FFFX 2022 Letter

[tranquiliteal]

Dear FFFX Writer,

Thank you for creating for me! This is my letter for the Five Figure Fanworks Exchange and I am excited to see your work. Below are my prompts, preferences, likes, and dislikes. You're more than free to look through my previous exchange letters. My interests are predominately SEGA video games, especially those by RGG Studio, and video games that were on the Dreamcast.

Note that I have treating turned on. For this exchange for my main gift I have been in a reading mood and thus did not include art as a requested medium. However, art treats are more than welcome, and I have provided a list of art likes and art DNWs in previous letters.

Tiiru

Quick links: Crossover Fandom | Judgment | Kurohyou | Yakuza

GENERAL LIKES

▸ I am a huge fan of character-driven stories, ie, characters struggling, undergoing trials of will, failures, growth and development.
▸ Dynamics between characters of all manners: friendships, family bonds, frenemies, romance, complicated relationships, enemies, enemies to lovers, friends to lovers, and so forth. I love seeing canon relationships further explored as well as between two characters who haven't met in canon but who could have potential together.
▸ I equally enjoy plotty fic, especially that which fills in the gaps between canon, pre-canon, or post-canon. I enjoy works that make sense of any loose ends in canon. As my requests are all for video game canons, I enjoy works that could feel they belong there as a side story or alternate ending that could have happened if the character had another option available.
▸ I enjoy the worlds of these canons and would love to see more worldbuilding, be it delving more into the backstory of a place or artifact, visiting new shops or cities, or expanding on any piece that already exists in canon.
▸ Tonal and genre-wise, I enjoy works that are more typical of its respective canon in terms of tone, and also I enjoy more somber and dark tones, drama, angst, noir, whump, and hurt/comfort (especially when the hurt is physical) but I also do appreciate canon typical humor.
▸ Unconventional formats, especially when letters, newspaper clippings, text messages, tabloids, emails, and the like are featured within a fic.
▸ Age gaps, especially wide gaps, being noted, especially in romantic/sexual relationships but it could apply to platonic relationships as well. Generational differences between two or more characters and how it impacts their worldview, and whether that leads to the two characters clashing.
▸ All of the details, from worldbuilding (the setting, the place they're staying in, what sort of people are around them) to what the character is eating. I enjoy being immersed in the world and having all of my five senses invoked by words on the screen.
▸ Loyalty, and when that loyalty is tested
▸ Incorporating game mechanics, minigames, side content, and so forth into a work. Catching little details from a beloved canon in a fic, even if it is just a passing joke, is always delightful.

NSFW LIKES

▸ Comeplay, come eating, coming inside partner, character is fucked while full of come inside, facials
▸ Porn With Feelings. Sex with intense feelings, no matter the sort, and lots of it.
▸ Locations playing a role: desk sex, up against a wall, dungeons, soundproofed walls, and so forth
▸ Orgasms, multiple orgasms, complicated feelings over orgasms
▸ Face to face sex.
▸ For consensual smut, I have no preference on who tops. For dubcon and noncon, I prefer the aggressor being the one who tops.
▸ Standard sex acts [oral, anal, and so forth]
▸ Voice kink: describing a character's voice against partner's ear, voice having an effect on a character.
▸ Double penetration
▸ Overstimulation
▸ Vulnerability
▸ Impact play, face slapping, spanking, show of dominance
▸ Bathing or shower sex
▸ Finger-sucking, fingerfucking
▸ Pinned by the wrists
▸ Power dynamics
▸ Sex as unhealthy coping mechanism
▸ Intoxication, drugged sex, consensual or otherwise
▸ Masturbation, being forced to masturbate in front of someone
▸ Praise kink, especially a more dominant character getting off on their partner praising them

