I know I am nearly a year late to the party, but that is how long it took me to knock Yakuza 3 out of my backlog. Actually, I breezed through the first four chapters of the game when I bought it last summer, and it promptly got whisked away into the backlog when the first half of 2010 was hammered hard with an unbelievable amount of tip-top games. The first couple months of 2011 I have dedicated to making some headway into my backlog, and the last couple weeks I have belonged to Yakuza 3. And with the release of Yakuza 4 just a month away, what ideal timing would it be for me to freshen everyone up on the series’ PS3 debut.

Once again, you control Kazuma who is now trying to put his dark past behind him. How does he go about changing his ways? By running an orphanage in Okinawa of course! Having Kazuma living a peaceful life in an orphanage would not make a great game, so naturally the land it is built on happens to be in the way of a pesky resort deal that is trying to rear its ugly head. It would not be a Yakuza; game either if this resort had ties to the Prime Minister and a bunch of Kazuma’s old Yakuza running buddies. Thus we have Kazuma’s impetus to getting dragged back to kicking some Yakuza tail!

Even if you have not played the first two Yakuza games, Yakuza 3 is still a good hopping on point because it features recap videos for both of the prior installments in the series to catch you up on all the events that have led up to third game in the franchise. The narrative is by far the strongest part of this game. It tells a great story even when I thought it started off kind of ridiculous with Sega making sure you get to know each and every single one of orphans that Kazuma is in charge of.

I kid you not, of the nineteen hours it took me to finish Yakuza 3, about five or six of them were spent doing mandatory quests for the orphans. This was my only real gripe with the story. I get setting up how good Kazuma has it and how happy he is with his life, but there was just way too much time spent in the orphanage. Eventually though, Sega reeled me in and got me to care about those orphans and to make sure no evil resort would be built over their orphanage!
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If E3 had a mascot it would be Gran Turismo.  I can’t say how many years E3 has been around, but let’s just say E3 has been around 25 years. I am confident 19 out of 25 years, some sort of Gran Turismo has been in development. Anyway, all you’re supposed to know something is happening with playing a bunch of Sly Cooper games; and Valve, there’s that. People still don’t have much faith in Socom Anal Bead. Personally, I’m looking toward Move for somebody to try something competitive with motion controls. I am probably the only person secretly wishing this.
Oh yeah, no PSP2.

3:08 mormonrage: I think shooters suck as demos
3:08 mormonrage: I’m so sick of seeing guns blowing & up for five minutes in these things

3:13 frozenlava: oh god
3:14 frozenlava: sly in 3d
3:14 frozenlava: big name!
3:14 rockhstrongo: i was just going to say gt5 3d

3:14 mormonrage: slycollection–hell yeah

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In honor of Intergalactic Shmuppreciation Month, I thought it would be nice to share a page I found a year or two ago with all you space pilots.  This is an independent article that highlights several Japanese space shooters for the original Playstation.  While you would need an import system to play these, you might want to consider the exciting price of such an endeavor.  Now follow the link and let’s take a little time to celebrate this torturous love.  I shmuppreciate you.