Yakuza 0

 PlayStation 4
User Score
8.6

Generally favorable reviews- based on 1510 Ratings

User score distribution:
  1. Positive: 1,303 out of 1510
  2. Mixed: 69 out of 1510
  3. Negative: 138 out of 1510
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  1. Kinokee
    Dec 16, 2017
    7
    I really want to rate it higher but the sour taste after many of the minigames and combat never exactly doing what I want it to prevents it from ever being a truly good game. At this point, I can get better value out of a novel and a game designed around only weird minigames, as then both would have the proper quality and not just **** around in the middle.

    cons: **** outrun. ****    I really want to rate it higher but the sour taste after many of the minigames and combat never exactly doing what I want it to prevents it from ever being a truly good game. At this point, I can get better value out of a novel and a game designed around only weird minigames, as then both would have the proper quality and not just **** around in the middle.

    cons:
    **** outrun. **** blackjack. **** catfights. **** mahjong. **** the timing in disco and **** the decade old combat system from the PS2 era.

    The camera auto rotates with the character which makes any tight corner a nightmare. It also gets locked on walls which means doing combat near rounded walls means you lose 60-70% of your vision.

    weapons hit a lot of invisible walls and make the character recoil for no reason.

    Accurate combat inputs at a high level is a nightmare. The game is enjoyable because you have enough health items and things thrown into it that it can be overlooked. However, actually examining the controls leads to a lot of problems, many of which are brought out in the climax battles. Inability to properly target enemies, slow turning, auto target targeting nothing, the inability to just turn around like a normal human being can, weapons not aiming correctly, heat action prompts appearing and not working 80% of the time, a 3 second delay on starting most heat actions after a combat command has already been used, and so on. It is the same crappy combat from 10 years ago and with so many other games doing combat better the only saving grace of this game is the niche void it fills.

    Pros:
    Side stories are enjoyable. Very Yakuza-esque.    … Expand
  2. Empyrea
    Aug 6, 2019
    7
    The best of this game is the plot, gameplay is ok. It becomes a bit repetitive. The worst for me is the really long scenes (there are several that last for more than 10 minutes, just crazy), even the sidequests have so many dialogues! In my opinion, it would have been better if they had made the scenes shorter and had dubbed the game to English or put subtitles in other languages becauseThe best of this game is the plot, gameplay is ok. It becomes a bit repetitive. The worst for me is the really long scenes (there are several that last for more than 10 minutes, just crazy), even the sidequests have so many dialogues! In my opinion, it would have been better if they had made the scenes shorter and had dubbed the game to English or put subtitles in other languages because for non-native English speakers it's very easy to "disconnect" and stop reading. I ended up skipping so many dialogues even some of the main story. About sidequests most of them are funny so feel free to do the sidequests when you feel to. I played this game for 47 hours spending many hours on minigames and sidequests so it can take about 30 hours or less if you go straight to the main story. To sum up, this game wouldn't deserve more than an 8. I had Yakuza 6 in my wish list but I deleted it because with one Yakuza I had more than enough. I'd only recommend this game for Japanese and English people.… Expand
  3. michaelb1928
    Apr 27, 2019
    6
    Enjoyable for a while, but really tedious sections with a lot of text reading made me drop it halfway through, side quests were not fun at all
  4. Neyb
    May 31, 2020
    6
    Where are the translations? A combat system without with nothing to offer... Every thing except story & situation feels boring and outdated.
  5. rscl
    Oct 23, 2017
    7
    Story-wise a really awesome game. I would recommend playing it on easy just as a movie of sorts. Visuals are average yet pretty. The combat mechanics are bs.
  6. MazrimTaim14
    Oct 14, 2019
    7
    My first dive into the Yakuza series is filled with WTF humor and old school relaxing beat them up.

    A constant "WTF Japan" ride from start to finish with a melancholic story and pure awesome bowling game.
  7. drlowdon
    Jun 14, 2022
    5
    It’s 1988, and Yakuza Kazuma Kiryu is framed for murder and has no option but to leave the Dojima family and set out on his own.

    Being my first experience of a Yakuza game I wasn’t sure what to expect, but to be honest I found it all a little dull and many aspects felt very dated. For a start there are far too many cut-scenes, especially early in the game, and the combat (which makes up    It’s 1988, and Yakuza Kazuma Kiryu is framed for murder and has no option but to leave the Dojima family and set out on his own.

