Yakuza: Like a Dragon - Low Level Part 1: The Unstoppable Trio (Chapter 4 Boss)
9The first major battle in the series, it's the clash against Totsuka's Underlings!
The challenge series I had promised earlier is now live. Reflecting upon the comments received, which in many a way mirrored my own thoughts and worries about its feasibility, I decided upon these simple rules, whose exact practicality I will observe as I proceed with the run:
Low Level
The staple of this channel. We attempt to clear the game at the lowest possible level by engaging only in mandatory battles, and having Kasuga Ichiban emerge as the sole survivor in each. While doing so doesn't quite void the exp gain for the remaining party members, as they still earn 0.3x the amount Ichiban does - and this applies to both normal and job experience - it does result in a significantly weaker party than otherwise. The process of routinely killing off all non-Ichi party members is very much a nuisance albeit a necessary one.
Running away from random encounters is yet another chore but one I expect to circumvent by getting the repellant accessory from the bug-catching minigame.
No Overpowered Gear
The self-evident piece of news is that farming money from the Management Minigame, or another, more time-consuming, source, and then using it to buy or craft weapons and armour immeasurably more powerful than anything you're equipped with and can find by following the story breaks the game in half. Is it the management minigame that's supposed to be banned? Other minigames, to some extent, also grant the capacity to earn money given the investment of time, so when facing a roadblock it's only a matter of how long it takes to acquire the dosh required.
My solution? Let us grind for any cash we want to enjoy the game's vast range of features in Ijincho, but prohibit access to gear far stronger than what we naturally get unless progressing the game absolutely calls for it.
Having more restorative items and stat boosters seems tactically exquisite, which is most welcome, but overkill armour that renders enemies' feeble attempts at attacking us laughable and equally strong weapons may take all the challenge away when crafted or bought as early as chapter 5.
So, the first major battle in the game takes place at the end of chapter 4 before our third character joins us and a plot twist greatly changes the direction of the following storyline chapters. Ichiban, Nanba and Adachi invade the Sunlight Palace, in which there is no opportunity to escape to heal up (though healing spots are present inside some of the time) and, more importantly, no opportunity to save the game. Every time we fight an unavoidable group of enemies, we need to arrange for the enemies to kill off Nanba and Adachi, which is rather tough at times.
Aida, Kikugawa and Kasayama are the familiar enemies we fight here, as we previously faced them while infiltrating the Sunlight Palace. Kikugawa and Aida are top priority for being taken out first due to their much lower max HP and the threat that they pose to everyone. Aida can paralyse us with his stun gun for instance (I'm *fairly* sure I took paralysis heals along, but the one time I opened the menu to look if perhaps I had a way to heal rage they clearly weren't there!), but that doesn't quite lead to anyone dying per se. Kikugawa poses the risk of achieving such damage output that he can OHKO Nanba at full HP after buffing his own attack, so I consider him my primary mark. He's weak to fire, while Aida's Achilles' heel is physical damage.
Eventually Kasayama will be alone. As powerful as his multi-strike charge attack may be, he dishes out less punishment than the other two and is therefore the easiest to deal with. His HP seemingly never ends, and he even reduces some of the damage throughout by guarding as if that weren't enough. Debuffing his defence is a smart move here, after which we just pummel away. Nanba and Adachi will have to die at some point not much earlier than Ichiban can deal his finishing blow(-s). An unexpected pitfall we step into in this video recording is the boss enraging Ichiban at a point where the former is so close to KO, with no way to cure the status as I was so low on cash I didn't bring any items healing rage. He snaps out of it just in time, luckily enough, and I wait for Nanba to die. He and Adachi once again gain 70% less exp this way.
I had a Hand Grenade I could use here, too. I was able to deal with the bosses well enough without it, though, so I didn't utilise it.
P.S. The recording here is still 40 fps / lower graphics quality to save battery life. I forgot to change it to the highest quality. Let's see what the difference of my next Steam Deck recording is going to be!
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