All hannyas on deck.
This isn’t a throwaway joke.
The game maintains this clip over the course of its 18-odd hour campaign.
And, despite the pace, it manages to introduce loads of new stuff without it becoming overwhelming.
The sailing is a shorthand way of understanding the tone of Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii.
Everything that isn’t fun, including sailing in the traditional, gusty sense, is largely absent.
But naval battles are usually swift and exhilarating.
Bigger naval encounters culminate with on-deck battles, which are huge, chaotic, and extremely silly.
I’m somehow embarrassed and proud, all at once.
The fights themselves feel bigger, lighter, and messier than many of the games that came before.
Heat Actions, in particular, feel more limited, with smaller windows of opportunity.
The other element that feels new is the sheer scale of the combat.
It’s not all about me, until the game tells me it is.
It still feels like a Yakuza game, despite being set completely outside of Japan.
A copy of Like A Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii was provided for review by publisher Sega.