    Being my first experience of a Yakuza game I wasn’t sure what to expect, but to be honest I found it all a little dull and many aspects felt very dated. For a start there are far too many cut-scenes, especially early in the game, and the combat (which makes up a large part of the gameplay) isn’t particularly satisfying either. As the game gradually opens up there are plenty of things to see and do but, for me at least, it was never enough to make up for the games flaws.    … Expand
  8. curzon_dax
    Apr 7, 2023
    7
    game is very subjective if you're gonna like it. it's well designed for its genre; it offers a relatively large open world of progressive adventuring without being excessively large; its battling style is relatively complex and you can progressively become better and better at it while the story is fitting for a crime story. however for my tastes it was very excessive in verticalgame is very subjective if you're gonna like it. it's well designed for its genre; it offers a relatively large open world of progressive adventuring without being excessively large; its battling style is relatively complex and you can progressively become better and better at it while the story is fitting for a crime story. however for my tastes it was very excessive in vertical progression design; the game has you doing repetitive mundane tasks in order to have minor progress every time for minor benefits in battle (if you take the money system out of the picture (e.g. by using a trainer) the game feels extremely barebones for little gameplay since the repetition for more and more money is what gave a lot of its apparent depth); the battle style is subjective if you're gonna like it and you might like it if you're into that kind of genre but I personally found it cumbersome and repetitive and not worth the trouble going the full road of perfecting my gameplay for this game while the story was nothing extraordinary but I definitely can't give it a very low score because it's obviously subjectively great if you're into that kind of genre.… Expand
  9. SOLIDSNAKEN64
    Jul 23, 2018
    7
    I really enjoyed this games characters and story, yakuza has a mix of serious story with a lot of goofy moments. It knows when to be serious but also to relax a little and not take itself to serious. Y0 is filled with many fun mini games and side quests. Each sidequests has it's own story and they were all pretty entertaining. I really enjoyed the 80s setting in Japan, you really feelI really enjoyed this games characters and story, yakuza has a mix of serious story with a lot of goofy moments. It knows when to be serious but also to relax a little and not take itself to serious. Y0 is filled with many fun mini games and side quests. Each sidequests has it's own story and they were all pretty entertaining. I really enjoyed the 80s setting in Japan, you really feel like you are in that era. I don't really see why people would rather have Japanese dubs over English dubs but I'm not one of those people. I would have much rather the dev's to have hired English actors for localization, but that's just me. The graphics are ps4 graphics even though they look good it would be nice if they took advantage of the ps4 hardware. The brawling system gets repetative after a while and I was so tired of the random encounters by the end of the game. Yakuza 0 is my first entry into the story and even though I enjoyed it for this most part i felt it was lacking in some areas.… Expand
  10. ToshLichev
    Jan 3, 2022
    7
    As a newcomer to the Yakuza franchize I have to start off by saying that Yakuza 0 is an absolutely massive game but not in the conventional way I'm used to. It doesn't have a huge open world, gorgeous cinematics or exciting traversal. In its essence "0" is actually pretty old school and in some aspects even archaic but it compensates with character and content.

    Where Yakuza 0 blows you    As a newcomer to the Yakuza franchize I have to start off by saying that Yakuza 0 is an absolutely massive game but not in the conventional way I'm used to. It doesn't have a huge open world, gorgeous cinematics or exciting traversal. In its essence "0" is actually pretty old school and in some aspects even archaic but it compensates with character and content.

    Where Yakuza 0 blows you away is the fact that not only does it have an intriguing and amazingly acted 30 hour storyline, it also has hundreds of hours of side content which is anything but filler. Every mini-game feels fleshed out and almost like a separate game within the Yakuza world. You also get not one but two open world areas which, although quite small, feel unique enough to each of the two protagonists. Speaking of which, both protagonists have their own fighting styles which gives depth to an otherwise fairly basic fighting system. All the characters feel like real human beings and you start to care about them sooner or later. Most of the time the game completely manages to immerse you in its world, however...

    There are more than a few problems with Yakuza 0. For starters the presentation. This does not look like a 2017 game, there are moments at which I felt like I was playing The Sims. I get that you can't animate every single conversation in this type of game but considering how dialogue heavy it is, the amount of actual cinematics and/or fully animated scenes is absurdly low. The lack of a dub is a respectable creative decision seeing as the japanese voice acting is superb, but when around 15 hours of the game is spent pressing "X" while reading walls of text, constantly reading subs can really become a problem because it takes you out of the game and even at some point starts to put a brutal physical strain on your eyes. The camera in many cases is absolutely broken. The constant random fights on the streets quickly go from fun to unbearably annoying - they earn you very little cash and are a waste of time. The game also seems stuck in the past with its menues and the fact that there really isn't a "restart" button for side missions or mini games which means that every time you fail you have to quit, go back to the NPC, go through all the conversations and only then can you try again. A huge waste of time.

