If you’re in Japan (or have command of the language and a Japanese PSN account), you’re lucky enough to get to play Yakuza: Like A Dragon this week. The eighth game in Sega’s unlikely hit series changes just about everything we’ve come to know about the game, with a new lead character and turn-based RPG combat instead of the brawling that we know and love. If you haven’t jumped into Yakuza yet, it can be kind of daunting. Here’s a robust Geeksplainer to get you up to speed on the life of a Tokyo gangster.
What Is Yakuza?
Originally developed by Sega’s New Entertainment R&D studio, the first Yakuza game came as a result of producer Toshihiro Nagoshi’s desire to delve into the world of Japanese organized crime. Nagoshi had been with the company since the early 1990s, working on games like Daytona USA and Yu Suzuki’s Shenmue.
Suzuki’s quixotic magnum opus, which blended an immersive free-roaming world with a number of odd limitations and quirky characters, is probably the closest ancestor to Yakuza. Unlike Western open-world games that revolve around vehicular travel, the games typically take place in a single Tokyo neighborhood, Kamurocho, with occasional story-driven detours outside. And given Japan’s strict gun laws, firearms are rarely encountered, meaning most disputes need to be settled with your fists.
The games are primarily set in the present day, but there are a few spin-offs that transport the action to feudal Japan or during a zombie outbreak. They’re mostly disposable, so we won’t spend any time on them here.
The other choice that differentiates the Yakuza series from its Western competitors is the protagonist. Instead of introducing a new playable character each game, for the vast majority of the franchise you walk in the shoes of one man: Kazuma Kiryu.
Who Is Kazuma Kiryu?
Nicknamed the Dragon of Dojima, Kiryu is a high-ranking member of the Tojo clan who embodies the romantic ideal of the Yakuza. Although he’s a criminal, he has a strong moral code and stands up for the weak and downtrodden. That doesn’t mean he’s an angel, of course – his group is caught up in all sorts of devious business. But he’s a staunch friend and ally and always tries to do the right thing. That’s how the first game starts out – with Kiryu finishing up a 10 year prison bid because he took the fall for the murder of his boss to protect his best friend, Akira Nishikiyama.
At the end of the first Yakuza game, Kiryu decides to leave the mob behind and live on the straight and narrow, eventually running the orphanage that he grew up in. Of course, that doesn’t happen, and over multiple sequels he gets pulled into the clan’s business in a variety of different ways. But he isn’t in this alone, and the games have a rich and interesting cast for him to interact with. Like this next guy.
Who Is Goro Majima?
Ah, Majima. The breakthrough supporting character of the Yakuza series, the flamboyant Goro Majima was introduced in the first game as a foil to the stoic Kiryu. While the main character only fights when provoked or to right a wrong, Majima, the “Mad Dog of Shimano,” hurts people just for kicks. He’s the chaotic Tiamat to Kiryu’s lawful Bahamut, in Dungeons & Dragons terms. Wearing his trademark snakeskin jacket, he’s always lurking ready to put your skills to the test.
Fan response to the character was extremely positive, so the team brought him back and increased his screen time in game after game. And when Sega started remaking the original series, Majima became even more vital. He’s a great example of how Yakuza walks the line between drama and comedy. His scenes are often way over the top and absurdly goofy, but he also has a real emotional bond with Kiryu and can be terrifyingly violent as well.
Who Else Can I Play As?
Yakuza 4 introduced three new protagonists to the series along with Kiryu, each of whom illuminates a different part of life in Kamurocho. Shun Akiyama is a loanshark with a heart of gold who lends to people who other banks wouldn’t take risks on. Taiga Saejima is a bruiser who did 25 years behind bars for slaughtering almost all of an opposing clan. And Masayoshi Tanimura is a bent cop who works both sides of the law.
The next game dispensed with Tanimura, as his voice actor left the industry, and added Tatsuo Shinada, a former professional baseball player turned freeloader who investigates the incident that got him banned from the game, as well as Haruka Sawamura, Kiryu’s adopted daughter who by this point has grown into a young woman pursuing her dreams of becoming an idol singer. She’s the only playable character in series history who has no combat mode.
Finally, the protagonist of Like A Dragon is completely new to the series. Like Kiryu, Ichiban Kasuga takes a jail term for a fellow clan member. But when he gets out 18 years later, nobody remembers him, his clan is gone and he has to build himself up from nothing.
Where Should I Start?
The problem with the original Yakuza games is that they really don’t hold up in the modern era. The graphics are pretty dire, and the camera is awful. It’s fixed, instead of being moveable by the player, and it gets in the way during fights and generally just seems like an anachronism.
