
We’ve all managed to survive the past 15 years without them, and could possibly survive another 15, if the outside world allows it.
#Yakuza kiwami majima email series#
The Yakuza Kiwami games – remakes of the first two entries in the series – did a good job, and that was for two games already available in the West! These spin-offs would start from scratch, not to mention appealing beyond the existing Yakuza fan base for the potentially wider audience that sees the setting of, say, Ghost of Tsushima.Īnyway, I’m not here for demand these games. But even if it takes some work – and in the case of… Ryu ga Gotoku Kenzan!some Real work – to get the games up to speed on modern hardware for modern expectations, there’s never been a better time to boost that spend. However, the game is also almost 7 years old, so we may have to do extra work to recreate it rather than a simple port, so the decision is a little more complicated.ĭespite the potential in those statements and the fact that the developers have said: they are working on games that go beyond the Yakuza and judgement seriesWe haven’t heard anything about the possibility since then. In my opinion, the action is some of the best in the series, so I’d love to locate them if we get the chance. We prioritized reclaiming our ground with the series in the West of Yakuza 0so time flew by without an ideal time to release these games. Personally, I would like these titles to be localized and enjoyed by our western fans. These have now been accompanied (or replaced) by technical problems, as we discussed last year when director Daisuke Sato said:: with the nuances of the time period (it says here that another Yakuza spin-off, the gun-heavy dead souls, used to be an English language release, which says a lot about Sega’s perception of the western market). The first was an understandable fear that if no one bought the most important, Yakuza games, why bother with these spin-offs? However, as that was slowly negated by the series’ increasing popularity in the West, there remained concerns that much of the games’ atmosphere would be lost to a Western audience, which would not be as well known. Sega and developers Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio have long had multiple reasons for keeping these games in Japan. These look great! I really want to play them! Ishin even, if you’re a fan of the karaoke sequences in the main games, has its own historical take: Watch the Japanese trailer for ishin and you’ll see what I mean: Then in 2014 Sega released Ryu ga Gotoku Ishin! for the PS4, which did the same – only now during the end of the shogunate in the mid-19th century – and introduced more main-series cameos, with appearances from favorites like Majima and Daigo.Īlthough they were set in different time periods and with a heavy, historical slant, these were still Yakuza games through and through.

It is set in Kyoto in 1605 and was a Yakuza game sent back in time, with players still controlling Kazuma Kiryu, except his name is now Kazumanosuke Kiryu, and instead of being a mobster, he’s a retired swordsman who now works as a bodyguard. In 2008 Sega released Ryu ga Gotoku Kenzan! for the PS3, which is best described as a Yakuza special holiday.

I know this sounds absurd, given the number and prominence of Yakuza games around these days, but it’s true! People were actually so concerned about it, that every little little change Sega made to… Yakuza 3s English version was scrutinized to perfection, with fans terrified that any little thing that could hurt sales would mean the end of the series in the West.Īll that fear was of course irrelevant… Yakuza 3 did a great job and the rest is history-but all that trepidation about low sales helps pave the way for why, around the same time, another one Yakuza game was released in Japan (later followed by a sequel) which we still haven’t been able to play in English to this day. But it wasn’t always like that! Between the release of Yakuza 2 and 3 things were looking incredible dicey for English speakers, and there were real fears that if Yakuza 3 If not sold well, it would be the last game in the franchise we would ever see here.

In 2022 Yakuza is a fairly large series in the West, as we saw yesterday eight games made it to PlayStation Plus.
