Just finished Gaiden, kneejerk reactions

Short version, I really liked it.

Longer version:

- Increasingly starting to suspect I'm out of step with the larger RGG fanbase when it comes to what sort of writing we prefer. I'd heard that this one was basically a good ending and nothing else, but I was having fun with it pretty nearly the whole way through. I thought they did a very clean job of marrying the martini spy fiction tropes they wanted to play with to the underlying yakuza-ness of it all, and I thought it was inspired, if not essential, to put Kiryu in a situation where he's kinda preternaturally uncomfortable the whole time and constantly forced to compromise or problem solve rather than just bulldozing all his problems with Tiger Drops (particularly after he spends the bulk of 4/5/6/7 alternately running in place or aura farming). This comes on the heels of me swimming upstream against what seems to be the conventional wisdom on the writing in LJ (liked it!), 6 (hated it!), and Judgment (hated the third act!), too, which I'm sure despite being a wholly subjective opinion will nonetheless make at least one random stranger very angsty in the comments, but on the upside, has me pretty cautiously optimistic for how I'm going to feel about Infinite Wealth, which, like Gaiden and LJ, I've largely heard has iffy writing.

- Related, one of the only RGG games I feel like doesn't trip over its own shoelaces down the stretch. No shoe-horned in second underdeveloped antagonist, no completely asinine plot contrivances (ok maybe it's a *teensy* bit clumsy how the gloss over the rest of his appearances in 7, but that's a minor offense at worse), no whiff of a panicked "oh crap we forgot to plan a final boss" late-stage rewrite.

- On the downside, the Dragon Engine still kinda never looks especially good to me (outside of the Judgment games) in terms of lighting. This is all a lot more sunblasted than I think it really needs to be and a story about a yakuza press-ganged into being a secret agent fixer shouldn't be so afraid of shadows (and the few scenes where it isn't tend to be the best looking scenes in the game).

- Back on the upside, though, the art direction is pretty delightful, particularly with regards to everything in or around the Castle... but also most of the new character designs are great, too.

- Speaking of which, choosing to believe based on his name, the timing of when this game was produced, the series' obvious affection for him, the haircut, and the dramatic cheeks (and cheek scars) that Shishido is a second (or, like, tenth depending on if you want to count the secondary Amons too) homage to my favorite Japanese actor, Jō Shishido... but it's certainly thinner than the much more over reference that is Jo Amon. Even if I'm just wishfully projecting this time, though, great character and, to me, felt a lot like RGG taking a second draft of a good idea they'd previously fumbled a bit with in the form of Aizawa. I felt similarly about the gal from The Kaito Files as sort of Yasuko 2.0, and I like that they're willing to do second drafts when something doesn't quite hit the mark.

- Speaking of, the Kaito stuff was great and I wish he was in it more. Gimme a scene of Higashi and Akame randomly hitting it off or the opposite, gimme Kaito and Shishido complimenting each other's fashion sense, have some more fun with it, come on!

- Kaito stuff also felt very much like them laying just the teeniest bit of groundwork for a Judgment world without Tak in it, particularly with the "Sotenbori expansion" stuff and Higashi getting an unsolicited sidekick tryout.

- Series-best arena, but if I'm being greedy, I wish they'd let your arena buddies level their way into multiple heat bars, or let guys like Kaito/Majima have their various styles. Kinda always felt like I was just better off playing as Joryu, but I still love that they give you the option.

- As great as the arena was, the giant enemy types felt like cheap gimmicky bullshit I didn't much enjoy. If I wanted to dodge-roll around a big, slow moving, unflinching horse-head guy, I'd get into Fromsoft or whatever.

- Watase's still a great character but who let them dress him like Peter Griifin?

- Agent Style was both very fun but also a teeeeensy bit janky. Feels like there's a potential version of it that could be my favorite RGG style ever, but they missed the mark by just enough that it ended up more middle of the pack.

- Amons remain cheap gimmicky bullshit, but in this case I found Tetsu's instant-kill death beam a lot more annoying than Gai's tedious healing.

- Hanawa's great and the reveal at the end that he's (presumably) Morinaga felt really rewarding. Already sad about him inevitably either not appearing at all or dying tragically in the next game.

- Pleasantly surprised by how little the Daidoji annoyed me in this game after drawing nothing but eyerolls form me in K3 and 6, but this felt very much like it needed to be the second-to-last game with them in it, and the existence of K3 suggests it really isn't gonna be.

- Akame also great. Hope she shows up again the next time the games go back to Sotenbori. Feels like a fun update on the Florist concept, without being quite so narratively inconvenient, and she's got a fun personality besides.

- The faux-Ryuji was fun but also felt suspiciously like RGG testing the waters for a "he's not actually dead" reveal, which is an idea i'd be a lot warmer to if we hadn't so recently resurrected at least four other major dead guys... but I appreciated Kiryu's sentimentality around it all the same.

- HATE this game's version of karaoke. I stumbled through the Platinum mostly by accident, but the unforgiving karaoke speed/timing is why I didn't make much of an effort at a "true" 100%. I think I could have gotten everything else, but there were three or four of those songs where I couldn't even break 80.

-As far as sorta/kinda/not really Kiryu sendoffs go, this hit basically all the notes I felt like 6 missed. Strangely for a story explicitly about him trying to be someone else, I feel like it grappled in a much more compelling way with who he actually is. Letting him have an actual moment with the Jimas and the orphans obviously huge, too, but even absent that this game felt a lot more curious and thoughtful about him than I felt like 6 did, which is what you want from a (sorta/kinda/not really) swan song.

- I have more thoughts but this is already embarrassingly overlong so they'll have to remain trapped in my skull for now.