It feels safe to admit it now, but my main emotion when I saw that Like a Dragon was doing a pirate game was apprehension. I’m part of the new wave of Like a Dragon fans, coming aboard with Yakuza: Like a Dragon, but I quickly fell in love hard with the series and Infinite Wealth was my 2024 Game of the Year, albeit in part for some more personal reasons.
And I also love pirates. Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii seemed perfect. I wrote recently about my desire for more cowboy games, and made special mention of the fact that cowboys and pirates, along with samurai, make up the trifecta of cool character archetypes. Knights are a distant fourth. So as someone whose favourite Assassin’s Creed is Black Flag and who has been yearning for something to take the wheel with the wind at its back, one of my freshly minted favourite series tackling a genre that has been hollow for too long seemed like a dream come true. But would it be?
Pirate Yakuza Builds On Infinite Wealth
The initial trailer focused more on the narrative, and the way this story slotted into both the characterisation of Majima and the timeline of the Like a Dragon, than the gameplay. Most of what we saw was very similar to Infinite Wealth, down to the same Hawaii setting. Run around the city, have fights, the end. It’s action-based like the games that launched under the Yakuza moniker rather than the turn-based stylings of Like a Dragon (which makes sense, as those were the games Majima featured heavily in), but other than that it seemed like more Like a Dragon. Or Yakuza. Needlessly confusing.
And really, that was enough. I like Infinite Wealth, so a smaller, faster, somehow more chaotic version of it with Majima at the centre was enough for me. But was this really going to be a pirate game, or just a game where you’re a pirate? And was it even going to be that, or just a tongue-in-cheek pirate king narrative riffing entirely on the fact that you have an eyepatch?
I was excited for a new Yakuza game, but I wasn’t necessarily hopeful for a Pirate Yakuza game, despite those two words featuring next to one another in the ridiculously long title. But after the recent gameplay showcase, those fears have been put to bed. Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii is going all in on the fourth word in a title that I’ll stop dunking on now, and I don’t know why I expected anything less. If there’s one thing RGG knows how to do, it’s commit to the bit.
Gaming Sorely Needs More Naval Combat
Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii is not a Yakuza game with some pirates. It’s a pirate game with some yakuza. You can fully customise your ship (both for aesthetics and offensive power), add a crew of over 100 characters, and make a variety of upgrades to give you total control. Out on the waves, you can fully steer the ship, whether that means crashing into foes, lining up the perfect barrage of cannon fire, or nestling alongside neatly to board them.
It’s strange that we haven’t seen a game explore this angle since Black Flag. I know we have Sea of Thieves, but that’s a very different kind of game more focused on player interaction and emergent live-service gameplay than the power fantasy of becoming a pirate lord. The less said about Skull and Bones the better, although it is worth noting that the fact Skull and Bones was such a long time coming may have put other studios off. Firstly out of fear of not living up to Black Flag and its spiritual successor from the same publisher, then as things went wrong, out of fear of joining the ill-fated title in development hell.
Pirate Yakuza though seems like a game without fear. It is fully embracing the carnage of running a pirate ship, and a lot of this fresh gameplay seems very unlike Yakuza with its focus on naval combat and large scale assaults, and yet incredibly like Yakuza with its range of wacky characters and over the top action. I wasn’t letting myself get too hopeful about Pirate Yakuza being able to rival the quality of Infinite Wealth, but now I’m all in. It’s a pirate life for me.
- Released
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February 20, 2025
- Developer(s)
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Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio