In order to prepare myself for the next Judgment (the preview of which is available here), I completely redid the PS5 version of the title to be sure to understand all the references. Finally ready, I tackled the latest production from Ryū ga Gotoku Studio: Lost Judgment. We find the whole troop that revolves around the hero Takayuki Yagami, with some new characters introduced that will allow the detective to advance the new investigation on which he has been commissioned by a new detective agency based in Yokohama!
The story is darker for this sequel...
This cabinet - Yokohama 99 - was created by well-known protagonists from the 1st opus: Fumiya Sugiura, a former thief linked to the investigation and Makoto Tsukumo, a hacker Yagami used for some of his investigations. We can therefore navigate between the famous district of Tokyo, Kamurochô, and Isezaki Ijincho, which the players of Yakuza : Life a Dragon were able to discover last year on PS4 and Xbox Series, and this year on PS5. Already richly scripted in the previous game (but dragging a hair in length), the story of Lost Judgment is more dark and intense. From the introduction, we witness the discovery of a badly battered corpse, whose identity we will discover fairly quickly during a trial with the Genda firm.
Yagami, parallel to the trial, is called by Sugiura who asks for help to investigate a bullying case in high school, which then unlocks access to Yokohama. The story constantly makes you want to see the sequel, thanks to the talent of the screenwriters who brilliantly multiply the twists and revelations. In the end, the most unexpected thing is to see that Lost Judgment masterfully manages to distance itself from its roots: the Yakuza. The fact of evolving in a high school completely changes the situation, and the studio knows how to treat the subjects with accuracy, and evokes, as said above, dark themes: school bullying, revenge or even suicide. We avoid the moralizing tone all the time, thanks to the dialogues between the characters who often have distinct points of view. I reassure you nevertheless, an RGG game would not be what it is without its share of absurdity. Small flat however, we will always find yakuza and other thugs, but one thing caught my attention. Our favorite detective does not hesitate before falling on the face of a little zealous high school student, and it doesn't seem to bother anyone. A bit curious, even if we can put it down to "the absurd". You will have many side stories that will lighten the mind a bit and lengthen the gaming experience and will justify many trips to Kamurochô to start some quests. Count 25 hours to complete the 13 chapters of the main story, which can easily be doubled to overcome the quarantine of secondary cases!
From now on, we can move around on a skateboard (only on the road)
On the gameplay side, we find everything that was in Judgment, with the addition of a new combat stance. In addition to the stance of the tiger and that of the crane, you will now have the possibility of opting for the stance of the snake, which allows you to perform parries and counter-attacks. So we have 3 very complementary fighting styles, even if, for my part, I totally abandoned the Crane, preferring the violent blows of the Tiger and the agility of the Snake. Note that now, certain actions in combat earn bonus PA, which is always appreciable. For the rest, we are on familiar ground. Yagami unlocks abilities through smartphone magic, spending his hard-earned skill points, and the effects of posture-modulo attacks make battles more awesome than before. To get around the new neighborhood, Yagami can count on his new skateboard. Japanese respect obliges, the latter can only be used on the road. Our hero will therefore put his foot on the ground as soon as you have a wheel placed on a pedestrian zone. Finally, a quick word on the mini-games in this sequel: boxing and dancing kills!
On the technical side, we are getting closer to what was done with the remaster released earlier this year on a next-gen console. It's very pretty, the modeling of the characters and facial expressions still commands respect, and we are on a display frequency that never wavers. I've seen several people here and there criticizing the "mass recycling" of playgrounds. While I can hear this argument, I don't really understand it. Two quarters reproduced at 1:1 scale, one of which has only been used on one game... It's work and I think it is necessary to reuse them. Maybe not on 8 different games, but all the same, here, the cards are fully exploited and offer a density as we rarely see in the Open-World. Audio side, as for the previous one Judgment et Yakuza LAD, we are entitled to two audio tracks: Japanese and English. I tested both and switched back to Japanese very quickly, having struggled with the main cast in English. For French speakers, we are entitled to quality French subtitles.
Light is still as brawling in Lost Judgment
It seemed difficult to me to do better than Judgment, and yet, the Ryū ga Gotoku studio has achieved it with mastery. Lost Judgment, it's an assumed and fully successful turn to move away from the Yakuza while keeping the Beat'em all DNA. We could have feared that, but we finally end up with a title that can easily be included in the "Game of the Year" list. Complete, enjoyable and exciting, difficult to pout in front of this new nugget.
Available from September 24, 2021 on PS4, PS5, Xbox One and Xbox Series S|X. Recommended retail price of €59,99.