DARK & NONCON LIKES

▸ Illnesses and injuries, and all the gory and nasty details therein. I enjoy reading about characters suffering
▸ Relationships and feelings more complicated and tangled up than your earphones
▸ Fellating a gun, or gun used to fuck a victim
▸ Fucked with the hilt of a weapon
▸ Asshole character getting arousal at hurting their partner or victim
▸ Arousal at another's pain
▸ Unconventional morality
▸ Painful anal sex
▸ Condescending attitude and words from aggressor
▸ Blood play
▸ Knife play
▸ Fear play
▸ Imprisonment, hostage situations, captivity, character who is bound and gagged, betrayals
▸ Tied up and well used over a long period of time
▸ Mindfuck and manipulation, PTSD, psychological horror, repeated trauma
▸ Aggressor treats victim like a lover
▸ Victim crying or trying to not to cry
▸ Breaking fingers, torture involving hands
▸ Bites, bruising
▸ Intimacy without love, unhealthy relationships, conflicted feelings by both parties
▸ Power imbalance, invasion of privacy, coercion, blackmail
▸ Being held down/bondage
▸ Tentacles and tentacle rape
▸ Characters wetting themselves out of fear or overstimulation
▸ Torture in all manner of ways
▸ Fuck or Die
▸ Wounds, wound fucking by way of tongue, fingers, cock, tentacles, objects, weapons, and so forth.

DNWS

▸ Underage [here defined as any character under the age of 16 written/drawn in an explicit sex scene. Teenage characters kissing/groping one another/or engaged in referenced sex or fade-to-black do not fall under this DNW.]
▸ Animal harm, animal death
▸ Issuefic, unrequested identity headcanons
▸ Non-canon permanent major character death unless requested
▸ Scat
▸ On-page eye or teeth trauma/gore [references to past trauma does not fall under this DNW. Threat of losing an eye or threat of having it gouged out does not fall under this DNW. Knocking a character's tooth/teeth out in a fight does not fall under this DNW.]
▸ Omegaverse AU
▸ Setting change AUs. [Canon AUs (spin offs, side stories, or alternate endings) do not fall under this DNW.]

---

Crossover Fandom

Request: Fanfic: 1 x 10000-Word Fic

Haruka appears in Yakuza 1/Kiwami through Yakuza 6, and Yagami appears in both Judgment games. Both games are available on Playstation and XBox, while Yakuza is also available on Steam. This prompt will contain spoilers for those games in addition to Yakuza 7: Like a Dragon.

▸ Sawamura Haruka (Yakuza) & Yagami Takayuki (Judgment)
I've nominated this particular combination after getting inspired by the substory "The Cabaret Killer" in Kiwami 2 where Haruka helps to solve a mystery. I've always felt there was a lot of potential to Haruka and I would enjoy seeing her get to shine. We know from Kiwami that she has a keen hunch as evident when Kiryu and her play cho-han, is a bit gutsy, and would also take a bullet for Kiryu just as he had for her by Yakuza 6. In an advert for RGGO we've seen her kick butt in her idol clothes. I really loved Haruka and was sad to say goodbye to her during Yakuza 6. I wonder what she would be doing during her life, in addition to raising Haruto with Yuta in Okinawa. Does she giving music another go? Or does she stay at Morning Glory and look after orphans the same way her father had? I would greatly enjoy a story where Haruka takes center stage.

Teaming her up with Yagami feels like the perfect choice. I enjoy playing the side cases in Judgment and seeing how Yagami treats his clients with respect and care, and if there are any two RGG characters I would love to see interact who haven't yet in canon, it would be Haruka and Yagami. Can you just picture Haruka in Yagami's office in Kamurocho? As for why she would seek Yagami out, I present the following scenario, as I have a rather specific prompt for this request.

▹ One day, years into the future, an older Haruka stops a gang of thugs from beating down on an elderly man. When she gets a closer look at the elder, she receives a great shock, recognizing Kiryu instantly, but it can't be Kiryu! He's so much weaker than she ever remembered him! He cowered away the moment their eyes meet. He couldn't even fight back the thug who had come back swinging a bat. In the skirmish as Haruka deals with the thug, Kiryu/his lookalike slips away.

Haruka is convinced she had seen Kiryu. Concerned for the man who had raised her like a daughter, Haruka embarks on a journey to track him down. Does she figure out that Kiryu hid away to protect her? Was it perhaps Date's dying confession to her that makes her aware of Kiryu's agreement involving the Fixer? Would the reason why Haruka instills help from Yagami, a detective on the verge of retirement, is not just because of his skills on the field but also in hopes that his understanding of the law could help to nullify the aforementioned deal Kiryu had made decades ago? Or is Kiryu hiding for another reason this time? If others had seen him during the events of Like a Dragon, then why the secrecy from Haruka in particular? Was this to keep the secret only from her or is there something more? Is he in danger from some new threat, or is he sick, or perhaps afraid of something or someone? Could Haruka still be in danger?

