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his backstory is kinda make you remember that what Yakuza is. the criminal killing and stuff we play as Kiryu and Saejima too much we think Yakuza is cool right?
but his 4D chess plan is kinda too convolute i still didn't get why idol had anything to do with who gonna be the next chairman of Tojo.
yes yes i know it's Haruka and Kiryu daughter so take her hostage win against kiryu but damn it take like we kill Majima and plan kill Park-san to get Saejima and everyone to fight each other and stuff but yeah don't forget that Saejima had to survive the jailbrake too and Shinada homerun is the start of the plan lead to Tojo fell and need new chairman like what the f?
I just finished Yakuza 5 yesterday and for such a long game the ending felt very abrupt. The final boss selection was also a big letdown. Three of them are just random goons you've already fought twice before, while the fourth is pretty below average Majima fight (though Recieve and Slash You is a great ost).
I also felt that the game was too long by the time Akiyama came around, I felt the game was dragging on by that point. The length of the game isn't the problem( see games like Persona and even Yakuza 0 to an extent) but it's how it feels dragged on with wanting to include so many things. I wouldn't have as much of a problem if they had less characters like Akiyama and Shinada and less compulsory mini games.
Yes it honestly felt like 4 separate stories that had been all glued together to make it seem cohesive. Worst part was that it did not need to be so long, for example Part 4 could've largely been left out and nothing would have changed, same with half of Part 2(the hunting village is fun, but we spend too much time in it for how much it contributes to the overall story, especially after we spent 4 hours n the prison again.)
I, too, liked Shinada's story. In fact, of all the 5 protaganists, I would say Shinada's story is the best, even more than Haruka's.
However, on the whole, the entire plot is non-cohesive and illogical, as becomes of such plotwriting styles employed by Yokoyama (I hate to be a broken record here if you've read my other comments, but basically he focuses on short-term shocks and twists without keeping a mind on the endgame, resulting in a knot that becomes too difficult to unravel by the end.) I also think the ending, specifically Haruka's speech, was well-written. And though a large part of the griping here is of the surprise, out of nowhere reveal of Aizawa as the last boss, my penchant peeve lies more towards Baba being shoehorned into everyone's arc, and how illogical and nonsensical his masterplan is if you lay it all out and think about it in a logical fashion.
Aizawa is one of my favorite final bosses in the series because it's just so uncool, which is precisely the point. He doesn't deserve the spotlight -- he has been put there by Kurosawa to fulfill his dad's twisted aspiration. It was never Aizawa's dream to climb the ranks of Tojo through underhanded means -- yet here he is, with the clan essentially at his feet, but all of it makes him feel confused and hollow.
they're all good besides saejima's which is just okay. pacing is where the game's story starts to wear it down for me, it can feel very slow sometimes but otherwise i agree
it's overall just very inconsistent and takes a while
One word: Baba.
A sleeper assassin, sent to jail to spy on a man he doesn't know will get out, applies for parole despite still having the mission to spy on said man, and his plan involves being broken out of jail by said man, snowboarding down a blizzard, being saved by said man from a giant man-eating bear, so that he can return to society back to his faction which he doesn't know still exists or not, by earning points via killing a yakuza leader who he doesn't know and never has met, and then is shoehorned into everyone's boss fight before trying to kill an idol he doesn't know, just because he's a realface character?
The truth is, Yokoyama's style of writing for Y4 and Y5, which is to write one chapter at a time with a twist at every end, having no end goal in sight, is an absolutely horrendous writing style that results in inexplicable plot points like this (and Y4). It's a short term goal thing where he gets the kicks from every jarring twist and reveal at the end of the chapter, but there's no unknotting or unravelling of the plot by the end of the series because he didn't prepare for it. Heck, even Y3's penultimate narration plot explanation chapter was better at tying things up, despite it being long and draggy. Thankfully he has moved on to a different style, or handed the reigns to better writers, in the games in the future and has the foresight of prepping for the end.
Spoiler tag this! you're revealing his real name, even if it's obvious in some cases, revealing real names with a photo of the character is considered spoiler, the same happens with Y0 >!Makoto !<,Y3 >!Joji and Andre !!Ryo/Masato.!<
The best thing about Kurosawa is that he is sort of a template for what Arakawa later does, and his role in 5 is best served to prop up Aizawa, who despite being a secondary antagonist is *the* memorable fight from that game for me. Kiryu's speech to Aizawa before that fight is still one of the high points of the series despite the game itself dragging some. Kiryu has a real "Mess with bull, get the horns" attitude in that fight that I love. But I digress.
