Overview

Judgment is an action-adventure, beat em up game that was released on Steam, September 14, 2022. The game was developed by Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio, and published by SEGA. Judgment is a spin-off game of the Yakuza/Like a Dragon franchise.

Graphics

Judgment was developed on an engine made by Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio themselves called the Dragon Engine. The Dragon Engine is the latest engine currently used in the rest of franchise. The game offers a pretty modest amount of graphical settings. These settings are, Texture Filtering, Shadow Quality, Geometry Quality, Real Time Reflection, SSAO, Render Scale, and Anti Aliasing. Their are also upscaling options available such AMD FSR 1.0/2.1, and XeSS.

The game requires decent pc hardware in order to play the game. The minimum requirements are an Intel Core i5-3470 3.2GHz/AMD Ryzen 3 1200 3.1GHz, Nvidia GeForce GTX 960 2GB/AMD Radeon RX 460 2GB, and 8GB RAM. Meeting the minimum will allow you to the play at 1080p 30fps with FSR balanced settings as stated on steam.

Judgment has some pretty amazing graphics. The Dragon Engine was made to really capture the Kamurocho nightlife extremely well. Bright and vibrant lights to catch your eye to the various shops and clubs across the map. The lighting and shadows are well done, light sources are reflected and bounce reflective surfaces such as the wet streets of Kamurocho (their always wet for some reason, seems to rain a lot). Shadows being cast from all light sources. The game has a lot of interiors you can go into with no loading screens. A lot of detail was done put into the map and environment.

Sound

I'm definitely gonna recite a lot of what I said in my Yakuza Kiwami review from a few days. Despite Judgment being a spin-off there is virtually no difference for how the soundtrack, and ambient audio structure. Its likes this for a lot of the games in the franchise. Hey, if it ain't broke don't fix it.

Kamurocho is a busy red-light district. Of course you're going hear a lot ambiance of large crowds, the many shops, restaurants, and clubs, and the rush hour traffic from the large roads that surrounds of the map at most ends (serves as the boundary). You also have to eerie quiet of some back alleys and construction areas (mainly little asia).

Judgment continues the trend of amazing soundtracks. You have a soundtrack for every occasion, even the comical ones. The regular battle soundtrack changes based on what fighting style you chose with seamless transitions. The soundtracks doesn't start over when switch back and forth. I am going to assume both soundtracks play simultaneously while one stays muted. Almost each boss fight plays their own soundtrack which becomes apart of their character. Due to the darker tone of the game, more serious moments in the game play a pretty mellow soundtrack.

Addictiveness

Judgment has always been a great game to play. Though I haven't gotten to change to play the game again, mostly due to me beating the game for first time not too long ago. I actually do plan on replaying the game in the near future. Judgment introduces a few new mechanics into the game that made it a bit unique from the rest of the franchise. Some of the mechanics were so good some of the future mainline games adopted it. The game offers are wide variety of content that keeps you glued to the game for hours. Kamurcho is a small map with a lot to do in it. A lot of the replayability comes from beating the game at a higher difficulty, even the highest just to test your skills. Also play whatever side content you've missed when initially playing the main story. This game really opens up when put a lot of time to doing stuff outside the main story.

Story

Judgment's story is vastly unique compared to the mainline games. As stated before, its a spin-off game. The story here doesn't have any connections with the mainline games. All the characters introduced are completely new. Now the story does feature the yakuza for the majority of the game. No changing that since they have a lot influence in Kamurocho.

Spoilers!

The story takes on December 2018. You take the role of a Private Investigator and disgraced ex-lawyer named Takayuki Yagami, the games protagonist. He works along side with his best friend Masaharu Kaito, an ex yakuza. Yagami is the director of a detective agency called Yagami Detective Agency. A series of gruesome murders are taking around Kamurocho. All the murder involved Kyorei Clan yakuza. A third murder takes place, an yakuza captain Kyohei Hamura, captain of the Matsugane Family, is arrested after being suspected of the murder. The Patriarch of the Matsugane wants Yagami to bail him out. After investigating the murder scene, Yagami was successful in proving Hamura's innocence. Despite this, the mysterious killer, now dubbed “The Mole” is still out there. Yagami is now determined to bring the mole to justice, and is to soon uncover a major conspiracy.

