Yakuza 3 is wrapped up. After A short adjustment. I got into the swing of things pretty easily with The dated gameplay. Really it wasn't that bad, but the enemies definitely didn't make the combat real easy. Way too much blocking. Main story was a nice change from the usual Yakuza business, and all the kids and everything in Okinawa give the game a very different vibe. I will say, this is the least amount of time I've ever spent on a game in the series. I almost entirely skipped the hostess junk, and a lot of the other side missions as well. I think when I beat the game I had got about 25% completion, whereas I normally get somewhere close to 50%.

Despite wanting to go back for a second playthrough, I'm going to close up Salt and Sanctuary and wanted to put my final thoughts down before moving on.

It's probably my favorite game I played this year. Very hard, but never unfair. Well, most of the time. There were a couple boss battles that I had to consult a guide on. And towards the end of the game, the developers either ran out of time, ideas, or money. Either that or they're just kind of sadistic. And in the last hours of the game, there is an over-reliance on your character blindly dropping into pits to find a platform. So if you choose to go left, and the platform you're looking for is on the right, you're dead. The narrative could have been a lot more interesting too. The first half of the game you really don't know what's going on, and it's not until the second half where you start meeting characters who drop little hints on what's going on.

All of that was fairly minor in the grand scheme of things though. I had a lot of fun with this and I'm sure I'll revisit again before the year is out.

I finished up Alan Wake remastered this afternoon. Glad I finally got a chance to check it out after all these years. Really good story that made up for a lot of the game shortcomings, which probably weren't quite as noticeable when it the original version came out 15 years ago.

Dragon Quest Heroes 2 is finished. Kind of interesting. It's got more content, More characters, more variety of things to do, and probably a better story. Story. Despite all that, I don't think it's better than the original. If anything this suffered from a little bit of bloat. I've been wanting to wrap it up for over a week.

Where I will give some special credit to it though is with the final boss battle. That son of a bitch was hard. I died a couple times during the course of the game so it wasn't a complete walk in the park. But that final battle was fucking devious. I had to try three different teams and ultimately had to spend about four more hours. Just grinding for money and accessories to get a hold of some better gear.