If Haruka enters Kamurocho while searching for answers about her adoptive father, she is bound to hear rumors about a detective both skilled in combat, an intelligent lawyer, and one with a rather impressive resume. If anyone can help Haruka unravel a complicated problem, it's Yagami. I am also curious to know if Kaito is still Yagami's partner at this point in time. If Kiryu is around mid 70s-80s in this scenario, Kaito would be in the retirement age in Japan (as would be Yagami after doing the math). Would Kaito still be working? Is he still around, or had he passed away during a battle at some point? What are the fates of Yagami's other friends? We never had a Yakuza story set in the far future, so I would be interested in seeing a take like this.

JUDGE EYES | JUDGMENT (VIDEO GAMES)

Request: Fanfic: 1 x 10000-Word Fic

Judgment and Lost Judgment are spinoffs of the larger Yakuza game series set during roughly the same time period (2018 in JE, 2021 in LJ), same locations, and even involve the same yakuza clan, albeit different families under the clan, and you hardly ever see the same characters in both canons. I enjoy the darker stories of the Judgment series, the gameplay and various activities you perform as lawyer-turned-detective Yagami Takayuki. The stories involve mysteries, which I enjoy as someone who grew up reading mystery novels. The games are set up differently than the Yakuza games in that Yagami, while he is capable of holding his own in battle, does not use weapons, but utilizes tailing techniques, examining for clues, taking evidence photos, and so forth.

There's endless amounts of side content and activities, everything from side cases with recurring characters which help to keep the town feeling real, minigames, arcades, and even toy capsule machines which invoke memories of playing Shenmue. Of course, Judgment isn't scarce on lovable characters either. There is plenty here, and I am drawn to many, their dynamics with one another, and the uniqueness of each. There's also a little trophy you can earn involving photographing cats.

Judgment is available on PS4 and the Remastered version is available on PS5, Stadia, and Xbox Series X/S [EDIT: As of September 14, 2022, both games and The Kaito Files DLC are now available on Steam. Click on the aforementioned link for more information on the bundle.] The primary difference between the Remastered and first Judgment game is that they removed the playable pinball machine in Yagami's office and some of the requirements for achieving the platinum trophy is different. Lost Judgment is available on PS4, PS5, and XBox.

I've already mentioned that this gem of a game series has a lot of characters that I love, but I have decided to focus my requests on Hamura and Higashi. They stood out to me both individually as characters and together with their complicated relationship that I would love to see explored further. The following will contain some big spoilers for the ending of Judgment and some of Lost Judgment.

▸ Hamura Kyohei/Higashi Toru (Judgment)
Hamura is endlessly fascinating and complex as an antagonist. We begin Judgment hating him, trying to chase down his whereabouts, get into a few fights with him, only for Hamura to end up turning the tables in a surprising yet very human twist, grieved by the death of his patriarch. He continues to surprise us when he delivers the incrementing piece of evidence Yagami needed for the court trial at the very end, and even testifies in court, thus turning himself in to the police. While Hamura was easy to dislike from the beginning, especially given the animosity between himself and Yagami/Kaito, and knowing what he did to Higashi, the ending showed another side to him that made me actually root for him.

Higashi is also another deep character. Our first introduction was this hard, cold yakuza, but it's not long before the tough guy act drops and we see Higashi's true colors when we learn more of what he endured one year prior to the start of the story. While he puts the mask back on throughout the series, and his hostility and jealousy towards Yagami can be amusing to witness, his softer side is undeniably there. It shines through at moments, and even as with the tough guy act, he's one of my favorites in this game.

His relationship with Hamura instantly ensnared me in Chapter 3 with That Scene in the sewers. In the Japanese version, Hamura says: "You scream like a woman, you know. Kinda gets me going." In the English version, Hamura says: "You scream like a fucking whore. Kind of a turn on to be honest." This wasn't their last interaction, as we see Higashi answer to Hamura on the regular, and get beaten up by either him or his subordinates. Hamura is only the Captain of the Matsugane family, but due to accumulating so much wealth for the family, he’s able to hold more power over them, more so than the patriarch Matsugane Mitsugu. Higashi has little else where to hide from Hamura's abuse. The scars from his time with Hamura can be seen even in Lost Judgment when he was running towards Soma, ready to strike, only to freeze at the sight of the gun. For an instant we see the past Higashi back at the sewers.

