In recent years, fans of Sega’s Like A Dragon games—a series formerly known in the West as Yakuza—have urged developers to allow characters like Kiryu Kazuma and Majima Goro to appear in fighting games like Tekken and Street Fighter. Former series producer Toshihiro Nagoshi often dismissed the idea, saying, “I really don’t want Kiryu beating up women.”
“Like A Dragon” producer and writer Masayoshi Yokoyama, who replaced Nagoshi in 2021, has a different opinion: think bigger.
In an interview with Yokoyama about the upcoming Prime Video series based on the games, Like a Dragon: YakuzaI asked him what he thought about characters like Kiryu, Majima, and Ichiban moving to a fighting game like Tekken 8.
This is certainly a more adaptable and ambitious answer than the one Nagoshi gave to Red Bull in 2020. So maybe we’ll see Kiryu fight with Kazuya Mishima outside Waffle House one day.
Kiryu from Like A Dragon has of course appeared in games outside the main series. He was a guest golfer in 2011. Hot Shots Golf: World Tournament Invitationand appeared alongside other Sega characters in games such as Project X Zone 2, Persona 5: Dancing in the StarlightAND Super Monkey Ball: Banana Madness.
I think what we really need is for Sega to finally do this Warriors Megamix 2so we can all fulfill our dream of playing the role of the Dragon of Dojima in a fistfight with a car from Daytona USAGet dynamite from Sonic Fightersand any other guy Kiryu would feel comfortable hitting.