Thankfully, as the franchise began to gain popularity, Sega realized there was money in remaking them for the current generation of consoles. Yakuza Kiwami, which released in Japan in 2016 and other territories the next year, used the Yakuza 0 engine to modernize everything and bring in the quality of life improvements that the series had seen. If you’re going to get into the franchise, Yakuza Kiwami is a great entry point. It’s Kiryu’s first adventure, but it’s been fleshed out with even more content. Majima also plays more of a role, as he pops up to challenge you in a variety of disguises, including his drag persona Goromi. You can get it pretty cheap for most systems and it doesn’t take long to immerse yourself in the world of Kamurocho.
From there, Kiwami 2 is a logical next stop. It’s Kiryu-centric, and the complex plot has been polished to make it easier to understand. Our man reluctantly returns after the clan’s chairman is killed, helping find a new leader and stave off a factional war. A whole new series of missions allow you to play as Majima for the first time, in a story that flashes back a year to show how the Mad Dog ended up leaving the clan as well.
A remaster of Yakuza 5 is already out in Japan, and will hit the West on February 11. Famitsu gave the original a coveted 40/40 score, and it’s a return to form for the series. The team doubled the typical one-year development cycle, and it shows. Kamurocho is packed with things to do, there are now five playable characters and as many unique locations to doof around in. It’s a full game, dense in the way that the franchise excels at.
Yakuza 6: The Song Of Life was the first new installment on current gen machines. It’s quite good, but parts of it feel repetitive – Kiryu starts the game being released from prison again, Kamurocho is once again ravaged by inter-gang warfare, you know the drill. That doesn’t keep the rest of the game from being solid as hell, with a huge array of mini-games and spare time activities that include such goofy concepts as rounding up stray cats for a cat cafe.
Several of the other games got remasters for modern consoles, but they’re less satisfying. Yakuza 3 feels like an odd stopgap in the series, and 4 is interesting for the introduction of additional playable characters, but most of them don’t connect to the player like Kiryu does. You can safely skip them unless you’re desperate for more.
Got Any Tips For Playing?
Absolutely. The first thing I would say is take your time. The main quest lines of the Yakuza games are pretty short, and if you focus on them to the exclusion of everything else you can blow through a game in a dozen hours. But that is the very definition of playing Yakuza wrong. These games aren’t like roller-coaster rides that bring you from one high-action set piece to another. Instead, you’re meant to wander around, soak in the atmosphere and goof off. No matter how urgent the narrative might seem, you can always head off to the arcade, go on a date at a hostess club, rent a video or otherwise entertain yourself. And doing so opens up more activities, increases Kiryu’s stats and more.
Secondly, save often. Yakuza games have some odd idiosyncrasies, one of which is the lack of a modern quicksave system. You need to stop into a phone booth – helpfully marked with an S on your map – and manually record your progress. It’s easy to forget this in the heat of the moment, but when you’re running off to advance a mission or do a side quest, stop and drop a quarter just in case. It’s easy for fights to go the wrong way, and you don’t want to lose a bunch of progress for no good reason.
There are a lot of things for Kiwami and crew to spent money and CP (the currency you get for finishing requests and side stories) on. A lot of them are totally useless, but there are a few that are must-haves. In several of the games, you can cash in for a Trouble Finder, which when equipped highlights potential side missions on the map. If you don’t feel like wandering around talking to everyone, this can save you a bunch of time.
What Else Should I Play If I Love Yakuza?
The Yakuza games are pretty singular experiences, but there are a few titles on the market that deliver some of the same thrills.
Probably the best place to start is Judgement, developed by the same team and released last year by Sega. Instead of a gangster, this one has you playing Takayuki Yagami, a retired lawyer turned private detective as he tackles a serial murder case in Kamurocho. This is an interesting one because even though it’s set in the same place and uses the same engine, Nagoshi worked to make it feel very different. Changes in the lighting engine, as well as a friendship system that let Yagami deepen bonds with other characters, make this one very worth checking out.
Yu Suzuki, who inspired the series way back when, just released the crowd-funded Shenmue 3. A similarly ambitious free-roaming adventure, this trilogy is a little more wholesome in its choice of protagonist but shares a lot of DNA with Yakuza. Protagonist Ryo Hazuki is trying to find his father’s murderer, a quest that brings him into conflict with a criminal organization controlled by the evil Lan Di. Much like Yakuza, the gameplay in Shenmue consists of ambling around a small, remarkably detailed set of environments, interacting with all sorts of people and occasionally getting in fistfights. It’s sort of like the “cozy mystery” version.
Sleeping Dogs, developed by United Front Games and released for the last generation of consoles in 2012, has a similar Asian underworld vibe. In it, you play undercover cop Wei Shen, tasked with infiltrating the Sun On Yee triad. The scope of this game is closer to a Grand Theft Auto, as Shen can drive cars and motorcycles, but the island setting of Hong Kong seems much smaller and more intimate, making it a good bridge between the two franchises. It lacks the personable, lived-in world feeling of Yakuza but delivers on kung fu combat, interesting supporting characters, and a gripping story.
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