So, its time for a new review and this will be of a video game I have recently finished playing, which is the action adventure video game, Judgment, which is a spin-off of the Yazuka games series. I haven't played the Yakuza games but I had seen some videos of this game on Youtube and was intrigued by them, so thought I would give it a go.
So, with that said, let's take a look at the game and see how it stacks up...
And the usual warning is coming up...
PLOT SPOILERS ARE AHEAD (BUT NOT TOO MANY!)
STORY
So, I will quote a bit of the plot from Wikipedia below to save time on typing (lol!).
"Defense attorney Takayuki Yagami investigates and successfully clears hospital worker Shinpei Okubo of the murder of patient Koichi Waku. However, Okubo is arrested shortly thereafter for allegedly murdering his girlfriend. Guilt-ridden, Yagami resigns from his law firm. Three years later, Yagami becomes a private detective in Tokyo's Kamurocho district and accepts investigation requests with his partner, ex-Tojo clan member Masaharu Kaito. A serial killer has been murdering yakuza members in Kamurocho and removing the eyes of the corpses. Yagami accepts a murder case concerning a Matsugane clan captain, Kyohei Hamura, who is suspected of killing a Kyorei clan member using the same methods. Yagami proves Hamura's innocence, though he suspects that he is working with the killer that Yagami dubs the Mole...".
THOUGHTS
Judgment is a very entertaining action game, which tells a really good and intriguing story that keeps you playing and guessing as to what is going on and who is really behind the killings. The characters are also very well drawn out with Yagami, a former top defense lawyer, who now works as a private detective and feels guilty after he defended a man, who then went on to murder his girlfriend. Yagami however is not only good with his mind but also with his fists as he often takes own many of the street gang thugs and Yakuza to be found in the fictional Tokyo district, Kamurocho and is helped by partner, Kaito, a former Yakuza, who was expelled from the Matsugane family. At the heart of the game is a man, who is determined to get to the truth and will stop at nothing until he gets it (sounds familiar lol!).
GAMEPLAY
As for gameplay, I will cover it in sub sections below as per usual.
MOVEMENT
Starting with movement, your character Yagami, who you play in the third person perspective, can walk, run and climb and jump over obstacles and during chase scenes, you will use quick time event button choices to allow Yagami to evade things in his path when chasing someone. Yagami can also tail someone in the game and in those instances, he can find certain spots that he can crouch behind to stay out of sight of his target before resuming his tail.
COMBAT
Combat wise, Judgment inherits a similar combat system found in the Yakuza series, where Yagami exclusively uses hand to hand combat and can perform a series of combos on his enemies, which can be street thugs, Yakuza members or the main game bosses. Yagami can also choose between two different fighting styles, crane-style, which focuses on fighting enemies in groups and tiger style, which deals with fighting individuals. Yagami can also pick up objects to help him deal greater damage to enemies such as bicycles, traffic cones and advert signs (yep ad signs!) which can be triggered by a quick time event button press.
Yagami will also have access a number of consumables that can boost his attack power that even give different effects such as fire and lightning to his combos that last only a limited while. Yagami can also be helped in combat situations by Kaito and without giving the plot away, he has another couple of associates who can help him in combat too.
INVESTIGATIONS AND TAILING
Another key aspect of the gameplay involves Yagami using his investigation skills to look for clues either at crime scenes or other areas when working a main story case or a side case. The player will have to hover over certain objects within one area and Yagami will scan them for clues, once he has looked over the required objects, his investigation will be complete.
Yagami will also as part of his investigations, ask people different questions throughout the game in both the main story and side missions to obtain information. Based on which order you ask the questions, Yagami may also be awarded a skill point bonus in these moments but if you ask in the wrong sequence, you will miss out on the bonus. The game will also try and ensure you were paying attention as Yagami will at times have to recall information he had learned and you will be prompted for it.
As for tailing, Yagami can tail suspects involved in crimes or other activities in both the main story and also the side missions. In this mode, Yagami must keep his distance from the person or they will become suspicious and turn round and look out for him, which will cause a suspicion meter to increase as the person grows more aware of Yagami following them. Yagami can also in some instances use his phone to take pictures of the people he is following if related to a specific case e.g. one case involves Yagami to follow a female client's husband she suspects is cheating on her and Yagami must get a picture of him as proof.
