Best. Title. Ever.
HIGH Goro Majima finally gets his very own game!
LOW The sailing and piracy aspects fall short of expectations.
WTF Sorry, no WTF moment here. Everything in this game is completely normal.
Some time after the events of Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth, series favorite Goro Majima washes up shirtless and dehydrated on a small island and is promptly saved by an innocent little tyke named Noah who warily hands the tattooed weirdo a cup of water. This random act of kindness results in Majima dedicating his life to protecting the little guy from assorted bastards on the island and making sure Noah’s wish of seeing the world is granted… by becoming an actual pirate sailing around the high seas at the helm of his own pirate ship.
Typically, if a sixty-year-old man loses his memory, begins dressing up as a pirate and promises to take a random ten year old boy away from his family on an extensive adventure… well, it wouldn’t end well for them. However, the story told in Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii isn’t terrifying — it’s heartwarming! Swoon as our lovable amnesiac ex-yakuza scamp rolls around Hawaii sinking enemy ships for plunder and stabbing the living hell out of anybody who gets in his way.
Of course, pirates have enemies and Majima will have to frequently defend himself from people who think a one-eyed maniac carrying a pair of razor sharp swords will make for an easy target. This entry opts for real-time third-person combat, and while Majima might be over the hill, he’s still a nippy little bugger in combat, scooting around the battlefield faster than a greased ferret shooting down a drainpipe.
Majima has access to two battle styles — his classic ‘Mad Dog’ where he brandishes a knife and can split into doppelgangers, and the new ‘Sea Dog’ pirate-themed stance where he dual wields a pair of cutlasses, can haul people around with a grappling hook or blast them in the face with a flintlock pistol. There are often tons of enemies on the screen, but fret not — Captain Majima is more than capable of ripping through anyone.
So, realism may have left the building, but joyful antics and salty shenanigans are in plentiful supply when it comes to Pirate Yakuza.
Unsurprising to anyone familiar with the character, Majima makes for an fantastic protagonist. He’s fearless and borderline demented, but also surprisingly sharp and empathetic in story scenes — at least when he’s not summoning cursed monkey Gods to punch people in the face.
The Hawaii map from the previous game makes a return, and there’s a few islands peppered nearby that can be visited for various reasons, from Noah’s home on Rich Island to the insane pirate lair known as Madlantis, where cannon-blasting seadogs drop anchor for well-deserved R&R. There may be shark tanks.
Naturally for a Yakuza game, there are tons of side activities, substories and minigames to indulge in. I’m not going to spoil them, but the revamped baseball minigame Bang Bang Batting deserves a special shout out, transforming one of the least interesting tasks in the series into a seriously addictive spectacle. It’s great.
Customization options aren’t too shabby either. Majima’s ship can be decked out as the player prefers, from the ominous black and gold setup I went with, to something that looks like it’s been dragged straight out of a magical girl anime with laser cannons melting everything in sight. Clothing options are also incredibly extensive, from basic t-shirts and hoodies to the apocalyptic Fist of the North Star-adjacent spiked shoulder pads I rolled with.
Given that this all of this madness sounds like it’s leading up to being the best game ever made, what’s the catch? Well, the catch is that as a side entry in the series, it doesn’t feel as fully-fleshed-out as it could have been.
Take the sailing, for example. The shipborne side of things isn’t bad, exactly, but it is disappointingly safe. There’s no truly open world sailing, with various maps being chopped up into sections and accessed via quick travel. Most battles on the high sea end in the blink of an eye, and its arcadey feel robs it of authenticity.
The fact is that despite the theming it’s not a pirate simulator in any way, and things such as weather changes are minor. Anyone who’s played Assassin’s Creed IV: Black Flag or Sea of Thieves will know how a sudden squall and churning waves can enhance the experience, but Pirate Yakuza doesn’t even attempt to compete on that level. For such a focal point of the story, being on the ship feels much like any other bolted on minigame in the series — decent, but somewhat throwaway.
I also have to say that despite liking the story overall, corners have been cut here, too. The whimsical and generally carefree nature of the plot is great, but there’s too much filler in the midgame. It doesn’t feel offensively padded out, but expect to fight human chew toy and supposed pirate boss “Keith” far more often than is desired, or to slam the brakes on storyline progression until the player levels up Majima’s ship or progresses through the ranks of the Pirate Coliseum before being allowed to continue to the superb finale. They’re unnecessary detours.
Despite all that, Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii is still pretty great overall, but this was one case where the devs should have pulled out all the stops to offer something truly different and unique within the series, and it didn’t quite get there.
Rating: 7.5 out of 10
Buy Like a Dragon: Yakuza Pirate in Hawaii: PC – PS – XB
Disclosures: This game is developed by Ryu ga Gotoku Studio and published by Sega. It is currently available on XBO/X/S, PS4/5 and PC. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the PS5. Approximately 30 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode, and the game was completed. There are no multiplayer modes.
Parents: According to the ESRB, this game is rated M and contains Blood, Strong Language, Suggestive Themes, and Violence. The official description reads as follows: This is an action-adventure game in which players control an ex-yakuza (Goro Majima) stranded on an island in the Pacific. As players seek to regain Majima’s memories, they explore the island and battle enemies to become captain of a pirate ship. Players engage in melee combat, using punches, kicks, blades, and pistols to kill enemies. Fighting is highlighted by impact sounds, cries of pain, and frequent blood-splatter effects. Finishing moves can involve brief slow-motion effects and/or dramatic stabbings. Cutscenes depict further instances of violence: a character shot repeatedly; a bound man punched and kicked; a child kicked on the ground. Some female characters wear revealing outfits (e.g., low-cut tops, deep cleavage); in one background area, a man is depicted groping a woman’s chest. The word “f**k” appears in the game.
Colorblind Modes: There are no colorblind modes available, though elements such as the subtitles can be recolored to suit.
Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game offers subtitles. The subtitles can be altered and/ or resized. There are no significant auditory cues. I’d also say that the game is also fully playable without audio.
Remappable Controls: Yes, this game offers fully remappable controls.
The chance discovery of a muddy, burnt out copy of '50 Shades of Grey' in a hunting pit gave him an appreciation for complex plots, characters and overarching narrative, and the unexpected gift of a Spectrum 48k allowed him to indulge in these newfound sensibilities with intelligent, highbrow games such as 'flee from the badly animated spinning turquoise dolphins' or 'avoid the deadly glowing bricks of doom'.
The fusion of both these interests finally culminated with Darren teaching himself how to write by basically guessing at what words might look like when jotted down on paper as opposed to being howled inarticulately at the skies.
Now others occasionally get to read his scribblings. Lucky them.
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I’ve played every (?) game in this series, and loved most of them, because I keep playing them.
I hated this one.
I’m not saying it’s irredeemable. I did beat it in the dozens of hours it took.
But the story was so nonexistent and the characters were so awful that eventually I just started skipping entire cutscenes.
There is a ton of copy-and-paste content from Y8, which . . . it’s not bad content! At all! But I played Y8 last year and I didn’t feel like playing the exact same minigames again.