Yakuza 5

Yakuza 5, an action-adventure game from Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio and Sega, hit the PlayStation 3 in Japan in December 2012. It’s the fifth mainline entry in the Yakuza series. Outside Japan, it arrived as a PlayStation Network download in North America, Europe, and Australia in December 2015. A remaster with better resolution and frame rate came out for PlayStation 4 on June 20, 2019, in Japan, and worldwide on February 11, 2020, as part of The Yakuza Remastered Collection. Windows and Xbox One versions followed in January 2021.

The game runs on a fresh engine, breaking from earlier titles that had reused the same one since Ryū ga Gotoku Kenzan!. For the first time in the series, players control five main characters across five Japanese locations. After Yakuza 5 came the spinoff Like a Dragon: Ishin! in 2014 and the prequel Yakuza 0 in 2015. The direct sequel, Yakuza 6: The Song of Life, released in 2016.

**Gameplay** Gameplay stays close to past games, with some tweaks. It splits into Adventure Mode and Combat Mode. Adventure Mode lets you explore areas and take on side activities like mini-games and retro titles such as Virtua Fighter 2 and Taiko No Tatsujin. Cities are much bigger than before, offering more to explore, and the game boasts the highest volume of play spots in series history. Switching between Adventure and Combat Modes is smoother now, without the old transitional pause when enemies appear. Controls and combat tempo have been "dramatically" improved.

**Plot** **Setting and Characters** Five protagonists star here, the most in any series game (Yakuza 4 had four). Kazuma Kiryu (voiced by Takaya Kuroda) returns as the series mainstay. Two protagonists from Yakuza 4 come back: Shun Akiyama (Koichi Yamadera) and Taiga Saejima (Rikiya Koyama). New to the playable roster is Haruka Sawamura (Rie Kugimiya), a recurring character since the original game. Though always key to the story, she’s never been a playable lead before. Her gameplay focuses entirely on rhythm, but still uses mechanics like a Heat gauge similar to combat-focused characters. The other new protagonist is Tatsuo Shinada (Toshiyuki Morikawa), a fresh face in the Like a Dragon series.

For the first time, the game features five distinct Japanese locales. Kamurocho, a fictional version of Shinjuku’s Kabukichō red-light district, returns.