The Rain Stopped

there's a lot of things in the way kiwami is presented, mostly the faithful recreation of cutscenes and story beats 1:1 to the original, that probably give a weird impression to newcomers. og y1 has a different direction than the modern games - cutscenes are interwoven much more tightly with the story objectives, and because the engine didn't support "in-game dialogue" (spoken text in boxes) anything they wanted voiced or even a little animated had to be a cutscene. i think this in combination with the slightly-too-abrupt fadeouts makes the game feel a bit more choppy. also they added a lot of side content for kiwami that lengthens the time you spend inbetween said cutscenes. since they're really short already, the change in pacing throws it off more.

all this to say it's not bad, but it makes so much more sense that i didn't really like it playing directly after y0. it's much more charming knowing the drama of the original ps2 scenes, and even seeing the emotional moments with the original voice actors was touching. given that modern rgg games trend towards long-winded exposition and long narration in substories that often feels unnecessary, kiwami loops back around to being "old" again with snappier dialogue and quests that lead very naturally into the gameplay loop (or at least doesn't unwillingly drag you into them). it's just nice when you can run across someone getting scammed, beat up the scammer, and then kiryu gets to drop a one-liner.

majima everywhere is also greatly improved having the context of the rest of the series. there is the little tidbits about majima's past (stuff introduced in greater detail in yakuza 4/5) but knowing there's approximately 1 minute of kazumaji in any given future game makes me appreciate it even more. i remember thinking it was a little gimmicky but actually it's pretty impressive how incredibly funny it is and also very in-character.

og y1 has such a special place in my heart... i've played it three times now so i might be biased, but the old clunky engine is my favorite because it encapsulates the "video game" feel of it so well while also capturing an incredible atmosphere (can you tell this is also my love of nocturne and dds?). kiwami does a really good job at recapturing that essence while adding modernity and qol - it's rgg studio's fourth game in the 0 engine (i think that's what people call it anyway despite the iteration beginning with y5) and you can really tell because a lot of the edges from 5/0/ishin were polished out, and the fighting styles gameplay is the best its ever been. genuinely so fun!!!!!!!

also you can relentlessly quote the english dub

I don't know how it happened Was it always this way and I just couldn't see it? Heart burning hot enough for the both of us I never realized how much you were holding back All the times I felt so plugged in You were tuning out A muted channel, a cold shell, a hologram, an abyss