The Matsugane family is small and thus these men have only themselves as family and a support group. I feel there is, despite everything, some love there between them simply for being in the same family, in whatever odd definition of love we're going with here. That adds to the many levels of multifaceted complexity of this relationship. For all the problems Hamura caused the family, he was doing it for their benefit. And no matter how bad things got between Hamura and Higashi, I like to think that Higashi doesn't completely despise him. I appreciate fanworks that do highlight this; I'll single out this fanart by Somojiro which shows a Higashi taking inspiration for his own appearance from both his aniki Kaito and his kashira Hamura. Had Hamura not put Higashi through hell, we may never have had the Higashi of today that we know and adore.

I do ship one-sided Higashi/Kaito with Higashi pining secretly, as it would explain his bitter and jealous feelings towards Yagami and Yagami’s bond with Kaito. The age gap of Hamura and Higashi is also a draw for me.

Prompts:
▹ Fans speculate Hamura may have received a lighter sentence for turning himself in. I would love to see what happens after Hamura has served his time. I am interested in seeing him and Higashi meet again, especially given their grim history and how the time apart may have changed them both.
▹ Bouncing off the above, perhaps Hamura in jail had some more time to think back to all he had done in the past and starts to have heavy regrets on what he had done to Higashi. He writes a letter to him. He does not think Higashi would ever forgive him, nor does he think he deserves it after all the pain he's caused. What if Higashi writes back? What's in his response?
▹ Another jail prompt. There's a new case that Yagami and his friends get involved in, and this time it involves another person who Hamura had connections to, either a subordinate back during the Matsugane family days or an associate from elsewhere. Higashi is tasked with visiting Hamura alongside Yagami, but perhaps Hamura is willing to talk more if it's one on one with Higashi. A revisit into the past and delving more into the Matsugane family is always a welcome. I do love the other Matsugane family members such as Ozaki, Kengo, Tashrio, Suzuki, and so forth.

クロヒョウ龍が如く | KUROHYOU RYŪ GA GOTOKU | BLACK PANTHER: LIKE A DRAGON (VIDEO GAME)

Request: Fanfic: 1 x 10000-Word Fic

Kurohyou is a spinoff of the larger Yakuza series, first released on the PSP in 2010. This game has never gotten a Western localization although you can download an English patch for Kurohyou 1 and Kurohyou 2 to play on your PSP via firmware or through an emulator. Both games have been fan translated, although the first game doesn't have a full translation and is buggy (TeamK4L, the fan team behind translating Kurohyou 2, have been working on translating Kurohyou 1.) Alternatively you can watch KHH's fan translation walkthrough on their YouTube channel for Kurohyou 1, and you can find a couple of Let's Play for Kurohyou 2 on YouTube as well.

Despite the scarcity of Kurohyou in the West, the canon enjoys a bit of popularity in Japan, as it earned itself a live-action television series, a short three-volume manga chronicling the first four chapters of Kurohyou 1, and at one point you could even purchase protagonist’s Tatsuya's tracksuit. Each game is ten chapters long and utilizes the boxing ring which will be familiar to longtime Yakuza fans, here known as Dragon Heat. The stories themselves contains some stellar twists, dark tales involving the Tojo Clan, and a neatly-contained plot. Like Judgment, this game also includes a side quest involving cats.

Kurohyou 1 follows Ukyo Tatsuya, a hotheaded and battle-happy teen who gets himself caught up in a mess with the yakuza after he accidentally murders the family patriarch. He's forced to compete in Dragon Heat where he must win ten consecutive fights to regain his freedom or be handed over to the police. But as this is a RGG property, there is always more going on below the surface. As the story progresses and the plot unfolds, Tatsuya discovers he may not exactly be guilty of murder, and while trying to find a means to prove his innocence, he unravels more about his past and how it may be connected to a conspiracy within the Tojo Clan itself. Kurohyou 2 follow Tatsuya two years later as he's fighting to save Dragon Heat which had been threatened by another underground boxing ring in Sotenbori called Asura.

