I've always admired Like a Dragon for its excellent tonal balance. Since their initial release on the PS2 as Yakuza in the West, each game has consistently contained absurdity while telling heartfelt stories set in the criminal underworld. Kazuma Kiryu risks his life to save everyone he loves, but in his free time he can also go diving off the coast of Hiroshima and fight a giant shark.
You will be in tears one moment and jumping for joy the next. Then, miraculously, all these disparate tones blend together perfectly. Our heroes may be on the run from the law and trying to stop an evil organization trying to murder them, but that can never stop them from heading out to a cheeky karaoke bar for the evening. This balance is even more evident in spin-off titles like Dead Souls. Here, the zombie apocalypse is contrasted with a similar level of dramatic seriousness and the ambitious nature of an urban open world.
But it works well, and the same magic will work once again in Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii.
For you and me, especially Goro Majima, it's the life of a pirate.
Last week, RGG Studio hosted Dragon Direct, showing off more of what we can expect from Hawaii's Pirate Yakuza. As expected, the studio is going crazy with the completely absurd idea of fan-favorite character Goro Majima washing up on a random beach and quickly deciding he wants to become the ultimate pirate lord. Majima is a man who takes every task assigned to him incredibly seriously, so it's not long before he's mingling with the locals and cruising the seven seas on his own pirate ship.
Creating a game in Hawaii and then pulling the pirate card is genius, and it speaks to RGG Studio's talent for reusing assets and characters to great effect.
Aside from Sea of Thieves, there aren't many modern blockbusters that have captured the beautiful cliches of the golden age of piracy and the thrill of clashing swords with fellow sailors or encountering massive amounts of loot. Pirate adventures don't have to be complicated, as long as they adhere to the basic principles that define the genre.
I'm talking about walking the plank, firing cannons, attacking or blowing enemy ships to smithereens, and calling shacks with your crew as the sun begins to set. It shows the simple beauty that RGG Studio understands, and the beauty that Ubisoft's Skull and Bones doesn't. This explains why many people directly drag during chat.
After spending the better part of a decade in development hell, Skull and Bones entered critical and commercial indifference last year. What began as a compelling and timely expansion of naval combat, as seen in
Assassin's Creed 4: Black Flag grew into a misguided attempt at live service piracy whose greedy intentions were surprisingly transparent.
No one cared, and eventually it became clear that Ubisoft just wanted to wipe this mess off its hands and forget about it. What hurts most is that Skull and Bones could have been a Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii game, but it was designed to be just another live-service blockbuster in an already saturated landscape.
Skull and Bones could easily be the best pirate video game.
It may not have been all that ridiculous in tone and character, but it did little to stop Skull and Bones from feeling like an unstoppable villain while fulfilling the pirate fantasy of assembling a crew and sailing the seas in search of hidden treasure. But it failed and now remains a harsh stain on Ubisoft's legacy.
I can't help but think about what the game might have been like if production hadn't been so problematic, or if Ubisoft hadn't been so determined to turn Skull and Bones into an all-encompassing cash kraken. At least RGG Studio is picking up the pieces and having a ton of fun with it. Because Pirate Yakuza looks explosive.
The game shows what a triple-A pirate experience can be like, assembling a crew, finding treasure, and laying claim to the seven seas can exist in isolation, without abusing live service elements for maximum profit. As part of Like a Dragon without feeling out of place. In fact, I would argue that it fits perfectly. Like Dead Souls before it, Pirate Yakuza understands the appeal of throwing familiar characters into absurd scenarios and connecting the dots with a beating heart at its center.
It's a translation of our childhood fantasies of being pirates into video game form. I can't think of a better interpretation of this genre.
