Best redemption arc of the franchise imo.
Hi there, welcome to another of my IA proposal, this time I'm back with another Like a Dragon candidate, as well as the first (and probably only) IA/IH crossover of the franchise, and the second IA candidate of the Judgment duology, who is one of my favorite characters of Judgment, let's begin! (also don't be confused if the proposal is kinda short, since his character arc as a hero wasn't that long).
What's The Work?
Judgment duology are the spin-offs of the Like a Dragon franchise created by RGG Studio, it took place in the same universe as the mainline installments. This time, we get to play as Takayuki Yagami, an ex-lawyer turned detective who always fought for justice and tried to ensure everyone was treated fairly.
Who is He?
Kyohei Hamura is the secondary antagonist of the first Judgment game, also known as Judge Eyes: Shinigami no Yuigon in Japanese. He is the former captain of the Matsugane Family. Despite initially being a greedy mobster who enabled many individuals to become very heinous villains, after his boss' sacrifice, he didn't take it for granted and decided to redeem himself to do the right thing.
What Has He Done?
After the death of his boss Mitsugu Matsugane, he felt remorseful for it and decided to redeem himself to support Yagami. After The Mole had escaped, he quickly chased him, when he failed, he immediately told Yagami that Mitsuru Kuroiwa, a cop, had been The Mole all along, and warned him to stop him before he killed more people. He then told everything he knew about Kuroiwa so that Yagami could use them to stop him once and for all. Knowing Yagami has been suspecting Shono, he then told everything about him and his AD-9 experiments so that things could be 100% confirmed.
After that, before the court began, he laid low to avoid getting killed by Kuroiwa, at the same time, he tried to gather sufficient evidence to testify against Kaoru Ichinose, the head of the conspiracy. When the time has come, he went to the batting center and called Yagami to approach him, so that they could plan to defeat the AD-9 conspirators once and for all. After that, when the trial began, he went to the court with sufficient evidences, he then actively testified against Ichinose by pointing everything he has done over the years as the head of ADDC, helping a lot of lawyers and prosecutors in process. Thanks to him, many people were saved from the brutal experiments. He also contributed to proving two innocents who were framed by the conspirators, Kazuya Ayabe and Yoji Shono.
Admirable Standard
As mentioned in a lot of my proposals, the admirable standard of the Judgment duology is pretty high, as it connects to the Like a Dragon universe, where there are a lot of selfless heroes who didn't hesitate to protect other people from large-scale threats, such as Kazuma Kiryu, Goro Majima or Ichiban Kasuga, who restlessly protected others from a lot of (Near) Pure Evil villains like Sohei Dojima, Ryo Takashima, Tsubasa Kurosawa and Bryce Fairchild, however, to save time, I will list some noble heroes in the Judgment duology which he had to compete, as they are still as admirable and influential as those from the main series:
- Takayuki Yagami: A very noble detective who never stopped pursuing justice. This is why he put a lot of efforts in stopping many villains like Mitsuru Kuroiwa, who brutally gouged innocent people's eyes out and killed them for an experiment; or Yoji Shono, a delusional scientists who brutally experimented on random innocent people, as well as framing Shinpei Okubo twice, causing the latter's tragedy. Therefore, thanks to him, the innocents citizen can be safe again, his heroism can also be on par with other Like a Dragon main characters because of that.
- Masaharu Kaito: Another noble detective who protected both the innocents as well as inspiring other heroes, including the main character Yagami, to become more noble. He also majorly took part in defeating Kuroiwa and Shono and stopping the AD-9 conspiracy. He also took upon himself to defeat a very vile PE villain, Kyoya Sadamoto, preventing him from poisoning more people to death, as well as to protect his girlfriend and kid.
- Jin Kuwana: Despite being a morally ambiguous and very lethal antagonist, he was the one who contributed the most in resolving teenage bullying, a very serious social issue which not many people dared to stand up against, and he also defeated a lot of bullies who were extremely abusive and remorseless, who all contributed to making schoolplace abuse a common thing, especially an NPE villain like Hiro Mikoshiba. He also stopped Kazuki Soma from killing more people in cold blood.
For Hamura, I think he easily stands out, comparing to both of those heroes from the main series and the Judgment spin-offs. Although it were Yagami and Kaito, as well as their friends, who majorly contributed in stopping Kuroiwa and Shono, two of the vilest villains of the franchise, Hamura was the one who was the leading figure in directly stopping and defeating Kaoru Ichinose, the bigger bad of the story, as well as another Pure Evil villain, who orchestrated the AD-9 conspiracy. He also contributed in defeating Kuroiwa, by revealing he was The Mole, making Yagami easier to stop him.
What also helps is that he has minimal screen time as well as lower resources as a hero, as he has only few chapters being a hero yet he took every of his screen time to do heroic deeds non-stop. Additionally, his resources also got much lower when he became a hero comparing to when he was a villain, as he went from a captain of a family to a normal dude with nothing to lose, yet he still did his best to defeat the overarching antagonist of the game.
What Makes Him Inconsistent?
This is obvious, what prevents him from being NPG is that he spent most of his screen time in the game as a very vile villain who passes the heinous standard. Some of his worst acts including his personal villainy towards Kaito and Higashi by framing both of them in his Matsugane Family robbery, making their relationship almost strained; enabling and directly helping Mitsuru Kuroiwa/The Mole, a Pure Evil villain, to brutally kill a lot of innocent people by gouging their eyes out; as well as supporting the AD-9 conspiracy, orchestrated by Shono and Ichinose. It doesn't help that he didn't or rarely feel remorse for any of those crimes.
Final Verdict
An easy yes to this redeemed villain.