Fist of the North Star: Lost Paradise

Fist of the North Star: Lost Paradise (Japanese: 北斗が如, Hepburn: Hokuto Ga Gotoku, translated as Like the Big Dipper in English) is an open-world action-adventure beat-'em-up game developed by Ryu ga Gotoku Studio and published by Sega as a PlayStation 4 title.

Plot
Nuclear war almost annihilated every living being, but humanity has survived. In an era in which civilization has been destroyed and nothing is created anymore, strong men struggle to conquer what little food and resources are left. It was a world dominated by violence. Yet, in a corner of that world, there was a place called “the city of miracles”, a city named “Eden”.

Eden receives energy and water from a giant dome-shaped relic of the old world named “Sphere City”, and there is even an entertainment district. Citizen lived a comfortable life that others in this era can’t even imagine.

One day, a man named Kenshiro reaches Eden at the end of his wanderings. He was the successor of Hokuto Shinken, an ancient assassination art passed down from a single line of successors. The heart of this man, thought invincible, was instead filled with despair. His only hope was a rumour indicating that his long-lost fiancee Yuria, that he thought dead, was instead alive and in Eden.

However, Eden is closed to outsiders and the gates block Kenshiro’s way. What will he have to do to enter Eden? And what destiny awaits in his pursuit of Yuria?

Kenshiro is a man who follows his love in a mysterious city, caught in the river of fate. A new legend of the saviour begins.

Gameplay
Fist of the North Star: Lost Paradise is an action-adventure game played from a third-person perspective. It features similar gameplay mechanics and systems to Sega's Yakuza series. Players explore the city of Eden, fighting through enemies using a variety of Hokuto Shinken styles, punctuated by Quick Time Events. There are various mini-games, such as bartending, I-beam baseball, racing, and retro games that can be played after being salvaged from the wastelands, such as Black Belt for the Master System, Space Harrier, OutRun and Super Hang-On.

Why It Rocks

 * 1) Kenshiro is back, and he is determined to find and rescue Yuria, no matter what obstacles get in his way.
 * 2) A lot of fan-favourite characters from the anime make an appearance in the game.
 * 3) The game looks gorgeous while faithfully recreating the iconic art style of manga and anime.
 * 4) Almost all the Hokuto Shinken moves from the anime and manga can be used to defeat enemies in the game.
 * 5) The Yakuza 0 voice actors did a really good at recreating the anime's original voice actors' styles as the characters they voiced were as close in personality as the characters they voiced in the former. The best example would be Kiryu Kazuma's voice actor Takaya Kuroda voicing Kenshiro.
 * 6) Kiryu Kazuma is available as a DLC skin, meaning you can play as him instead of Kenshiro.
 * 7) Loads of missions, weapons, enemies and locations to discover
 * 8) Just like the Yakuza games, it is open-world.
 * 9) You can freely switch between the Japanese and English dubs on the fly, something that is rare in most video games.
 * 10) The English voice actors also did a great job at voicing the characters, with Robbie Daymond (who voiced Tuxedo Mask in Sailor Moon) voicing Kenshiro.
 * 11) Simple and easy-to-remember combat mechanics for Kenshiro and his Hokuto Shinken moves
 * 12) You can turn off the Quick-Time Events for the Hokuto Shinken finishing moves, but they deal less damage without the QTEs. This encourages the player to leave it on as they can also watch in full details how the moves are performed.
 * 13) * The QTEs are also simple to perform and happen very quickly in order not to break the game's fun and immersion.
 * 14) The game also has an adjustable gore meter where you can freely tone down or ramp up the gore to 11!
 * 15) The game has a ranking system that lets you see how well you perform in combat, encouraging to use a variety of moves and as many Hokuto Shinken moves as possible in order to get the coveted S++ rank.
 * 16) You can grab your enemies' death screams and bludgeon them with it, one of them being "Hidebu!!".
 * 17) Loads of fun minigames that Kenshiro (and the player) can take part in:
 * 18) The baseball minigame involves Kenshiro using a massive I-beam as a baseball bat and he can smash motorbiking enemies with it so hard that they literally fly high up in the sky.
 * 19) * In fact, you'll get bonuses for successfully hitting 7 enemies into the sky and making them form the Big Dipper, aka the shape of Kenshiro's iconic torso scars.
 * 20) Kenshiro can also try his luck defeating waves of enemies in a Colosseum.
 * 21) Kenshiro can act as a doctor where he gently taps different pressure points of patients in order to heal them of their ailments.
 * 22) He can also do part-time jobs as a bartender, and it comes with its own set of substories.
 * 23) * Hell, you can even get to wear his bartending uniform under his armour as an unlockable outfit after successfully completing all of the bar minigames!
 * 24) Kenshiro can work as a bouncer and manager for a nightclub too and deal with enemies and rowdy patrons while making profits for the night.
 * 25) He can also take part in gambling activities in the casino.
 * 26) While the franchise has been serious, Lost Paradise combines it with Yakuza's humour and happily embraces its stupidity.
 * 27) The game utilises every single buttons and feature on the DualShock controller, with its accelerometer being used to shake cocktails in the bartending minigame.
 * 28) Loads of optional side-quests to take part in, and they have their own funny moments.
 * 29) You can craft Talismans based on characters from the anime, which give you additional power-ups and perks that are useful in combat.
 * 30) You can now unlock secret techniques in the middle of battles, which is impressive considering the fact that Kenshiro needs a defeat in the anime in order to unlock secret techniques.
 * 31) The game has a Star meter, which fills up for every enemy you kill. Filling it up completely allows Kenshiro to go into Burst Mode, which increases his strength and speed and allows him to unlock special techniques that can be used without Burst Mode.
 * 32) You can customise your buggy to whatever style you want, and it has its own skill tree that lets you reduce damage to it in crashes or increase ramming damage to enemy vehicles.
 * 33) You can yank flamethrowers off flamethrower-wielding enemies and use them against them.

Bad Qualities

 * 1) As the game is very much a reskin of Yakuza 0, a lot of the combat was recycled from the former and remade as Hokuto Shinken moves.
 * 2) Some of the enemies look as if they have been using too much makeup due to their skin textures.
 * 3) Texture glitches can sometimes occur with NPC clothes and the start of the QTEs.
 * 4) Jagi's laugh. It sounds bad and is almost like a dying hyena.
 * 5) You don't get to kill Jagi completely like in the anime. Instead, Rei does the job for you.

Reception
Fist of the North Star: Lost Paradise received mixed to positive reviews from critics, but overwhelmingly positive reception from the audience.

Jim Sterling gave the game a "hundred fists out of one hundred" and praised its combat, humour, story and minigames, with his only complaints being the weapon-wielding enemies and the enemies' skin tones. GameSpot also gave the game praise and rated it 8/10, praising its combat, story, humour and open-world while criticizing its pacing and the fact that some of the characters aren't as well-developed as the anime.

Videos
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