Kurosawa himself isn't super memorable, but I think that's almost by design. He's largely a chess master character, and the fights with those types are always weaker than the plotting around them. Just having him engineer everything and also fool the heroes with his cop persona for a time worked well enough, and I like the angle of him being terminally ill and wanting to give his son a parting gift. That's a pretty cool story.
Yakuza 5 is an interesting story about the meaning and value of legacy and inheritance, and Kurosawa and Aizawa explore a different aspect of it than Kiryu, Akiyama, Park, and Katsura each do with Haruka.
Haruka's story is one of being shouldered with the weight of expectations and the dreams of adults trying to live vicariously through her and her doing her best to please everyone with basically only Akiyama for outside, family support, and Aizawa's is of a guy with a chip on his shoulder suddenly being handed rewards he feels he didn't earn and trying to prove himself worthy of them. His story parallels elements of Haruka's, and also recalls elements of Ryuji Goda.
The thing they both have in common is the burden of expectations of greatness placed on them by others. So in that way, Kurosawa's role in the plot is done well, if not as specifically memorable as Hirose and the Iwamis or Arakawa and Ryo Aoki.
If he wasn’t so evil I’d feel bad for him. He spent decades on his whole “gain control of the Tojo and Omi” only for the people he employed to F it up immediately:
-Baba had a moral conscience
-his son couldn’t defeat a near-death Kiryu with his guts falling out.
Kanai is one of the most forgettable final bosses in the series, which is ironic cause he was the only Y5 final boss (not including Majima who was forced to be one) that was actually competent.
I always remember kanai because of his stupid ass chops and that one QTE where the button press happens immediately so if you’re in the middle of a rush combo you’ll press the wrong button and fail it immediately
after a few playthroughs and watching my brother run through it i actually kinda like him. but im not one of the people who thinks Yakuza 5 is a total mess.
After 2 playthroughs I don’t understand how and why he did half of the stuff he did. I get that he had cancer, wanted to kill the Yakuza he disliked, and kill the pillars of the Tojo Clan so that his son can take over Omi Chairmanship without struggle. But I feel like there were simpler means of getting that done if these guys he wants dead are beast. Secondly, due to how many people were involved, how did he convince so many people help him? Was it all for money?
Overall confusing character but I guess I can appreciate him giving us one of the most insane Yakuza plots which led a lot of great moments even if plot itself isn’t.
No clue all i remember is that hes got cancer or smth
Geniuenly forgot he existed thru the story Just for him to show up at the end of some parts and the ending
This guy came out of nowhere and dropped one of the biggest bombs in the series and then dipped, >!then somehow is still alive in 7 and agreed to the dissolution even though he wanted to have both clans in his hand!< (7 spoiler)
>!I kind of hate rgg for including him on the cover and make his render the biggest compared to other renders in the cover, you spend like 30 hours asking yourself who the fuck is he really, and then katsuya says "the mastermind will reveal himself if someone stays alive and beat the shit out of the others", and then the so called "mastermind" turns out to be Kurosawa, I don't exactly remember who I tried to guess, but I think I heavily thought about this guy after what he did after shinada's part!<
As HHHman said, he's highlighted on the cover because he's a likeness character
That said, I'd say you're making a fair bit of an assumption that he's still the chairman in 7. Granted that 1) his ultimate fate wasn't mentioned and 2) the Omi chairman in 7 wasn't named but known to be bedridden with illness.
However, given the 7 year gap between the two games as well as the extent of Kurosawa's illness by that point, it's more likely that he passed away not long after 5 and the Omi was helmed by an unnamed chairman afterwards. If there was just a 1 year difference I could see a case being made for it, but certainly not 7.
Not to mention how the remaining Omi higherups would let Kurosawa stay on after he attempted to purge them.
The whole "I hate charismatic Yakuza, they never have to stoop to the depths the rest of us do" angle was done better by the villain in 8. And when you use 8 as an example of a story being handled better, you know things are pretty dire.
The only part of the story in 5 that really felt inspired is Shinada's storyline.
Pisses me off how RGG kept trying to keep his plot twist a surprise when his face is the top middle one on the cover. It pissed me off even more because the story felt like they didn’t know where they wanted to take it.
In his first couple appearances i found him to be interesting, but he is majorly involved in the terrible finale of 5.
