YAKUZA 3 REMASTERED / DEVELOPER & PUBLISHER: SEGA / PLATFORM: PS4 / RELEASE DATE: OUT NOW
The Yakuza series debuted back in 2005 on the PS2 and now spans seven main titles and roughly the same amount of spinoffs, mostly exclusive to PS consoles apart from, weirdly, a Japanese exclusive Wii U remaster of the first two games. Throughout the main series, we follow Kazuma Kiryu, a member of the Tojo clan, as he goes about his business with – and against – the Japanese mafia (it all gets super complicated and that’s the most simple way to describe it!), in a long-running saga that seemingly may never end.
It might have flown under the radar for many, or just been ignored as a potentially po-faced super-serious GTA knockoff, but the Yakuza series has become a cult phenomenon over the years. Positive critical reception for the PS3 releases of the third, fourth and fifth games in the series saw the Yakuza name start to pick up steam outside of Japan, but it wasn’t until 2017’s western PS4 release of prequel Yakuza 0 that the wider gaming community became convinced that the series was absolutely worthy of further investigation. The subsequent worldwide release of Yakuza 6, as well as remakes of the first two games (Yakuza Kiwami 1 and 2), meant that four of the seven main Yakuza games were now available in the west on a current-gen console. The missing three instalments are now headed to PS4, all remastered and re-localised and all containing content that had been cut from previous versions of the games.
Yakuza 3 is the first of these remasters to see the light of day – 4 will be available at the end of October, with 5 due for release in February 2020. Despite being a little rough around the edges (as you might expect, with it being ten years old), Y3 is still an immensely playable entry in a series full of genuinely fantastic titles. Its story is emotional and heartfelt, and there’s plenty of humour which now shines through more than ever thanks to the re-translated dialogue. Combat is a little on the clunky side, but there are tons of diversions, side missions and mini-games to break up your adventure. Definitely highly recommended for anyone looking to fill in the gaps of their Yakuza experience.