My requested characters all appear in the first game, so my prompts slant more towards Kurohyou 1, but I will not mind if the fic takes place after Kurohyou 2, and have even prompted for such.

▸ Kudo Saki/Sakaki Tenma/Ukyo Tatsuya (Kurohyou)
I loved watching Tatsuya grow from the hotheaded punk who just wanted to knock teeth out from anyone who crossed his path, to someone wiser and who carried a personal philosophy on fighting. His relationship with each of the characters is different and equally important. Even out of the ring he develops a relationship with nearly each opponent.

I loved Tenma and how the friendship between him and Tatsuya stood steady throughout all of Tatsuya's earlier bullshit and survived Tenma's betrayal at one point. One couldn't ask for a better mentor to Tatsuya than Saki, and it does pain me that she doesn't appear in Kurohyou 2 at all, although considering how Kurohyou 1 ends, I can understand why. Still, not hearing her voice during the boxing matches in Kurohyou 2 left a void in my heart.

I would equally enjoy a fic set during the events of Kurohyou 1, immediately post Kurohyou 2 or even many years later to present time. Feel free to feature any of of the rest of the cast from Detective Shozo Takenaka, Tatsuya's sister Saeko, Cho, other fighters Tatsuya has known, and so forth.

Prompts:
▹ We never got to see Saki's reaction to Taizan's true identity and fate, and I would like some resolution. What happened to Saki after the events of Kurohyou 1, if she has any connection to boxing at all still, if she became a nurse in another ring, or if she's training others in her fighting style. Tatsuya reunites with Tenma in KH2, but I would like Tatsuya to also reunite with Saki, perhaps as post-canon to KH2.
▹ Some good traditional whump or hurt/comfort involving Tatsuya post match requiring medical attention, with Saki and Taizan ready to patch him up. Tenma can definitely feature in, especially as someone to offer Tatsuya emotional support.
▹ I ship Tatsuya with Saki and Tenma equally. Making them work as a threesome, or some sort of unconventional love triangle where it's an open relationship all around, would be nice to see. I would equally love something with just Saki and Tenma getting a chance to get to know one another, either as a gapfiller during Kurohyou 1 or set during the time between Kurohyou 1 and Kurohyou 2, or during one of Tatsuya’s matches. Perhaps Saki taught Tenma how to tend to Tatsuya's injuries, and Tenma teaches her some recipes from his family's restaurant.
▹ In KH2: "You will eventually lose your place. And you will become a murderer! And...you will then become a monster!" This was a prophecy told to Tatsuya from Ryo Nozaki, before we later learn that these prophecies were only smoke and mirrors. However, I would be curious to see a situation that does arise which pushes Tatsuya to his limits. He's lost so much. He's gone through a lot for a young protagonist. He's grown immensely over the games, but could there be something that will tip him over the edge, and if something does, will he friends and remaining family be there to hold him back?

龍が如く | RYUU GA GOTOKU | YAKUZA (VIDEO GAMES)

Request: Fanfic: 1 x 10000-Word Fic

THE KIRYU SAGA

The games that started it all. The mainline series runs from Yakuza 0 to Yakuza 6 for Kiryu's saga while Yakuza 7: Like a Dragon onwards a the new era with a new protagonist. The games have been released on multiple platforms, Playstation, XBox, and Steam, and they're usually on sale. There are also numerous spinoffs and AUs, but those are considered different IPs and fandoms, although I have caught a couple of references to one another while playing the games. I am familiar with all of the games, including the original PS2 Yakuza 1 and Yakuza 2, but I do lean more towards the Kiwami remakes for those games as I personally enjoyed the additional content in both. I am also familiar with both the original and remastered versions of Yakuza 3-5.

The Kiryu saga, as it is informally known, feature a beat-em-'up style of combat although they've gone through changes in mechanics over time. The Y0 and Kiwami games have a style changes which isn't present in any of the other mainline games. Yakuza 6 and Kiwami 2 has the Dragon Engine. Yakuza 4 and 5 have multiple protagonists. No matter which game you're playing, there's bottomless fun. The stories are engaging, with signature twists that keeps the story on this side of batty and entertaining. The substories and minigames are among my favorite aspects as well as the characters themselves. It's hard to pick a singular favorite character as I enjoy everything RGG has served up, and I've enjoyed all of the various dynamics and relationships. In Yakuza 6, you get to befriend cats and collect them for a cat cafe. This is important information.