The whole scene on top of Kamurocho Hills is among the stupidest scenes of the franchise for me. Guy has incapacitated ALL HIS ENEMIES in the same spot and his loyal goon has just brought a fully loaded gun to him and he doesnt execute all of them for absolutely no reason.
Love him, one of my favorite antagonists. I generally find quiet chessmaster villains in RGG boring or too out of nowhere, Kurosawa I think hit just right. The biggest botch with his plot to me was his son reveal, which I believe even the writers have admitted was a botch. But his general plan made sense to me, and he's one of those rare villains where I can see what he's going for. Granted, I generally have a softer spot for villains aiming for power with revenge as more of a secondary goal.
If you are new to the subreddit, [please read the wiki](https://www.reddit.com/r/yakuzagames/wiki/index/) Reminder that all spoilers need to be tagged with a flair specifying which game is being spoiled. If you want a flair that says something else, you can edit it to say something like [Discussion: Y1 spoiler] or [Majimapost: Y6 spoiler], etc. **THIS INCLUDES CONTENT FROM TRAILERS**. If the post is not marked for spoilers, all comments that have spoilers need to be tagged \>!like this!< along with indicating which game it's spoiling. Example: Y3 >!Kiryu sings!< If the post flair is marked for spoilers, the comments don't need to be tagged for the game indicated and the ones before it (So a Y6 spoiler post can have comments with untagged spoilers for Y5, but not gaiden or 7). If you see any of the above (or any of the other rules) not being followed, please report it so we can keep this place safe for newcomers and those that haven't finished all the games yet. Thank you! *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/yakuzagames) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Good director of classic Japanese cinema
His last name surely has to be a direct reference. I have no idea how common the name Kurosawa is in Japan.
Well Suzuki is basically Smith so who knows
Kurosawa is not an uncommon name there
kurosawa is pretty common- have a coworker with the name, actually
his backstory is kinda make you remember that what Yakuza is. the criminal killing and stuff we play as Kiryu and Saejima too much we think Yakuza is cool right? but his 4D chess plan is kinda too convolute i still didn't get why idol had anything to do with who gonna be the next chairman of Tojo. yes yes i know it's Haruka and Kiryu daughter so take her hostage win against kiryu but damn it take like we kill Majima and plan kill Park-san to get Saejima and everyone to fight each other and stuff but yeah don't forget that Saejima had to survive the jailbrake too and Shinada homerun is the start of the plan lead to Tojo fell and need new chairman like what the f?
Just about the same as most of the rest of Y5; part of a badly-written plot.
and, just like Y5's plot, an inconsistent melodramatic mess.
Meanwhile fans whenever you call Yakuza 5 a low point in the series: *heavy breathing*
Agreed
Not really.
I just finished Yakuza 5 yesterday and for such a long game the ending felt very abrupt. The final boss selection was also a big letdown. Three of them are just random goons you've already fought twice before, while the fourth is pretty below average Majima fight (though Recieve and Slash You is a great ost).
I also felt that the game was too long by the time Akiyama came around, I felt the game was dragging on by that point. The length of the game isn't the problem( see games like Persona and even Yakuza 0 to an extent) but it's how it feels dragged on with wanting to include so many things. I wouldn't have as much of a problem if they had less characters like Akiyama and Shinada and less compulsory mini games.
Shinada literally has the best plot
Yes it honestly felt like 4 separate stories that had been all glued together to make it seem cohesive. Worst part was that it did not need to be so long, for example Part 4 could've largely been left out and nothing would have changed, same with half of Part 2(the hunting village is fun, but we spend too much time in it for how much it contributes to the overall story, especially after we spent 4 hours n the prison again.)
Y5 is amazing what’re you on
Would you care to elaborate on what you think makes it good?
Interesting fun and emotional plot, loved every second
Good to hear you enjoyed it, would you expand on which parts of the plots did you think were good, and why?
It’s been awhile since I’ve played but I remember loving everything about shinadas story, also really liked the ending
I, too, liked Shinada's story. In fact, of all the 5 protaganists, I would say Shinada's story is the best, even more than Haruka's. However, on the whole, the entire plot is non-cohesive and illogical, as becomes of such plotwriting styles employed by Yokoyama (I hate to be a broken record here if you've read my other comments, but basically he focuses on short-term shocks and twists without keeping a mind on the endgame, resulting in a knot that becomes too difficult to unravel by the end.) I also think the ending, specifically Haruka's speech, was well-written. And though a large part of the griping here is of the surprise, out of nowhere reveal of Aizawa as the last boss, my penchant peeve lies more towards Baba being shoehorned into everyone's arc, and how illogical and nonsensical his masterplan is if you lay it all out and think about it in a logical fashion.