CONSUMABLES AND HEALTH
Moving onto consumables, there are various ones to be found in the game that have different uses such as replenishing HP, boosting Yagami's EX gauge (to perform special attacks), boosting Yagami's attack power and also to increase item discovery when defeating enemies. As for Yagami's health, which is shown by a health bar on the HUD, it can be increased by gaining skill points but Yagami can suffer mortal wounds during combat, which will require him to use medical kits or to visit an underground doctor, who can treat him for these wounds.
SKILLS
As for skills, Yagami can learn different skills for combat as well as adaptive skills within his environment. Such skills for combat include different attacks for both the Tiger and Crane fighting styles, evasive moves to dodge attacks during fights. Other skills also include Yagami's ability to pick locks and use wires to open doors, so he can infiltrate different areas as well as increase his abilities to use a drone, which Yagami will use off and on through the game to spy on suspects to gather information.
FRIENDSHIPS AND DATING EVENTS
Throughout the game, Yagami can also get to meet knew people, who he can befriend by doing them favours or helping them out in some way, which will allow him to form friendships with them. Further to this, Yagami can also through friendship also go on dates with women, which will involve texting them back and forth in order to meet up and eventually form a relationship with them.
ENEMIES AND BOSSES
And lastly in the gameplay section are the enemies and bosses in the game as Yagami will face a various number of enemies throughout the game. The enemies can range from street thugs, who Yagami often fight in groups and for the most part are quite straight forward, however as the game progresses, the gangs can become tougher. Then there are the bosses of the game, who can present a stronger challenge for Yagami as they larger health bars and more often than not, they will have at least two health bars that Yagami must deplete before defeating them. There are however mini bosses in the game, which Yagami can fight and on defeat, he will just get up and take his loss on the chin (literally I guess!) but the main game bosses will see Yagami die, which involves restarting the fight again.
VOICE ACTING
As for the voice acting, well I played the game using the English voice option, so the accents are exclusively American and I know some of the English voice acting in certain Japanese games can sound a bit dodgy but overall here, they have done a pretty good job with a solid cast.
Starting with Greg Chun, who is excellent as Yagami, the former lawyer, turned private detective, who takes on a murder case, which goes way deeper than he expected and event links to his past. Yagami generally a pretty morose expression on his face but despite that, Chun actually makes Yagami quite likeable while serious, he does show that Yagami has a lighter side too.
Crispin Freeman is also very good in his role as Kaito, Yagami's partner at the detective agency, who was a former Yakuza member, who was expelled from his family but now helps Yagami to try and solve the murder case in the main game. Kaito is a very ballsy, gung-ho character but basically a good guy in his own way and his brash yet likeable manner, adds a lot of colour to the game (especially the shirt he wears throughout!).
Fred Tatasciore is excellent too in his role as the intimidating Yakuza captain, Hamura, who is arrested for the murder of a Yakuza member and put on trial for it but there is more than meets the eye with him. Tatasciore actually replaced another actor in the role, who had criminal charges against them, which forced the makers to dismiss him and change the actor's likeness.
Brian McNamara also is very good as Genda, the head lawyer of the law firm, where Yagami used to work before his resignation and he plays a key part in helping Yagami out during the murder case of the main story.
Cherami Leigh also provides a fine performance as Mafuyu, a lawyer at the chief prosecutor's office, who was once romantically linked to Yagami and as the game progressives, she tries to help Yagami with the murder case. Leigh herself would go on to voice the female version of V in the RPG action game, Cyberpunk 2077.
Steve Blum is also very good in his role as Higashi, a high ranking member of the Matsugane Yakuza family, who faces stern pressure from Hamura's brutal ways throughout the game and has torn loyalities toward his family and helping Yagami and Kaito.
Keythe Farley also provides a very good performance as Shintani, one of the lawyers that Yagami works with and defends the Yakuza captain, Hamura on his murder trial. Shintani however soon becomes involved in something deeper than just Hamura's trial, which later has dire consequences.
