You might have forgotten, but there used to be a time when the Yakuza/Like a Dragon series was a PlayStation exclusive series. The idea of the games coming elsewhere was a bit laughable. Then they started coming to Xbox. Still, the developer Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio affirmed that the series would likely never come to the Switch due to its adult nature on a historically family-friendly console. Fast forward to last year, and we received Yakuza Kiwami, the remake of the first title, on the Switch. The floodgates are now open.
Now, Yakuza 0 Director’s Cut is a launch title for the hotly anticipated Nintendo Switch 2, providing new content unique to this port. Like the series’ thematic and narrative affinity for sentimentality and generations, this release feels like an important full circle and final frontier for the franchise. The beloved prequel that retroactively marked the start of a franchise is now kicking off a new console. It’s funny how some things change and some things stay the same.
Yakuza 0 follows the story of protagonist Kazuma Kiryu, a legend in the Yakuza scene and a name to be feared across the streets of Japan and namely, Kamurocho. It tracks the early days of Kiryu, following his stint with the Dojima crime family, and how he came to be the fabled ‘Dragon of Dojima.’ Conversely, and running parallel to this plot, you’re also following Goro Majima, a club owner with yakuza roots who follows his own path and has his own trials and tribulations. We too, with his story, are learning how he gained his later infamous title, the one of ‘The Mad Dog of Shimano.’ Across seventeen chapters and dozens of hours of play, you’re certainly in for a ride.
Devoted Yakuza/Like a Dragon fans are already in the know with this entry. In Yakuza 0, you’re more or less getting the best that ever was in crime drama storytelling in games. Kiryu’s story is long and fabled across the nearly dozen games he’s either in or stars in. Getting his origin story is incredibly juicy as you learn of his devotion to his family, his orphan upbringing and the like. Similarly, Majima is a crazed figure that is sometimes-ally-sometimes-villain across the franchise, but he’s more gentlemanly here, leading you to believe just why and how he is the way he is later in the timeline. It’s a narrative that is also enriched by the character work. Kiryu and Majima are two sides of the same coin, and both are in debt to their Yakuza families; Kiryu owes his family his entire upbringing, while Majima’s debt is one more literal, tasked with raising money owed to the family by netting profits at his club as a last chance.
These cutscenes and the story feel primed for the Switch 2, and playing them in handheld mode is a good way to engage with them as if it were a piece of literature. Where this lets up is that Yakuza game cutscenes can run pretty darn long, and if you’re idle long enough the Switch screen will darken before sleeping, forcing you to promptly do an input to wake everything up. A minor issue, but an annoyance nevertheless.
There are some new additions to the story in the form of new cutscenes, and this is where Yakuza 0 Director’s Cut will be most divisive compared to the original. There are upwards of about 25 minutes of new cutscenes in-game; more often than not, they’re extended scenes to add context to moments. These scenes vary anywhere between hand-holding the story too much or even retconning narrative choices for the worse. A YouTube compilation of the scenes has the comments filled with people similarly being disappointed. Certainly a recurring theme. At the end of the day, you can’t help but wonder why these choices were made and if they really were all that needed, or just bolstering to make the port more ‘worth’ it in RGG Studios and SEGA’s eyes.
English voice acting (new to Yakuza 0 but in the series since Yakuza: Like a Dragon) is hit or miss, even with stars like Matthew Mercer playing Majima or Solid Snake himself, and David Hayter as Kazama family captain Kashiwagi. These are good performances, because of the talent alone, but minor roles have less than stellar voice acting. Consistency is also troublesome with the fact that people you fight on the street and shopkeepers in stores – unimportant NPCs – still speak in Japanese, removing immersion if you did in fact want to play in English. Though the option there is a nice oddity, I suppose, it just goes to show that playing this series in anything other than Japanese is a considerably lesser experience.
Yakuza 0 Director’s Cut’s final new addition is a round-based combat gauntlet mode called Red Light Raid, allowing for friends to jump in together online and choose between upwards of 60 playable characters to control, taking on hordes of enemies. There are diverse options for play here, letting you control freako NPCs you previously would otherwise only see in Substory missions, like a clown that throws their weight around. It’s not the most extensive system to be added to the game, but it’s the most infallible because it is simply just that fun, and a good amount of hours can be poured into it thanks to the levelling for every character on offer.
Otherwise, what you see is what you get with Yakuza 0 Director’s Cut. Though some small differences make perhaps the original version the best way to play the game, it’s hard to pass up playing as Yakuza badasses Kiryu and Majima on the go. There aren’t any technical hiccups like you might’ve expected or worried about on the original Switch. It’s buttery smooth and you can get into many an arcade game and concret jungle chaos in bite sized chunks all in the comfort of your hands. For some, that’s more than enough.
Yakuza 0 Director’s Cut is available now for the Nintendo Switch 2. For more Switch 2 coverage, why not check out our review on Nintendo Switch 2 Welcome Tour?
About the Author
Charlie Kelly
She/Her, They/Them
Charlie loves her video games as much as she loves dumb, charming JRPG protagonists: probably way too much. You can often catch her spending too much time being emotional over LGBT stories in games. She also thinks Yakuza 6 is the best one.