    Yakuza 0 is a mostly great game and if you're willing to look past some of it's archaic game design and are ok with it blatantly wasting your time at certain points, then I think you'd like it quite a bit.    … Expand
  11. Lazyyybone
    May 31, 2021
    5
    액션 게임은 좋은데 그러면 게임성에 더 치중하지 왜 스토리랑 컷씬 너무 많이 넣어서 재미도 없고 그렇다고 스토리도 뻔한 일본 야쿠자 장르물 스토리이고. 게임이지만 게임보다는 다른 요소만 엄청 넣어서 몰입도 깨지고 그렇다고 일본 도쿄의 오픈월드의 자유도는 또 떨어지고 많이 실망
  12. Tobylua
    Jun 24, 2022
    7
    Yakuza 0 on PS5
    Game completed : June 5, 2022
    Playtime : 102 hrs I”ve completed games with more than 100 hrs before but this is by far the longest and most tedious i have ever felt completing a game and probably because its a very outdated game and i am playing it on a ps5 today. Because of the fact, nothing more to enjoy in this game and its only saving grace is its story. To be    Yakuza 0 on PS5
    Game completed : June 5, 2022
    Playtime : 102 hrs

    I”ve completed games with more than 100 hrs before but this is by far the longest and most tedious i have ever felt completing a game and probably because its a very outdated game and i am playing it on a ps5 today. Because of the fact, nothing more to enjoy in this game and its only saving grace is its story. To be clear, i think if you play this game 10 yrs from now there is a lot of positive to say but obviously it is not the case now. Its story and plot is very unique and compelling that it is one of the most unforgettable plot and twist i have ever experience in a video game. considering its a very old game, i never felt the cliche you would expect in a mafia game and ive completed a lot from the past. I cant wait to see what happened to the 2 main characters in its sequel. in summary, its a familiar and simple outdated experience with an excellent plot and story.    … Expand
  13. Jollyolfun
    Nov 18, 2022
    7
    I find Yakuza games to be quite slow for my tastes, but the great moments are truly great.
  14. Agusto101
    Dec 14, 2022
    6
    Es un juego totalmente insufrible lo único bueno son los combates contra JEFES y un par med misiones principales el resto todo aburrido.
  15. waywardlaser
    Jun 28, 2022
    5
    How can a game that's so wacky also contain some of the most dry, overlong cutscenes I've ever sat through?

    A masterful balance of fun and mind-numbingly boring that I have not seen before or since.
  16. HeitorCampos
    Mar 13, 2023
    7
    Fun as hell, the tonal shifts work way better than they honestly should. It´s not great at anything, but it´s goofy in the most fun way possible. Didn´t expect to get addicted to the bowling minigame lol. The gameplay isn´t good honestly, it´s kind of clunky too, not to mention the absurdly long cutscnes and drawn out dialogue, but I don´t care, I like this game.
  17. Avey123Avey
    Mar 19, 2023
    7
    The combat and encounter designs are decently fun. The story is quite fun and has many satisfying twists and turns. The open world structure is interesting and has some very well fleshed out mini games and subsystems. This game makes for a very great entry point to this bizarre series. It's a variety show with lots of personality and quirks. If I had a major complaint it would be with theThe combat and encounter designs are decently fun. The story is quite fun and has many satisfying twists and turns. The open world structure is interesting and has some very well fleshed out mini games and subsystems. This game makes for a very great entry point to this bizarre series. It's a variety show with lots of personality and quirks. If I had a major complaint it would be with the overly repetitive JRPG esc random encounters that dot the environment just to slow you down and make sure you've seen every combat animation so many times that it becomes drilled into your memory… Expand

Awards & Rankings

24
#24 Best PS4 Game of 2017
22
#22 Most Discussed PS4 Game of 2017
19
#19 Most Shared PS4 Game of 2017

Critic Reviews

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Metascore
85

Generally favorable reviews - based on 87 Critic Reviews

Critic score distribution:
  1. Positive: 77 out of 87
  2. Mixed: 10 out of 87
  3. Negative: 0 out of 87
  1. RPG Fan
    Aug 8, 2018
    85
    Yakuza 0 is a lot of Yakuza, showing a great deal of excess, brilliance and occasional frustration in equal fashion. There's lots and lots to do, a great story to breathe in, and wonderful characters who play well off each other. At the same time, 0 lacks some of the innovations and gameplay conceits that came with later titles, and it's also just as frustrating in places as some of the franchise's more egregious offenders.
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  2. PLAY! Zine
    Oct 12, 2017
    90
    Yakuza Zero is a fantastic game. Spectacular main story combined with great diversity of sub-stories and solid gameplay create a rather unique game.
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  3. Games Master UK
    Apr 2, 2017
    90
    A fantastically bonkers open-world gem that finally opens up the magic of the series to everyone. [March 2017, p.64]
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