Yakuza 0

Do You know those games that are pretty easy on lower difficulties but get completely unfair on hard? Well this isn't that game. At least for the majority of the gameplay.

Legend has to be unlocked by finishing the game on any other difficulty. It doesn't appear in New Game Plus so you have to start from scratch. If you already played the game or completed most / all of the achievements this might seem a huge time sink. Luckily this isn't the case. Outside of two rage inducing parts the entire game is smooth sailing and doesn't require any kind of grinding at all. Since you can't play this mode without finishing the game I only focus on the tactics and give tips for the parts that might cause problems.

Key differences on Legend:

1, No auto saves or retries
If you die you can only load manual saves you made at phone booths. Always save! Outside the last mission this isn't a restriction.

2, The enemies deal more damage (obviously)
But not much. Seriously. I expected to get hit like a truck coming from easy but it is not much worse. There are some incredibly damaging moves but you will rarely if ever suffer them aside from gun shots in certain story missions. Money is so easy to come by you can have your inventory filled with Staminan Royales (drug store) all the time. Outside the last mission I don't think I ever had to use more than two between save points. For the majority I used one or none at all.

3, Enemies are more aggressive, You fall over more easily, bosses stay standing more easily
If you are using my advice about fighting this won't be apparent until the latest chapters. Outside a few key points and the last mission they won't have a chance but when they stun lock you it can hurt pretty bad.

4, You generally do less damage with weapons (except guns) and heat actions
This isn't a big deal. Only thing you need to use is melee for the 99% of the game and melee is better with high heat. There are a few heat actions that are useful however, mainly to counter attacks.

5, Really quick time events
Remember those parts when you had to press a button during a cinematic to not get damaged slightly on lower difficulties? These button prompts give you much I mean much less time and hurt like hell. You can get killed from half health if you miss one and all the major fights have one or two. Watch your health and chug down a Staminan Royale asap as you get to half hp. You have tons, it doesn't worth the risk to lose 20 or more minutes of playtime due to a stupid prompt.

And this is pretty much it. Everything else is exactly the same. The money system, the prices or the enemies.

General gameplay:

After the tutorial parts of both characters, run to the CP Shrine. Redeem every gift from the clown there. You get some healing items plus equipment (including stones that can save you from death - keep them for the last mission) but most importantly some expensive items you can sell in the pawn shop. This will leave you around a 100million Yen with Kiryu and well above with Majima (you can sell the crafting material too). You can upgrade yourself early on but don't spend it all right now! Buy the 400k upgrades for your first and second style to have something until Beast unlocks for Kiryu and Breaker for Majima. That is where you want to spend your money! Health boosts are welcome from other styles, but only if you have extra, you only need those two styles, nothing else! The originally unlocked upgrade circle is more than enough to finish the game, don't go completing everything or grind millions! Go for the hp, damage and heat boosts, you don't need fancy moves you will never use. Fill your inventory with Staminan Royales, it is 12k a pop, extremely cheap. Until you get your main moves play normally, X...Y combos, heal if you are below half health. If you have CP you can spend it to run more and earn a little more money but it doesn't matter.

After you get Beast with Kiryu: is all you need. is useful for a quick clothesline finisher if someone sneaks up on you from behind. Spam it as soon as the fights start. Hits like a truck, knocks most enemies down, fills the heat bar like crazy and even bosses have a hard time to do anything but suffer your might. Don't be afraid if the first few hits get blocked, usually enemies will open up for the last. Aside from the obvious upgrades (dmg, hp, heat) it is worth to invest in blocking mid combo and blocking knives / guns (you suffer the damage but don't fall over). Later (chapter 10+) enemies get very aggressive and blocking mid combo helps a ton. If you have the money then from blocking helps with the last boss in the last chapter. Large weapons are very useful with the style, knock down everyone and kill them quickly. If you only have one strong enemy or boss left you can abuse a throw move to remove one or two health bars before they start blocking it. When the enemy is on the floor walk to his legs then press to grab his leg and again to drop him over. Step a little close to him and you can repeat this for a very long time. With all this said Kiryu has a little harder time than Majima, you have to watch his health all the time.

After you get Breaker with Majima: (slight pause until he starts coming down from his flip)(mash) is all you need. Unlike with his normal helicopter spins Majima goes very low and break dances around erratically like a spinning top that is close to falling over. After Majima is coming down and the third X is registered he is already safe from most attacks in the game and when the Y spin winds up it is extremely hard for anyone to touch him while he dishes out tons of damage in every direction. Since the first two X presses are unsafe I suggest making some distance, start the combo and as soon as the third X starts to wind up move towards the enemies. The AI can't really do anything but die. Upgrading is the same as Kiryu, focusing on dmg, hp and heat except Majima has access to tons of health upgrades on all his base circles. Not only his missions are much easier but with the added HP his parts are a joke on Legend. However I suggest learning one move from the break dancing masters, the "Friendly Fire". If you stand between two enemies at least (which can very well happen if you end up in a bad position) for a simple Y press you can delete two lower level enemies or damage a bigger one while getting some breathing room. There are two other moves I feel I should mention, Rising Rotor and Last Stand. Those could help with certain bosses in chapter 12 and later. Spin to win!

