In every Yakuza game there are two things to do. You can either progress the main story or do optional content. Most of the time each new game builds on the engine and content of the last game. This would be unfair to older games in a ranking of each game overall. Instead, this ranking focuses on the campaigns of each game. The most recent version of each game as of the writing of this ranking will be used. Some usually minor and nonspecific spoilers are contained!
8: Yakuza Kiwami
Yakuza Kiwami is a remake of the game that sets up the events of the rest of main series. This is easily the most jam-packed story in the main series. Unfortunately this leaves little time to flesh everything out and kills a lot of the impact of important moments. It’s still a better story than most games, but the later games in this main series achieved a better balance. Even though this is the worst campaign of the main series, its still one of the most essential games to play in the main series because its the most referenced game with the biggest repercussions by far.
This game builds on of the version of the Yakuza 5 engine used in Yakuza 0. Despite the comparatively advanced engine, it feels like you are stuck playing basically the same campaign they had on the PS2. Prepare for a lot of walking around and getting into completely unmemorable fights. The combat is slightly more fun, albeit simpler, than the combat in Yakuza 0, but the scenarios they put you in hardly make it shine. Without the story holding it up this campaign would pretty much be a bad game.
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7: Yakuza 0
Yakuza 0 serves as a set up for Yakuza Kiwami and the extra content added in Kiwami 2. It came out only one game before the end of Kiryu’s story, so they weren’t able to add anything lasting and important to this game. This leads to a largely pointless story where you already know all of the original characters in this game are just going to die or leave and get forgotten by the end. It’s still a much more entertaining story than the vast majority of games out there, but once you get further into the main series this game gets a lot less impressive.
They built off of the engine for Yakuza 5 but the gameplay design of the main campaign took many steps back compared to that game. This game basically just copies the template of the original two Yakuza games, which consists of way too much walking around the city and doing repetitive fights. Yakuza 0 does have some of the better boss fights in the main series, though that isn’t saying much.
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6: Yakuza Kiwami 2
Yakuza Kiwami 2 is the remake of Yakuza 2 in the engine from Yakuza 6. This engine is frankly way better than what came before, but the base of Yakuza 2 and its position in the story hold it back.
This is easily the most pointless story in the whole main series. Its pretty obvious that they weren’t sure a Yakuza 3 would ever happen when the original version of this game came out. The main bad guy of the story and the stuff surrounding him is cool, but prepare for disappointment when you see how this part of the story ends up. Yakuza Kiwami 2‘s story also noticeably clashes with what Kiryu’s character is supposed to be like in a few areas, which makes this an odd entry in general. Like all of the other Yakuza stories, Yakuza Kiwami 2 is superior to most other video games, but far below where the main series eventually goes.
The combat is better than all of the games besides Yakuza 6 and Yakuza: Like a Dragon, but some of the decisions they made to change it from Yakuza 6 made it a lot worse than it should have been. The biggest change from Yakuza 6 is introducing a mechanic where you hold down the heavy attack button while doing combos with the light attack button. Not only is this an extremely lame mechanic, but it also makes your moveset feel different from all the other games and not in a good way. Besides all of the fun opportunities to instantly defeat enemies by throwing them from heights and into water in this game, it’s basically a downgrade from Yakuza 6‘s combat. The overall gameplay design is also not too impressive compared to what they managed in the later games, likely due to the Yakuza 2 base this game was built on. They did a better job than most of the other games with level design at least, which is an area most of the older games in the main series were lacking in severely. Overall it’s one of the more fun games in the main series, but it has been outdone in story many times.
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5: Yakuza 3 Remastered
Yakuza 3 is where the second half of Kiryu’s story begins. The planning for Yakuza 3′ s story shows a lot more thinking ahead than the previous games. The story finally touches on new themes and the sad parts start being a lot more sad at this point in the overall story. Yakuza 3 is the best take on the absurdism of the main series, which leads to it having the most entertaining ending of any main series game. The only real problem is how it builds off of Yakuza 2‘s ending, though that isn’t really Yakuza 3‘s fault since the way Yakuza 2 ended wouldn’t really make for a fitting place to continue the story. Overall this is one of the best Kiryu-centric stories.
If you started with Yakuza 0, this is the first game to introduce a new city, which is a much needed change of pace. The combat is obviously the oldest in the current version of the main series, which means there are a lot less options for fighting enemies. The enemies are noticeably different compared to other main series games as well, on hard most at least, as they are blocking almost nonstop. The combat in these games was never particularly good in the first place, so the odd challenge this game provides is sometimes more interesting than the more complex combat systems in newer games. Still, the gameplay of this game is hardly notable. The one time you are forced to play golf is an interesting part of the main series, at least. Overall it doesn’t rank very high in terms of fun but the main series campaigns are generally not that impressive in this sense compared to other games.
