YMMV / Yakuza: Like a Dragon

Like a Dragon | Main Page
Yakuza series
Yakuza | Yakuza 2 | Yakuza 3 | Yakuza 4 | Yakuza 5 | Yakuza 0 | Yakuza 6
Like a Dragon series
Yakuza: Like a Dragon | Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name | Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth
Judgment series
Judgment | Lost Judgment
Other Spin-Offs
Ryū ga Gotoku Kenzan! | Yakuza: Dead Souls | Like a Dragon: Ishin! | Fist of the North Star: Lost Paradise

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• Adorkable: Ichiban is basically a spirited teenager in an adult man's body and, at times, can be every bit as adorable as even Haruka herself!
• Alternative Character Interpretation:
  • Sawashiro's resentment towards Ichiban once both Sawashiro's backstory and the truth of Ichiban and Masato's parentage is revealed. Did Sawashiro resent Ichiban because he got off lucky compared to Masato, who had to be confined to a wheelchair, despite being under the same circumstances? Or was Sawashiro's resentment more towards the fact that Ichiban reminds him of his past self?
  • In the ending, Jo is shown sitting at the prison wall depressed. Was it because of his lingering guilt for all the crimes committed by his hands or the fact that his real son, Masato Arakawa/Ryo Aoki, was killed by Kume?
  • Joon-gi Han's Drink Link reveals that when Yeonsu was presented to the original Han as a Body Double, Han was disgusted by Yeonsu's father for drugging him and forcing him to undergo plastic surgery but nonetheless took him under his wing and treated him as a friend instead of an expendable tool. Given that this is explained solely through Yeonsu's perspective, the original Han is dead, and what kind of person Han was, it raises a question whether Han kept Yeonsu close out of genuine friendship, out of vanity, or out of pragmatism.
• Anti-Climax Boss:
  • Kume. Being weak to Blunt attacks (e.g., regular attacks via the A/X button or Ichiban's Tenacious Fist) like the rest of the Bleach Japan mooks ensures that he'll barely get a single hit on you, if at all. This is despite his status as a King Mook. He isn't any better when you fight him again in Chapter 9, either.
  • The final boss Masato is an enforced example. Coming off from the heels of Tendo, Masato is meant to be a Breather Boss that shouldn't take one too much effort to beat. While Ichiban will be reverted to Freelancer regardless of the class you were using previously, it doesn't even matter if you haven't spent any time levelling it up, as the game temporarily boosts you to a high-enough rank to access all of its skills. Also makes sense from a story perspective, since, as he was confined to a wheelchair for half his life and spent the other half working towards a political career, it's safe to assume he never had the time or need to learn how to fight like a yakuza member would.
• Anvilicious:
  • A major theme of the story in Ijincho is the divide between those who live within society and those who live on the outskirts in "gray zones", like homeless people or immigrants. It's shown multiple times that those who turn to gray zones to survive only do so out of necessity since they've been rejected by society in numerous other ways. It also shows the damage that puritanical ideals can have on innocent people living inside these gray zones since the Bleach Japan movement is hopelessly naive about the political complexities behind these spaces and just wants them gone without consideration of the damage that would occur. The reveal that Bleach Japan is just a front for Ryo Aoki to seize political power and turn Japan into a dictatorship with him at the helm also sheds light on many real world political movements- any pretense of respect for the rule of law and the needs of the public is mainly just an excuse to keep the rich, powerful, and criminally connected on top while turning ordinary people against each other.
  • Bleach Japan's tactics are presented in a VERY unflattering light. Ichiban's interrogation of Ogasawara is highly illuminating in this regard, highlighting how Bleach Japan's good-on-paper goals are used as an excuse to completely gloss over its' unsavory activities by the mainstream media; you could replace "Bleach Japan" with any number of real-life political groups, and the scene would be no less accurate. The longer the scene goes on, the more obvious the parallels become; Ogasawara makes it increasingly clear that Bleach Japan's real power comes from social assassination, manufactured outrage, and people who are only in on the "cause" so they can be trendy, rather than any legitimate investment or understanding of the issues they claim to be infuriated by. Ichiban outright states that he's not sure who's worse, between Bleach Japan and the politicians enabling the gray zones they claim to stand against.