The Story guide aka when you don't just mash everything to death:

Chapter 1: Redeem the items form the clown, upgrade your basic two styles a bit (400k damage and some health if it is less than 10m), buy max Staminan Royale. Use Brawler until Kuze (drink those Royales because the QTEs will kill you if you are not near max!) then switch to Rush. Lock on him with the right bumper, dash to the side with A and hit him when he punches the air. This is pretty much it.
Chapter 2: Don't worry about the mandatory Shakedown fight,, even if you have a 100m on you he will only take 1-2 at best. Avoid him afterwards forever. Not worth it.
Do the following substories with perfect answers: How to Train Your Dominatrix (pig, any answer, pervert, watching you), Password Protected (Subotenuhigeukiro), The Show Must Go On (any greeting, food, tilt, remove). The items you get are incredibly good. The gun will unlock for purchase (1.3m) in the Tiger+Dragon for both characters. You need at least one on You for the last mission with Kiryu!!! I deliberately completed the entire game (minus that part) without guns to see if it is doable but if you buy a couple it makes for a good safety net if you struggle with someone. You get some guns from the clown but this is much better.
Soon you get the Beast style. Upgrade what you can right away. You don't need to grind money but if you really really want because the next shiny thing is close then there is a way you can make 2.4m in every 30 seconds. Oda is a joke with all those furniture.
Puzzle Pool easy money method: pick easy and bet 3m. The first two puzzles are extremely easy. Do them, stop and then restart. If you can do the third consistently it is 6.7m but as I said you don't need to grind. If you are really short on money then play one round of darts alone, you get a better darts. Then play with the guy standing near, he is very easy to beat and gives you 100k / 500k / 1m if he loses. 500k is enough to work yourself up with pool from then on. Puzzle Guide: Chapter 3: Redeem your stuff, upgrade some. Poor Majima doesn't have good substories but you might want to do From the Heart (Secret Wallet) and Be My Boyfriend (dentist, movie, childlike). Interesting but if you do your worst in Be My BF you get a better item.
Chapter 4: Fights should be easy enough, what might cause problem is the escort mission at the end (boy we love those). Try to avoid as many fights as you can and spin around Makoto all the time. She can die from two(!) grabs and won't ever heal(!) until you finish this part. By now you should have the spin down pretty good. If it really gives trouble I can only suggest practice on randoms.
Chapter 5: Don't even think about grinding Real Estate.
Chapter 6: JCC is another good money making method if you really can't help yourself. Look up the achievement guide on the site. I'm guilty of making a 100m in a few matches because... I do enjoy catfights.
Chapter 7: Nothing of note.
Chapter 8: A great escort mission again. This is however much easier.
Chapter 9-12: Easy all the way if you are stocked up. However Ch12 has Sera as a boss who can (and will) counter your spin of death. All in all there are ways to fight him properly but to be honest you probably still have all but 2 slots full with healing items. So just wind up the good old spin from afar and poke him instead of getting fully commited until he is visibly stunlocked. You get countered a lot but who cares when you can heal like crazy. Eventually you will stomp through his defense enough times to get him. If you have the last stand skill you can counter his counter sometimes if you have heat. If you have at least one heat bar then switch to slugger, wait him to walk up to you and press Y for some smashing success to speed things up.
Chapter 13: Fitting number because this is the first of the two parts that might make you throw the game or the console out of the window (not necessary in this order). Save before you go back to CAL Videos. From then on you have to suffer a complete bulls* on rails section where you have to shoot enemies from a car more times than you can count and you CAN'T HEAL. There are tons of guides up for this part, the only thing that helped me is holding the slow mo button down if it is empty and no time to fill it. You get micro slowdowns this way constantly and much more time to aim at enemies. If you manage it somehow then comes the surprise if you forgot: you have to fight a bunch of guys while Makoto is free for a grab behind you! Two mistakes and you have to start from the car chase again... Crush them with anything you can think of, use guns if you want, this is no joke.
Chapter 14-16: Nothing.
Chapter Finale: After you beat Kuze for the final time you can also save for the last time. The last part is incredibly long and if you die any time you have to start from the beginning. Majima has it easy again. There are only two parts you might have trouble with. First you will enter a room eventually where one big guy and two gunmen are with pistols. No time to wind up anything, you either shoot them or run up to them and Friendly Fire at least one. The last part is the final boss Lao Gui, he throws things then shoots then fights and counters. He might seem very intimidating when you find yourself chugging on Royales while not doing much damage but his first two phases are very short. You don't even have to remove a whole health bar to make him switch. The last melee one might be annoying but you should have still a lot of Royales left. Spin him to death.
On the other side Kiryu really got the short end of the stick. Here, for the first time in the game you can actually run out of healing items! I suggest restarting the intro fight at the pier if you can't do it in 4 or less healing items. Always go for the gunmen, always back off if you break through the next part of the ship. This way you are protected from gunmen from afar and melee guys come to you. After you beat the guy with the barrel on the side of the ship go up the stairs then back off to bait the melee guys down. Then comes a very luck based part, you might want to equip an item that can save you from death (the clown gave you some). There are two gunmen far away in a straight line, they can shoot you simultaneously and kill you instantly. Pull your shotgun, walk towards them and shoot. The gun has a ridiculously long range and one shot kills one gunman. Not long after you punch someone through some chain, three gunmen will stand in front of you very close. You either back off to the corner and wait them to come at you or you shoot them to oblivion ASAP with your gun. I suggest the gun. After this there is basically only the boss, who you may guess is on another level. Hopefully you have half or more of your Royales left. If you have the punch from a block ability it helps some but most of the time you can barely stand up only to be stunned by another attack. Still your good old XXXY is your best bet here. If you go down you have to sidestep with A when you get up or you will be stunlocked forever. If you can get him down then use the leg throws as much as you can. When you are against his beast form it is more manageable and you can counter with Y if he has something in his hand. The worst thing in the last phase is definitely the QTE. I'm not sure but if you miss any of the three, he should kill you instantly. I swear it is a tiny bit slower (maybe for this reason) than the others on Legendary. When I finally got there I didn't risk it, beat him the first try.