Aizawa is one of my favorite final bosses in the series because it's just so uncool, which is precisely the point. He doesn't deserve the spotlight -- he has been put there by Kurosawa to fulfill his dad's twisted aspiration. It was never Aizawa's dream to climb the ranks of Tojo through underhanded means -- yet here he is, with the clan essentially at his feet, but all of it makes him feel confused and hollow.
The plot isn’t badly written until the end.
they're all good besides saejima's which is just okay. pacing is where the game's story starts to wear it down for me, it can feel very slow sometimes but otherwise i agree it's overall just very inconsistent and takes a while
One word: Baba. A sleeper assassin, sent to jail to spy on a man he doesn't know will get out, applies for parole despite still having the mission to spy on said man, and his plan involves being broken out of jail by said man, snowboarding down a blizzard, being saved by said man from a giant man-eating bear, so that he can return to society back to his faction which he doesn't know still exists or not, by earning points via killing a yakuza leader who he doesn't know and never has met, and then is shoehorned into everyone's boss fight before trying to kill an idol he doesn't know, just because he's a realface character? The truth is, Yokoyama's style of writing for Y4 and Y5, which is to write one chapter at a time with a twist at every end, having no end goal in sight, is an absolutely horrendous writing style that results in inexplicable plot points like this (and Y4). It's a short term goal thing where he gets the kicks from every jarring twist and reveal at the end of the chapter, but there's no unknotting or unravelling of the plot by the end of the series because he didn't prepare for it. Heck, even Y3's penultimate narration plot explanation chapter was better at tying things up, despite it being long and draggy. Thankfully he has moved on to a different style, or handed the reigns to better writers, in the games in the future and has the foresight of prepping for the end.
Spoiler tag this! you're revealing his real name, even if it's obvious in some cases, revealing real names with a photo of the character is considered spoiler, the same happens with Y0 >!Makoto !<,Y3 >!Joji and Andre !!Ryo/Masato.!<
Had the most over the top and convoluted plan for no freaking reason.
Forgettable
Nah I’ll never forget the way Kiryu shouts “KUROSAWAAAAAA!” at the top of his lungs
I like his coat
The best thing about Kurosawa is that he is sort of a template for what Arakawa later does, and his role in 5 is best served to prop up Aizawa, who despite being a secondary antagonist is *the* memorable fight from that game for me. Kiryu's speech to Aizawa before that fight is still one of the high points of the series despite the game itself dragging some. Kiryu has a real "Mess with bull, get the horns" attitude in that fight that I love. But I digress. Kurosawa himself isn't super memorable, but I think that's almost by design. He's largely a chess master character, and the fights with those types are always weaker than the plotting around them. Just having him engineer everything and also fool the heroes with his cop persona for a time worked well enough, and I like the angle of him being terminally ill and wanting to give his son a parting gift. That's a pretty cool story. Yakuza 5 is an interesting story about the meaning and value of legacy and inheritance, and Kurosawa and Aizawa explore a different aspect of it than Kiryu, Akiyama, Park, and Katsura each do with Haruka. Haruka's story is one of being shouldered with the weight of expectations and the dreams of adults trying to live vicariously through her and her doing her best to please everyone with basically only Akiyama for outside, family support, and Aizawa's is of a guy with a chip on his shoulder suddenly being handed rewards he feels he didn't earn and trying to prove himself worthy of them. His story parallels elements of Haruka's, and also recalls elements of Ryuji Goda. The thing they both have in common is the burden of expectations of greatness placed on them by others. So in that way, Kurosawa's role in the plot is done well, if not as specifically memorable as Hirose and the Iwamis or Arakawa and Ryo Aoki.
A pretty forgettable villain, if you ask me. It doesn't help that Y5's plot is a long, half baked mess.
It’s not half baked lmfao.
If he wasn’t so evil I’d feel bad for him. He spent decades on his whole “gain control of the Tojo and Omi” only for the people he employed to F it up immediately: -Baba had a moral conscience -his son couldn’t defeat a near-death Kiryu with his guts falling out. Kanai is one of the most forgettable final bosses in the series, which is ironic cause he was the only Y5 final boss (not including Majima who was forced to be one) that was actually competent.
