Speaking to IGN Toshihiro Nagoshi SEGA’s CCO and Executive Producer on the Yakuza series explains that the game has been made in such a way that loading screens now seamlessly transition between adventure, fighting, and cutscenes without breaking the flow of the game.
“We’ve worked hard to make this game completely seamless, you can engage in the central adventure, get into battles, watch drama scenes, and go back to the adventure, all without any loading screens. Go into any building or any room or any floor without loading.”
“There is more action and more discovery, For example, if you spot a building on fire in the distance, you could travel all the way to that building and rescue the occupants.”
“Loading is problematic for lots of reasons, including its effect on the realism of the story — let’s say you have a 60-second countdown to reach a location and stop an explosion, but when loading screens come in, how do we account for those seconds? How do we keep the pressure on? So we really pushed to make it seamless this time. That’s where a lot of the budget went, and it’s also the reason we did not make a version for PS3. The effect is that the player has the freedom to solve problems as they like, and the sub-quests themselves are presented in a seamless way.”
There’s a great example of the new system in this video at 8:00 minutes in. A woman hanging from the top of a building and Kiryu needs to save her within the time limit. The whole thing plays out without any loading screens giving the whole thing a feeling of tension.
The studio has been pushing for this since Ryu Ga Gotoku Ishin but only now that they’ve made the jump to Playstation 4 have they had the power to pull it off!
[Thanks IGN]