The third in this high-octane story-based Japanese criminal underground action game further expands the trials and tribulations of Kazuma Kiryu (an ex-Yakuza and former chairman of the Tojo Clan) who can't seem to escape his past. 

If you're unfamiliar with the series and don't plan on picking up the first two installments, the stories of these two games can be viewed with a concise recap of all the important details of events, loaded with rival criminal factions, lies, loyalty, double crossing, honour amoung thieves and impacting secrets revealed. 

With Kazuma and the young girl Haruka surviving the violence and bloodshed, he now plans on running an orphanage, but dark forces are conspiring to turn his tranquil plans into a bloody mess.  Kazuma is not liable to take it lying down.

As the story takes him on his trail to get to the bottom of these new dangerous developments, Kazuma can converse with various characters and jump into action when necessary, through 12 chapters.  There is no loading between the story mode and fighting scenes, and objects can be picked up and used as weapons.  Heat Mode builds up as you fight which allows for special, more intense moves.  Technology also gets incorporated.

The intense and wide plot exposition (with around two feature films' worth of animated link scenes) has a strong emotional narrative thread, and is countered with cool mini-games in Adventure Mode, adding that little extra to divert the seriousness a bit.  Battle Mode throws Kazuma into mixed martial arts tournaments, and completing each of the game's modes unlocks various additional missions and levels. 
Extra downloadable content can also be accessed.

While the Japanese dialogue with English subtitles may bug some, I feel it adds more to the authentic feel of the Tokyo and Okinawa settings.

Fans of the controversial director Takashi Miike can look out for his live action version based on the original game.