Yakuza Kiwami 3 & Dark Ties, the recent remake of the classic Yakuza game from RGG Studios, added a lot of new content. The major additional piece was Dark Ties, a spinoff that added an extra story about one of the game’s main antagonists, Yoshitaka Mine. It adds more detail about one of the series’ best villains, filling in background and motivations. The thing is, there are so many rich and interesting characters in the Yakuza/Like a Dragon universe that deserve their own playable chapter. Here are five that we’d love to see:
Ryuji Goda
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The main antagonist from Yakuza 2/Yakuza Kiwami 2 is another beloved character, with his rough and tough personality being a particular highlight. A game focusing on more of his Omi Alliance days leading up to becoming patriarch would be fantastic.
His brash and strong-headed personality would mark a significant narrative shake-up compared to Kiryu, along with a fighting style that would be much heavier and hard-hitting. This is by no means a request to bring him back to life, by the way, but seeing him in his younger days would be awesome.
Seonhee
The leader of the Geomijul is an absolute badass, with a past rife for exploring. There’s a lot we don’t know about her, leaving plenty of room to show her rise to the kingpin of the deadly crime family. She’s calculated and smart, with a potential mini-game running the information network being an interesting area to explore.
Her assassin-like combat kit could be a ton of fun to engage with, mixing in long-range weapons like throwing needles and crossbows with a whip for close combat. She’s one of the best recent additions to the universe and deserves her time in the spotlight.
Shun Akiyama
Shun Akiyama, the loan shark with a heart of gold, is easily one of the best characters across the entire franchise. While sharing the spotlight in previous titles, Akiyama has a ton of untold history and unaccounted-for time that a solo spinoff could explore.
There are years when he leaves Japan to hold on to his fortune and help those in need, meaning there’s plenty of destination potential for RGG to keep playing in. His kicking fighting style is always a blast to use, especially if some of Mine’s fast and agile set gets used as inspiration for some updates. A globe-trotting Akiyama is a game waiting to happen.
Shintaro Kazama
Kiryu’s adoptive father and role model would be a fantastic character to explore, especially in his younger years. We’ve seen some of his brutal and violent past, along with his opening of Sunflower Orphanage in an attempt of dealing with his guilt and regret. A tale looking at his rise to the top of the Kazama Family could be a much harder-hitting journey, where his tactical thinking could shine.
Alternatively, setting the story in the early years of Sunflower Orphanage and seeing younger versions of Kiryu, Nishikiyama, and Yumi could open up a lot of interesting parallels between himself and Kiryu. There’s a lot RGG Studios could do with Kazama and his younger years, with a ton of interesting lore and backstory to dive into.
Kaoru Sayama
Kaoru Sayama would mark the biggest change up from this prospective list, given her history as a detective. With the apparent loss of the Judgment series, a focus on Sayama could let her detective and investigative skills shine. Using some of the investigative systems RGG previously used, it would be interesting to include sections where Sayama would need to identify the true culprits behind various events. RGG could really play with the overall formula here and dive deeper into one of the most interesting characters that’s been in the background for a number of years.
With so many incredible characters over the years, and an interesting idea in Dark Ties, RGG Studios has a ton of options on where to go next. Focusing on any one of the above characters could introduce really interesting concepts and lore deep dives, while shining a spotlight on periods of time that I would love to see filled in. And while any one of these characters would be interesting, I neglected, however, to mention the one true answer to who deserves their own spinoff:
Captain Beef
’nuff said.