One thing that stands out compared to other main series games is Yakuza 3‘s soundtrack. It is noticeably good compared to the other main series games, which don’t have particularly memorable soundtracks as far as Japanese video games go.
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4: Yakuza 4 Remastered
Yakuza 4 is the first game in the main series (when it came out) to let you play as multiple characters. The new characters are all pretty interesting. Akiyama is a good character but his story has way too much filler and its importance to the main story is dubious. Saejima is not that good of a character relative to the others but his part of Yakuza 4‘s story is one of the most entertaining parts of the main series. Tanimura is cooler but his story is about average for the main series. Unfortunately the way this game’s ending plays out gives the impression that they ran out of ideas at the end. Still, the journey is a better time than most of the games where you are stuck with Kiryu the whole time.
The gameplay design takes another step up from Yakuza 3 by excluding a lot of the parts that felt like they were at the quality level of optional content but still forced. Having to tell multiple stories cut down on the filler, it seems.Yakuza 4‘s combat is unfortunately very easy, with everyone besides Saejima feeling overpowered. Fortunately the frequent switching of characters with different combat styles is somewhat of an improvement over being stuck with Kiryu the whole time. Overall this is one of the funner main series Yakuza campaigns, but that isn’t really saying that much.
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3: Yakuza 6: The Song of Life
Yakuza 6 is the end of Kiryu’s story, and it doesn’t disappoint. The obligatory new problem Kiryu has to solve is told in an enjoyable way. It’s connection to the rest of the main series is also entertaining. The ending is not quite as fun to watch as what happens in Yakuza 3, but the significance and impact of what happens is obviously much better. Yakuza 6‘s only real story related issue is its short length, but this is partially made up for by just how good what is there is. Overall it is the best main series story that focuses on Kiryu and is definitely up there overall as well.
Yakuza 6’s budget must have been much higher than the budgets of the other main series games. The engine looks great, the animations are improved, and the main story is more fully voice acted than ever. The new combat is more simple than the old combat, but it makes up for that by being much more unique and less repetitive. It is pretty much the best action combat in the main series. It also ups the difficulty from Yakuza 4 and Yakuza 5, which was nice to see. At one point Yakuza 6 introduces some elements from the Shenmue series, which are appreciated even though they are executed much less well. Overall its more consistently fun than just about all of the other main series games before it, though its short length plays a big part in this.
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2: Yakuza 5 Remastered
Yakuza 5 is the best story in a Yakuza game. Everything besides Saejima’s story takes a step up compared to before. It is easily the most epic story of the main series as its length would suggest. No game in the main series tops the amount of memorable and entertaining moments that this game has. It does sometimes get a little bit too far off the main point of what is happening though, especially for the Saejima part. Like Yakuza 4 they still weren’t ready to do a truly great ending either, saving that for Yakuza 6, apparently. Still, if you made it this far into the main series there is no doubt you will enjoy a lot of what happens.
The gameplay of this game offers a new formula that makes the campaign a bit too long, but is at least more entertaining than walking around and doing extremely similar battles repeatedly like you spend most of your time doing in these games. Yakuza 5 repeatedly forces you to play through some of the many side activities that they came up with for this game. Luckily a lot of these activities are actually good. The first one is notably funny and fun at the same time. Like Yakuza 4, this game is way too easy even on hard mode. The gameplay variety from all of the characters and forced side stuff remedies this a little bit, at least. Overall the forced side stuff is often more fun than the other main series campaigns, but Yakuza 5 can get pretty tiresome due to how long it is.
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1: Yakuza: Like a Dragon
Yakuza: Like a Dragon is the best campaign in the main series. The story itself isn’t the best, being essentially another take on the first game (which makes sense since this is the first game with Ichiban as the protagonist) with a few things carried over from the Kiryu part of the main series. Still, Yakuza: Like a Dragon tells its story in a better way than the first three stories in the main series managed to so its still one of the more entertaining Yakuza games. The way it references other video games is enjoyable too.
Where this game really shines is the gameplay. It is a turn based JRPG with an open world that is like a lite version of the open worlds found in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Xenoblade Chronicles X. The Yakuza main series suffered from a serious lack of enemy variety for 7 games straight until this game came out and fixed that. They also designed this combat system to force you to have to interact with these enemies, rather than letting you easily defeat them before they can do anything like in previous games. This isn’t just a simple JRPG either, as it includes a lot of interesting enemy designs and mechanics that you don’t see in every other JRPG. It also brings some much needed difficulty to the main series campaigns, being much more difficult than pretty much every other main series campaign on hard mode even though you only get to play Yakuza: Like a Dragon on normal mode on your first try. Overall this is the most fun Yakuza main series campaign yet.
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