Depth

Judgment offers a very generous amount of content. The map is small but you have a lot to do in it despite its size. Mini games take the bulk of the content around the map and most are pretty fun time killers or you just want to 100% the game. Some of these are mini games are Club Sega, Darts. Drone Lab/League (a very fun drone racing competition), Mahjong, Paradise VR, and Yoshida Batting Center. Not all of them are listed but these are the ones you'll definitely enjoy.

Substories are not a thing anymore. Well just for this game. Substories were replaced with Case Files. They function they same as side quest. The difference to substories is that some case files will have solve actual cases with cilents which can have its own intricate story. A lot of case files can still just random event. A few of them can introduce new mechanics and characters.

Judgment introduced a brand new mechanic which allows to date 4 specific women in the game. Its a pretty unique mechanic that while not really benefiting you too much in the main game is fun side quest to go after. There is no consequence to dating all 4, but only one can be your girlfriend. The dating system doesn't force to make time for your dates, meaning you're free to pursue them as you like.

The one major change done with the game was the combat.Yagami has a pretty unique set of fighting styles. These fighting styles are vastly different from the ones your used to in other Yakuza games.
You have only two sytles in the game. Crane, which allows you to handle multiple enemies with wide kicks and easy dodgin. Tiger, which is an offensive fighting style meant for one on one combat, dealing moderate damage.

One more change they made was the skill upgrade system. Its similar to the one in the mainline games but change from using exp to SP. Skill Points are used to unlock new abilities, health, heat, and some character traits, like holding more items at a time. SP is earned through fights, side cases, and in-game achievements.

Difficulty

Judgement has a set of difficulty settings. Simple, Easy, Normal, and Hard. Yeah no Legend like the mainline games. Of course, simple is the easiest and for plebs, I mean people new to the genre. While Hard is the veteran players of the franchise, or you just want a challenge.

This game ended up being more difficult than what the settings give off. It all goes back to the combat, Crane and Tiger are impressive fighting styles but overall feel underwhelming, especially crane style. I have felt like im not doing anything to enemies when I was far into the game. Each hit was doing almost nothing, and some really tough bosses were tossing me like nothing. Honestly I can go down to just the protagonist, Yagami is as strong as the likes of kiryu.

One thing that really change how to combat works is the introduction of the mortality system. If you get hit with charged enemy attacks or weapons, you not only lose health but some of that lose health won't be recoverable. Your overall health depletes. You can combat this by using first aid kits, they will restore health and get rid of any mortality on your health bar. That mechanic really changes to combat and requires you to be extra careful in long battle. You don't want to go after bosses with almost no recoverable health.

They severely limited the amount of healing items that can be carried in your inventory. Not only that they got rid of healing items that recovered a good chunk of health. Stamina Royales, Toughness Emperors, Tauriner Max, all gone. You will have to relie heavily in alternatives. The various convenience store food items are your best bet, and you're allowed to carry quite a bit more than healing items.

Lastly if you want to, you have the option to go after the secret boss fight at the end of the game. The Amon Clan, well like usual just one member from the clan. A boss with insanely high health, high damage, and now you have a tricky fight in a area surrounded by an electric cage. Good luck. He is optional and can only be fought by completing a majority of the game.

Overall

Judgment was a surprisingly good game. I didn't go into the game thinking it wasn't all that good. I expected RGGR to make this game great, I was surprised how fantastic it was. Its plays like a yakuza game but feels completely different. The story is personally one of my favorites in the franchise. The characters are really likable. I'm glad I have taken the time to beat the game and enjoy what it has to offer.