After months of teases, Sega has finally unveiled the next mainline entry in RGG Studio’s phenomenal fighting series, Yakuza 7. I’m grateful for more information, even if the announcement has left me confused.
We all know the drill right? Series Protagonist, Kiryu, beats the living daylight out of countless street thugs in an ever satisfying brawler game. Well, not this time.
We all knew that Kiryu will be taking a well-earned break after the events of Yakuza 6 with a new character, Ichiban Kasuga, taking up the mantle. What we didn’t know is that change would turn out to be one of the more subtle ones as Yakuza has now morphed into an RPG.
In surprising news the fighting of old is gone, replaced with a live command RPG battle system which will see Ichiban fighting with a party as is traditional in RPGs. The news hasn’t gone down too well with fans over on Twitter and I’m not sure how to take it myself, although I’m confident in the studio to deliver us a great game.
You may remember this years’ April Fools joke that showed footage from Yakuza 7 in an RPG style. Turns out this wasn’t a joke after all and was just a brilliant way to showcase footage and trick us all. Sneaky.
The story, however, does seem familiar. Ichiban is released from prison and must fight his way up to become a new Dragon. The folks over at Gematsu have translated the whole trailer if you want to take a look. The trailer itself can be seen below:
Another change is the setting. This time around players will get to experience an area of Yokohoma that’s said to be three times the size of the Kamurocho we are so used to, although I’m sure the latter will make some sort of an appearance, as per the norm.
The trailer itself does showcase some interesting characters and despite the changes, I’m excited to give it a go. Thankfully, we won’t have too long to wait as Yakuza 7 releases on January 16, 2020, in Japan with a western release to follow sometime in 2020.
What do you think of the changes and will you still be buying Yakuza 7: Whereabouts of Light and Darkness (Like a Dragon in the West)? Let us know in the comments.