And last of all is Michael Gough, who also does very well in his role as Shono, an important research scientist who works for a centre that is trying to create a drug that will cure alzheimer's disease with the drug known as AD-9.
GRAPHICS
As for the graphics, the game looks great with plenty of good detail in the environments and the busy streets of Kamurocho are always lively with people walking around but there are also plenty of neon lights, traffic, reflections and shadows. As for the character models, they are also excellent although not quite lifelike, they still look very good as Yagami and the other characters all very well rendered. There are some rough edges to the graphics however here and there (well there was on the Xbox Series S version I played but maybe not so much on the other next gen consoles) which are often noticeable on windows and blinds. That aside though, Judgment is still a pretty good looking game.
MUSIC
As for the music, the score was composed by Hidenori Shoji and it is pretty good overall as it sounds both quite modern but at the same time, it also has a noir feel to it, particularly in the moments where Yagami is tailing someone. The score also re-uses a couple of its themes for different parts of the game, specifically where Yagami is questioning someone or there is a fight scene. Overall however, this is a pretty good score and one that is well suited to the tone of the game.
FLAWS
As for flaws...yeah Judgment does have some worth mentioning.
For starters, I think while the game's story is a very good one overall, I did think the game ran on just a bit too long as there are a whopping 13 chapters in these game and each chapters is at least a couple of hours each. So, by the time I had finished my playthrough time was over 26 hours long, which is just a bit long winded for my liking for such a game. The story thankfully is pretty compelling overall but I just felt the game still could have benefited from being a bit shorter.
Another issue I had was to do with the repetitive nature of the combat, as the game overwhelms you with loads of enemies as Yagami runs through the streets, he frequently is forced to fight street thugs or Yakuza family members over and over again. So, it tends to get a bit tedious after a while, as you just want to get from A to B after a while without having to open another can of whoop-ass on more enemies! The same can also be said for the main game missions where Yagami has to infiltrate different places, he will again have to fight groups of enemies time and time again before he can reach his objective and again this can get a bit tiresome after a while as it is so repetitive.
This is also brings me onto the side missions of the game, as there are times where the game also springs them on you at some inconvenient moments where again you just want to get somewhere but then the game presents with another side mission! One such example is where Yagami has to chase a floating object through the streets and if you lose it, you have to start all over again and I just happened to stumble on this side mission by accident, which I didn't really want to do in the first place. So, if that happens, you basically just have to reload the game and try and take a different route to avoid the mission.
Another problem I had was to do with the map system as reading the map can get a bit confusing from a directional standpoint, especially when you place a way point to get somewhere but following the map, you can too easily take a wrong turn and end up in the wrong direction entirely! You can get use to the map system after a while but at first it is pretty confusing.
WARNING: SPOILER AHEAD IN THE NEXT PARAGRAPH!!
And last of all on a plot note, I felt there are time where Yagami was being a bit too direct and confrontational with certain suspects before he had sufficient evidence in the game. Such an example was when Yagami goes to the ADDC to confront the research scientist, Shono, who is working on the drug, AD-9 to cure Alzheimer's. So, Yagami basically barges into the place, beats up the guards that oppose him and he corners Shono and tells him his theory that implicates Shono in the murder case Yagami investigates, without any proof whatsoever. So, for me there are times where Yagami just wants to intimidate his suspects to get a reaction but without actual proof its more just a waste of time.
Anyway that's it for the flaws.
SUM UP
So, to sum up, Judgment is a very solid and enjoyable spin-off game from the Yakuza series, which tells a really compelling story that will keep you guessing and riveted to its end and the gameplay itself is fun with a number of different things you can do and not just the combat, which is also fun. There are some issues of course still as the game is very long and the combat can get a bit repetitive after a while with non stop hoards of enemies after you.
However, if you are willing to forgive its shortcomings, Judgment is definitely worth checking out and I for one, will definitely be checking out the game's sequel, Judgment Lost, which should be out later this year.
So, I will give Judgment a rating of:
8 out of 10
So, that's it for now and I will be back sometime soon with another review.
Till then, bye for now!
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