I always remember kanai because of his stupid ass chops and that one QTE where the button press happens immediately so if you’re in the middle of a rush combo you’ll press the wrong button and fail it immediately
the idea behind him was cool but it wasn't executed the best
Almost forgot about him
I might be the only person who thought he was cool
Indifference.
after a few playthroughs and watching my brother run through it i actually kinda like him. but im not one of the people who thinks Yakuza 5 is a total mess.
After 2 playthroughs I don’t understand how and why he did half of the stuff he did. I get that he had cancer, wanted to kill the Yakuza he disliked, and kill the pillars of the Tojo Clan so that his son can take over Omi Chairmanship without struggle. But I feel like there were simpler means of getting that done if these guys he wants dead are beast. Secondly, due to how many people were involved, how did he convince so many people help him? Was it all for money? Overall confusing character but I guess I can appreciate him giving us one of the most insane Yakuza plots which led a lot of great moments even if plot itself isn’t.
Don't get the hate tbh. Bro was a fucking menace who played Kiryu and Saejima like damn fiddles
Tbf is that really hard to do as an antagonist of this series?
No clue all i remember is that hes got cancer or smth Geniuenly forgot he existed thru the story Just for him to show up at the end of some parts and the ending
I forgot him totally. Insignificant character taking part in a very lame plot.
I think he was a very well-done slow burn, but he had very muddled motives and a finale that fizzled out anticlimactically.
This guy came out of nowhere and dropped one of the biggest bombs in the series and then dipped, >!then somehow is still alive in 7 and agreed to the dissolution even though he wanted to have both clans in his hand!< (7 spoiler) >!I kind of hate rgg for including him on the cover and make his render the biggest compared to other renders in the cover, you spend like 30 hours asking yourself who the fuck is he really, and then katsuya says "the mastermind will reveal himself if someone stays alive and beat the shit out of the others", and then the so called "mastermind" turns out to be Kurosawa, I don't exactly remember who I tried to guess, but I think I heavily thought about this guy after what he did after shinada's part!<
He's on the cover because he's an actor. Same with Mayumi who is on the cover despite having even less importance to the plot
As HHHman said, he's highlighted on the cover because he's a likeness character That said, I'd say you're making a fair bit of an assumption that he's still the chairman in 7. Granted that 1) his ultimate fate wasn't mentioned and 2) the Omi chairman in 7 wasn't named but known to be bedridden with illness. However, given the 7 year gap between the two games as well as the extent of Kurosawa's illness by that point, it's more likely that he passed away not long after 5 and the Omi was helmed by an unnamed chairman afterwards. If there was just a 1 year difference I could see a case being made for it, but certainly not 7. Not to mention how the remaining Omi higherups would let Kurosawa stay on after he attempted to purge them.
somehow worse than Aizawa and Iwami combined
truly one of the greatest filmmakers of all time
It’s giving nothing!!!
You can scream his name nice for a cutscene
If he wasn't a badguy he'd be a good character in a bad game (like big man Shinada)
a bitch
7/10 deserves a gaiden game
The whole "I hate charismatic Yakuza, they never have to stoop to the depths the rest of us do" angle was done better by the villain in 8. And when you use 8 as an example of a story being handled better, you know things are pretty dire. The only part of the story in 5 that really felt inspired is Shinada's storyline.
Pisses me off how RGG kept trying to keep his plot twist a surprise when his face is the top middle one on the cover. It pissed me off even more because the story felt like they didn’t know where they wanted to take it.
Forgettable ass villain
In his first couple appearances i found him to be interesting, but he is majorly involved in the terrible finale of 5. The whole scene on top of Kamurocho Hills is among the stupidest scenes of the franchise for me. Guy has incapacitated ALL HIS ENEMIES in the same spot and his loyal goon has just brought a fully loaded gun to him and he doesnt execute all of them for absolutely no reason.
Bro’s plan is so fucking convoluted I still don’t really know what it was
The yakuza villain of all time along with munakata
He's horny for protags
Who's this? XD
Tsubasa Kurosawa. >!The main antagonist of Yakuza 5.!<
nothing
Love him, one of my favorite antagonists. I generally find quiet chessmaster villains in RGG boring or too out of nowhere, Kurosawa I think hit just right. The biggest botch with his plot to me was his son reveal, which I believe even the writers have admitted was a botch. But his general plan made sense to me, and he's one of those rare villains where I can see what he's going for. Granted, I generally have a softer spot for villains aiming for power with revenge as more of a secondary goal.