An absolute masterpiece!

I have never played any game from the Yakuza series, so when I saw Yakuza 0 I figured "Hey, why not?" it's set in 1980s Japan, and it's VERY well portrayed, with neon lights everywhere and noisy gambling parlors plus many Sega HI TECH LAND arcades where hearing people talk about the old arcade games (which are fully playable btw, and emulated to near perfect accuracy) as "state of the art" and "brand new" makes me smile every time.

The graphics are amazing, the voices are in Japanese with English subtitles and I wouldn't have it any other way, the voice acting is top notch, and the MINIGAMES! OH GOOD LORD! <3 managing a cabaret club? is ridiculous fun, and you get FILTHY RICH! in the process, on the other characters side you get to be a real estate kingpin, not QUITE as fun, but nets more cash overall. There are also non-profit minigames such as Pocket Racing, the arcade games, the disco, karaoke, pool, darts, telephone club YOU NAME IT! Yakuza 0 has a minigame for it!

The story is excellent, brilliantly paced and the confrontations between bosses and the dialogue before you battle sets the mood perfectly. The combat system is excellent, very fluid and easy to work with (Similar to Sleeping Dogs combat) and has different fighting styles which can all be levelled up separately to mix things up.

Overall Yakuza 0 is one of the BEST games I've played, and I am SO glad that my first entry to the series was this one, I HIGHLY suggest you pick this up, the amount of content you get for your money is astounding and there are TONS of interesting sidequests worth your time, plus Michael Jackson (Miracle Johnson) is in it, so there's that!

ALSO: Koi No Disco Queen is such a DAMN good song. Trust me, you'll be humming it for DAYS!...plus it's my ringtone, which makes public transport WAY more fun when someone calls me.

EDIT: Nominated this game for "Game of the Year" Steam Awards 2018