▸ Kiryu Kazuma/Majima Goro & Sawamura Haruka (Yakuza)
Kiryu is a wonderful character. He endures a lot through the series, and multiple times have faced death. He always walks away stronger. His laidback and accepting nature of other people makes him admirable. He oscilates between a wise mentor and an awkward and shy dragon that makes substories with him just fun to play. It's always amusing to see him become flustered or put in awkward situations. Majima meanwhile is just fun. It's a little hard to define him in one sentence. I hadn't expected to love him as much as I had the first time I played Yakuza 0, but he won me over instantly. Watching as this man slowly cracked into becoming the Mad Dog that we've come to know in the main games before mellowing back to the real Majima...he's a fascinating character with many layers.

I love the rich complexity and complicated nature of the relationship between Kiryu and Majima. They're not your typical friendship pairing, although they are friends, sort of, but I would hesitate to call them an enemy ship either. The many ways their lives have been intertwined since Yakuza 0 and throughout Kiryu's saga has always been a point of interest for me. Kiryu is deeply interwoven in Majima's past with Makoto, which I feel is partly reason for Majima's strange obsession with Kiryu. There's also the fact that Saejima is missing in Majima's life, although I do not believe Kiryu is solely a replacement. While Kiryu may have started off that way, he had become something more to Majima if Majima was willing to kill Saejima because he did not wish to see Haruka die (and thus break Kiryu's heart).

I especially enjoy their relationship with Haruka. We get to see Kiryu and Haruka be a family in the games aplenty. After nearly every game we get to go places with Haruka; it's always a reward to walk around holding hands with her. I love that the primary love story in the series is a familial love story. But I'm especially interested in seeing Majima and Haruka get to spend more time together. Her first experience with Majima wasn't pleasant, yet she doesn't seem to hold any fear or grudge towards him, which leads me to think that the two must have had more pleasant interactions after that point in Kiwami.

Prompts:
▹ Majima and Haruka spend time together. From Yakuza 0 and Yakuza 5 we learn that Majima wanted to be a father, and he has a soft spot for both women and children (as seen in the Yakuza 0 substory "The Doll Girl"), so I would love to see him dote on Haruka and get a chance at being a father. To offer one scenario: the very end of Yakuza 3, right before the credits, when it had seemed Kiryu had died. From the way the scene played out it didn't seem like Kiryu would make it. Haruka must have been devastated. I would love to see Majima's reaction when he heard the news. Majima rushes to the hospital and sees a clearly upset Haruka. After checking in on Kiryu who is out cold, he decides to try to try to cheer Haruka up, who is understandably terrified at the thought of being alone again. Majima helping to distract her (and to also help distract himself) by taking her out to karaoke and donning in his old goofy idol attire to get her to laugh, going to the batting cages or doing any of the typical Haruka Requests that Kiryu usually does. Or just even going to Okinawa to be with the kids while the orphanage is rebuilt. And of course, visiting Kiryu from time to time, just to be alone with him.
▹ Post-Kiwami or Kiwami 2 with the three of them. If you're going with the period between Kiwami and Kiwami 2, perhaps after hearing about how much Kiryu is grieving over Nishiki, Majima decides to help him out in the only way Majima knows how. After all, Majima too is grieving for a brother. I would love to see Haruka's perception of Majima throughout it all: her adoptive father beating this man to within an inch of his life only to pat him on the back and pay for his Smile Burger shake, or the two of them going from just pals enjoying pool to destroying the entire vicinity in a sudden outburst of fisticuffs. Love is strange.

LIKE A DRAGON

Like a Dragon introduces a new protagonist, new team of friends, new storyline, and a new combat system. I highly enjoyed the entire experience. Ichiban is the perfect antithesis to Kiryu and not only in appearance: where Kiryu was more reserved, Ichiban is more exuberant; Kiryu knows when to hold back his emotions and in a fight while Ichiban wears his heart on his sleeve and needed someone to hold him back; and more than once it was hinted that while Kiryu isn't interested in sex and might even be a virgin canonically, it's more than obvious that Ichiban fucks (I found the rationale for that being the pink screens of the telephone club versus the Honk Honks; Ichiban's pink screens come with a suggestive sound. The interrupted kiss in Dead Souls also had a soundtrackless pink screen, which adds weight to the theory.)

