All right, next is Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name. This is Kiryu's story after Yakuza 6 and alongside parts of Yakuza: Like a Dragon, so there are spoilers fo…

All right, next is Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name. This is Kiryu's story after Yakuza 6 and alongside parts of Yakuza: Like a Dragon, so there are spoilers for those games and Gaiden here, including its ending. I would play this after Yakuza: Like a Dragon and before Infinite Wealth. The events overlap, but that doesn't make Gaiden something I'd move ahead of 7 on a first playthrough. It shows another side of things that 7 is still working toward revealing. Kiryu is living under the name Joryu and working for the Daidoji. The arrangement is tied to the decision he made at the end of 6: the world believes he is dead, and the people he loves are supposed to be able to live without being pulled into his life. He is still around, still getting involved, and still trying to help people. He just isn't allowed to openly be the person everyone remembers. That is the part of this game that connects most directly to what I've already said about Kiryu and Haruka. I understand why he made that decision. I understand what he thinks he is protecting them from. I still wanted more of their actual life together. Morning Glory mattered because we got to see him living with people, taking care of children, and having responsibilities that didn't end when he won a fight. Gaiden spends time with the consequences of taking that away from him. There is still plenty of ridiculous side content. Kiryu can dress for the Coliseum, get involved in Pocket Circuit again, help people all over Sotenbori, and build a fighting team with some very strange recruits. The Castle is an entire floating entertainment district built around excess. You can move from a serious conversation about what his life has become to running around in an outfit you have no business wearing. The combat gives him two styles. Yakuza is built around his established strength, charged attacks, and ability to turn whatever is nearby into a weapon. Agent adds wires, drones, explosive cigarettes, and jet-powered shoes. It changes how you handle a crowd, especially once the gadgets are upgraded and you start using them in Extreme Heat. This is a smaller game than the big numbered entries, with five story chapters and a more concentrated set of locations and activities. That doesn't mean the side content is negligible. Akame's network connects a lot of it: the requests, smaller jobs, upgrade currency, and some of the people you can recruit for the Coliseum. If you ignore that whole system, you also make your combat progression harder than it needs to be. Akame gives Kiryu people to look after even while he is separated from his own family. The problems aren't always enormous. Sometimes someone needs food, a photograph, or help getting an item down from somewhere. Other requests turn into something uglier. The orphanage investigation is an obvious example of why this material belongs in a Kiryu game. You don't have to convince him that children being used by an adult is worth his time. Then the main story catches up with the dissolution of the Tojo Clan and Omi Alliance. Shishido matters because he has spent his life fighting to reach a position in that world. He refuses to accept that the people above him can decide the whole structure is finished just as he sees a chance to claim it. Kiryu has been dragged back into that structure repeatedly. They arrive at the same fight with completely different reasons for refusing to back down. But the scene I need to talk about is the recording at the end. Hanawa shows Kiryu footage from his grave. Taichi and Ayako have noticed the camera and speak to it in the hope that he might be watching. They tell him about their lives and make it clear that he hasn't been forgotten. They still hope he will come home. Then there is the picture Haruto drew. Kiryu isn't there to answer them. He gets to see that they are growing up, that they are carrying things he taught them into their own lives, and that they still want him with them. He is also seeing more of the time he has missed. The people he gave up his name for have continued living, but the separation hasn't become painless for either side. His breakdown gives that loss room. It doesn't rush him into another speech about being strong enough to endure it. That's where my frustration with the direction of his family story and my appreciation for the scene can exist together. I can understand what the writers are doing with his sacrifice and still wish these characters had been allowed more time together. Gaiden makes that separation harder to brush aside because it shows how much Kiryu himself wants the life he walked away from. I'm saving the full Kiryu-and-Haruka discussion for its own post. For Gaiden, this is why I wouldn't reduce it to an optional bit of explanation between two bigger games. If Kiryu and the people at Morning Glory are a major part of why you care about the series, there is important material here. The guides are a little kinder this time. There are no permanently missable trophies, no required Legend run, and no requirement to finish the entire Activity Log for platinum. The Coliseum and Amon still need real preparation. I'll separate those goals properly so that someone going for the achievements doesn't mistake every optional completion target for a requirement.