  • Ichiban's Innocently Insensitive comments towards Nanba in their first meeting lead to a scathing rant about why telling homeless people to "just get a job" won't magically solve their issues. It comes across as a partial Author Tract while still in-character, but it's not unjustified.
• Applicability: It's rather appropriate that this was released in Western territories when it did, for a variety of reasons.
  • One of the primary characters happens to be someone raised wealthy who turns into a politician, and who's outward political goal is to, for lack of a better comparative phrase, make Japan great again.
  • Bleach Japan, a very influential force in Japanese politics, is extremely analogous to a variety of protest movements in Western politics. Ichiban's interrogation of Ogasawara is extremely telling in this respect, with Ogasawara outright referring to "uneducated youths who had never worked a real day in their lives, praised for trying to reform their world." In general, Bleach Japan's scheme is so broadly applicable that it's hard to see Ichiban's comment about not knowing which side is worse as anything other than a deliberate Lampshade Hanging.
• Ass Pull: A lot about Mirror Face, ranging from how his ability to effectively physically transform into anyone goes unexplained to how he shows up at the end to help out Ichiban's scheme without any mention of how the two got in contact.
• Award Snub: Lost to Final Fantasy VII Remake for Best RPG in The Game Awards 2020. Though there is some solace to be had in the fact that a Yakuza game was even nominated for anything to begin with. Nevermind also going up against another Sega title and solid contender in Persona 5 Royal.
• Awesome Bosses:
  • The fight against returning characters Majima and Saejima, if only for the ability to pit protagonists against each other. The fight intro is the cherry to the pre-hype cake, and the energetic "Receive You" remix reflects the mood the players are likely feeling at the moment. It feels respectful to their legacy too, as it takes the combined might of Ichiban's group to even go toe-to-toe against them, and in the scene that follows the fight, it's shown that only Majima (the lankier of the two) receives any kind of injury, and even then, it is simply a cut lip. And it's implied they were holding back the whole time.
  • The fight against returning character Kiryu, largely for thematic reasons. It's an intense fight against the best of the best, and one that pays nothing but respect to the character, as it takes Ichiban and three others just to survive an encounter with the Dragon of Dojima himself. The opening cutscene makes absolutely clear how uneven the match is, with Ichiban punching Kiryu with all his might… only for the recipient to not even budge.
• Awesome Music: Here you go.
• Best Level Ever: The Millennium Tower. Not only is it truly worthy of being The Very Definitely Final Dungeon, but from a story context, it's incredibly bone-chilling in an awesome way. With Masato acting on his paranoia like Ichiban had expected, he sends some of his best men to the tower to retrieve something that Ichiban made up, also sending in Tendo to do the dirty work in his stead. Ichiban and his friends take this opportunity to strike as they fight their way up the tower to the Arakawa Family office, where Tendo, who had also murdered Arakawa in cold blood earlier, lies in wait for Ichiban to settle the score with. Pair this with an incredible theme that plays throughout the dungeon and the Millennium Tower is every bit as exhilarating as the Dojima HQ Raid in 0 and the fight to Kamuro Hills in 2/Kiwami 2.
• Big-Lipped Alligator Moment: Seagull Cinema is essentially a minigame version of this trope. In case the REM Rams and Alarm Cocks (yes, you read that right) weren't obvious enough.
• Catharsis Factor:
  • Sick of being pushed around by heavy machinery? No worries, just assign any one of your party members to the Foreman class and hit 'em back harder with a wrecking ball of your own! There's No Kill like Overkill indeed.
  • Letting anyone who's been wronged or is a victim of the boss you're fighting against land the finishing blow is quite satisfying - like Saeko finishing off Zheng after the latter sexually harassed her, for example.
  • If you're not a fan of Kume (and quite frankly, nobody else in the game is, for that matter), then finishing him off with the Tag Team: Essence of Mayhem Kiwami move when you fight him in Chapter 5 and 9 will feel quite right.
  • Using the Breaker class on Majima can be this to those that struggled against him back in Yakuza Kiwami, especially if you were caught dead without the Tiger Drop.
  • Ichiban giving Kume his just desserts by calling him out on his bullshit and hitting the nail on the head to the point he can't do anything other than run with his tail tucked between his legs!
