun? Well, almost all of them are but I forgot how good these substories are. There's even a dedicated dating one for your first m8 and it's funny as ♥♥♥♥.
+ Character Customization - one of the few modern addition that I can get behind to. Introduced in Gaiden and as far as I know, should stay on the upcoming games. Why didn't I rush the Luffy outfit was beyond my understanding.
+ Works well on my rig and with the deck
HIT OR MISS:
? Seafaring Elements are a mixed bag of pros and cons:
*arcade-y and janky
*no upgrades to ship speed throughout the game
*camera angle is way off and you can't see much in both seafaring cameras
* no real exploration in sea; instead, game shows key points / areas in map for you to go to
* deck exploration was actually really good though; you can basically do anything you can do on land while not in combat. (i.e. camera selfies, talking to crew, and you have added captain functions like hosting a feast, giving gifts to crew, mini farming) You can't jump out into the open water though
? weakest story of the franchise and thought in the beginning that it was a character assassination for Majima. Rushed through the story after exploring all that the game offers. That said, after finishing the game, the ending was tacky BUT was the reason the story went from a CON and into the HIT OR MISS section. Last bit before the epilogue became a literal Filipino classic lol but you can tell Majima will really do those things.
? The pirate land hub didn't have anything fun in it except for the Pirate's Coliseum
? Melee combat was meh: You had two choices, classic majima and pirate majima which has different movesets. Classic majima is always welcome BUT they could've done more with the pirate moveset. Feels off sometimes and I just end up switching to classic anyways because it's the better choice to kill mobs.
CONS:
- Relationship dialogue while exploring the open world is just white noise. I know it's meant to deepen their relation ship but it's extremely boring ♥♥♥♥. Guaranteed everyone skipped this.
- Phone menu is just part of the main menu lol. I don't get it, why didn't they just put the phone menu features inside the main menu?
- Color grading is WAY off. Makes everything look like plastic or against the light. I think it also has this problem in Kiwami 3.
- Grenadier enemy crew stun locks and steam rolls your boarding party.
- sound design was cheap for LAD: Pirates especially for the sword sound effects lol.
Game is fun as hell BUT if you're looking for a character progression for Majima inside the Yakuza universe, you're looking at the wrong game. Fun is all that LAD: Pirates has to offer for Yakuza fans. Barely got in BUT I have to recommend LAD:Pirates, preferably on sale, especially if you've played Yakuza Infinite Wealth since you've explored half the game already.
2.5/5