I loved this game a great deal. The change in game mechanics from beat-em-'up to turned-based, which began as an April Fools' Day joke that stuck around, turned out to be the perfect fit, because that style of gameplay perfectly suits Ichiban's vast imagination and gamer heart, and it offers the players a chance to play with the other party members who tag along with him. Getting to see women, and controlling how they fight, in battle, was also a major plus in my book. No minigame involving cats [EDIT 9/4/22, thanks to a friend reminding me, there is indeed a side quest involving cats!], and there are fun minigames involving go karts and one that turned trying to stay awake during the movies into a zany Whac-A-Mole mechanic involving REM Rams.

▸ Kasuga Ichiban/Zhao Tianyou (Yakuza)
▸ Kasuga Ichiban/Zhao Tianyou & Kasuga's Party (Yakuza)
Ichiban is a great character to take up the mantle. He's equally as lovable as Kiryu, and his optimistic nature is infectious; playing the game on a bad day helps with improving one's mood. Ichiban's relationship with everyone in the game is something that stayed with me long after I finished the game. Whether it was with a NPC in a substory, a supporting character in the main story, or one of his party members, Ichiban just oozed with so much affection that drew you in instantly.

Zhao won me over the moment he joined Kasuga's party. Zhao starts off as an enemy but we never fight him personally, although we do get acquainted with other members of the Liumang. When his true colors start to show, it was hard not to love him. In fact, I found myself including him on the active party more frequently than not. He's playful on the battlefield what with how he goads his enemies. His character's a combination of Majima and Higashi, an odd mix that just works. Zhao's history with Mabuchi reminded me of both Majima-Saejima and Higashi-Hamura, which was a nice little added bonus to everything else that I enjoyed about him.

I am especially drawn to Ichiban and Zhao's relationship. His friendship with Ichiban isn't anyway near as tumultuous as Majima and Kiryu's, and Zhao's a little more confident than Higashi. The ways that Zhao teases Ichiban, and how frequently Ichiban falls for his pranks in numerous Party Chats or Dinner Talks is greatly entertaining. It's also not hard to miss the rather flirtatious way Zhao says, "Kasuga-kun" in both the Japanese and English versions, reminiscent of how Majima says "Kiryu-chan".

Prompts:
▹ Zhao intensely pining for Ichiban. If you write me for any of those two tags, I'm craving Zhao pining in any capacity. What with Zhao shacking up at the Survive Bar for some time, perhaps he got to know Ichiban a lot more intimately, but there's a little trait about Ichiban that's infuriating, at least to Zhao: the man spreads his heart all over the place. He sees Ichiban give flowers to everyone, friends and prospective romantic interests alike, oblivious to how these gifts and his charisma is attracting everyone, women and men, to him. He knows what Ichiban and Iroha did upstairs that one time. He tries to hide the pain whenever he knows Ichiban is out searching for one of the "Honk Honks" (as Ichiban calls them) to have a good time with. Zhao would like to make himself more known to Ichiban, but how? Ichiban seems open to casual sex, but Zhao wants so much more. He's not sure how Ichiban will react to that. A little part of him is nervous, and truth be told, after losing Mabuchi, he's nervous about losing another very close friend.
▹ I love Ichiban's dynamics with everyone in his party. I would enjoy any story exploring the party just being together, perhaps shortly after the events of the main story. What's that strange text message Ichiban got one day about heading back to the Millennium Tower? The party preparing for this challenge. My own experience preparing for the True Final Millennium Tower was quite the Grind, but it did allow me to fully immerse in the game's many different minigames and thus feel as though the party was taking breaks in between their trips down Kamurocho Underground to bond together but playing darts, karaoke, and sampling every dish in each city they visited. These are the sort of memories one makes before facing off the ultimate secret boss. I would love to see the party members noticing the close bond and flirtations between Ichiban and Zhao throughout this journey. Perhaps they conspire to get the two to hook up.