The Yakuza hype train just keeps on rolling. Fans of the series will be delighted to hear that Yakuza 3, 4, and 5 are being remastered for the PlayStation 4.
The series was already given new life with the last years release of Yakuza 0, Yakuza Kiwami, which itself is a remaster of the original Yakuza, Yakuza 6: The Song of Life, which was just released in April, and Yakuza Kiwami 2, which comes out on August 28, 2018. With the impending release of the three remasters, this means that the entire Yakuza series will be available on one system.
At this time, Sega has only confirmed that these remasters will be out in Japan. However, with the popularity of the series gaining momentum in the West, it wouldn’t be a surprise if they were released here as well. The tentative Japanese release schedule is as follows: Yakuza 3-August 9 2018, Yakuza 4-Fall 2018, and Yakuza 5-Spring 2019.
Since these games originally came out for the PlayStation 3 years ago, they will all receive a huge boost in performance and graphical output. All three remasters are expected to run at 60 frames per second and boast a resolution of 1080p.
Ever since its inception back in 2005, the Yakuza series has taken off in Japan to become one of Sega’s most acclaimed series. While the series fared well in the West, it was sometime after the 4th iteration that it began to slow down in popularity. This was evident when Yakuza 5 was ported to the West in late 2015, more than three years after its original release in Japan of 2012. At the time, Sega wasn’t certain if the series would be able to continue outside of Japan. But with Sega Executive and original series creator Toshihiro Nagoshi, the company continued to push for more international releases. With the release of the Yakuza 0 in 2015, the series hit a high point. The game was critically acclaimed and when it came out in the West in 2017 the reception was the largest since the PlayStation 2 days.
Yakuza has come a long way, and from the looks of things, it wont slow down anytime soon.