    Ichiban: People don't exist to serve the law. The law exists to serve the people!
• Character Rerailment: After spending the previous three titles playing a passive role and undergoing Badass Decay, the boss fight with Goro Majima shows that age does little to slow the Mad Dog of Shimano down.
• Complacent Gaming Syndrome:
  • Many players will keep characters in their starting jobs, due to that easily being their best one. Joon-gi Han will likely stay a Hitman for most of the game, just as one example.
  • Endgame Nanba is usually a Host or Fortune Teller, depending on whether you want an offense-focused Nanba or a support Nanba (since Fortune Teller has various debuffs, and his first skill brainwashes enemies). As Fortune Teller is argued to have the best Magic stat, though, players try to have their cake and eat it too by giving Nanba Character Skills that give Fire and Ice damage, and keeping him as a Fortune Teller because of its massively powerful Fulminating Forecast skill for the Shock one. It should be noted that Host has the Job Skill "Coercive Shout", which is this game's Makakaja.
  • Adachi is usually going to be an Enforcer or a Musician owing to him being a surprisingly effective Support Party Member.
  • Many players stick Saeko as an Idol job, due to her high healing stat and being the only female party member outside of Eri.
  • When not using his Gangster job, Zhao is made a Chef by a number of people because he takes a normally low-tier job and makes it work, with the bonuses to damage against bleeding opponents just increasing his damage even more. It also makes the most thematic sense for him, as being a Supreme Chef is one of his most notable traits.
  • Eri will most likely be a Hostess or Dealer owing to her much higher Attack stat than Saeko. Some also keep her as a Clerk, as she has one of the best AoE attacks in Thumbtack Scatter, which is exclusive to her starting class. This is on top of the Clerk class having a very high Agility stat, making her a decent substitute to Han before he's unlocked in Chapter 10.
  • For a specific example with Joon-Gi Han, whenever possible, a number of fans spam his Head Trauma skill. This is because, whether it's because of a glitch or not, it's EXTREMELY efficient, since, for only 6 MP, the initial headlock alone can deal upwards of 500 points of damage without buffs or crits, let alone the following punches and throw. He's essentially used as the premier anti-humanoid single-target assassin, thinning down numbers in crowds, or whittling down bosses efficiently.
• Continuity Lockout: Several characters from previous Yakuza games show up in the later stages of the story. Suffice to say, a lot of context is lost if one is playing this game without playing the previous ones.
• Crosses the Line Twice
  • Ushio scamming horny teenagers by selling them animal porn^{disclaimer...}More specifically, documentary footage of animals copulating. under the guise of it being uncensored porn. Two things here: one, he's not entirely wrong, and two, this exchange:
    Ichiban: Stop! Ushio, you piece of shit!
    Ushio: What, and get caught?! Get fucked, you cum stain!
  • When Bleach Japan drops by to protest Hamako's brothel, Ichiban threatens to drop some garbage on them if they don't scram, which they promptly do. The fact that it's the same trash bin full of "used" tissues of a room that is part of a brothel is what really sells it. It also wouldn't be nearly as funny if it were anyone else other than Kume and Bleach Japan.
  • Ichiban, Nanba, and Adachi returning to Otohime Land after saving Nanoha's father only to be greeted by Nonomiya's corpse? Pretty morbid. The name of the achievement for completing the chapter being Soap on a Rope? Funny in a pretty fucked up way for sure.
  • Knocking a mook into traffic wouldn't be as hilarious if A, it happens to someone that likely deserves it, and B, you get an achievement for it.
  • Literally anything involving heavy machinery. Is it a bit much to rely on a fucking wrecking ball or an excavator to deal with what is, at best, a group consisting of Elite Mooks? Yeah, probably. Is it hilarious that, in both instances, the excavators fought roar like dragons in their Dynamic Intros? Oh, yeah. Very. Especially when, in one instance, a chimp is the one manning the excavator!
  • Like Kiryu before him, Ichiban would come to own a pet chicken as a company mascot. What might this chicken be callled? Omelette.
  • The fact that Noboru, a 9-year old boy, is unlocked as a recruitable worker for Business Management after completing his quest. With the same salary as most hirable adults. And just like Omelette, he's surprisingly effective in shareholder meetings.
  • Some heat actions from previous titles return as usable skills under the Freelancer class with the Essence of Roadside Weapon skill. Among those include the infamous Heat Action from Yakuza 6 where Ichiban tosses a mook head-first into a microwave and asks the cashier to heat up the mook's head.
  • You can, if you please, equip Ichiban with a giant Hitachi Magic Wand look-alike (which actually does surprisingly good damage for the early game), and have him followed around by a dominatrix with an electric whip who can devastate enemies with a Groin Attack and heal other party members in a similar fashion. And then give them all the head of Ono Michio.
  • Not to mention that you can, with use of DLC, have Saeko and Eri dress up as Haruka and pull sexy poses to reduce the attack and defence stats of all enemies... including Kazuma Kiryu, her adoptive father.
• Demonic Spiders:
  • Sluggers. High damage output, a lot of health, and often never come alone.
  • Gluttons. Fat Bastard doesn't even begin to describe the absurd amount of damage just their normal attacks can put out. Or the fact that they're very resilient and take a while to defeat. The Noblesse Obesity variety with their Raucous Roast stands out because this is very likely to kill you even if you debuff their Attack.
  • Hitmen. Two words: Stealth Mode. If you don't take these guys out as soon as possible, then they're more than likely to activate Stealth Mode on their first turn, wherein they disappear and are completely invulnerable to everything while they're invisible, forcing you to deal with the other mooks they often come with. And that's not even going into their attacks, which are extremely difficult to time your Perfect Guard against and will almost always floor you.
  • Arminator Soldiers are frustrating no matter your level. Besides being Elite Mooks they have a lot of health, a lot of damage output, attacks that are a pain in the ass to guard against, and very few weaknesses. Fortunately, you won't be encountering a pack of them at once, but it's not like they always come alone, either.
  • The Munanugget Messiah Cultist takes everything that's already irritating about the regular Cultists and throws in zero weaknesses and a lot of health, making them a pain in the ass to dispose of. Thankfully, unlike their lesser counterparts, they won't call for backup, so you can feel free to dogpile on them once you've taken care of their fellow Cultists, which is easier said than done when they come with a group of upwards of seven cultists at once. Oh, and just to add more salt in the wound, they'll automatically heal themselves when you empty their health bars the first time. Have fun.
  • Biker type enemies. They have high health, resistance to Blunt type attacks, and hit like a truck due to their attacks always inflicting critical hits. They can kill your party members in just one or two hits if you're not careful.
  • Massacre Mascots for their Bursting Bottle attack specifically. When it hits, say goodbye to a huge chunk of health.
  • Invulnera-Billboards. Their Sign Cutter attack is very hard to guard against, they can hide behind their sign to raise their defense and automatically counter melee attacks, they're only weak to electricity from magic attacks, they have a ton of health, and - like most mooks in the game later down the line - don't give out much Experience when you defeat them. They're really not worth the hassle of taking down.
• Difficulty Spike: The boss battle in the Omi Alliance HQ is a lot tougher than previous bosses. You take on two returning characters from previous Yakuza games, and they are both level 50. If you have been rushing through the story, you might not even be level 40.
• Ensemble Dark Horse:
  • Omelette is well-liked by fans for the same reasons as Nugget in Yakuza 0. Yes, just like in 0, Omelette is a recruitable employee in the Company Management minigame and to sweeten the deal, she's a Poundmate that Ichiban can summon at anytime during the day for a quick HP and MP pick-me-up.
  • Nancy the crayfish has many fans who became attached to her when Ichiban saved her from getting eaten by a homeless man, and also for the hilarious absurdity of her being a Poundmate who can assist you in battle. The fact that she can poison enemies also helps.
  • Nick Ogata. Despite first appearing to be a foppish, overconfident playboy, he turns out to be unexpectedly bold and reliable. He has the courage and audacity to tell a group of Omi thugs that the bar he sold to them is failing because of their own incompetence, he teaches Ichiban how to use a smartphone after 18 years of prison, he repeatedly invests hundreds of millions of yen into Ichiban Holdings without asking for the money back ever, and all the way at the finale, he reappears in the main storyline as the beginning of Ryo Aoki's end - by hacking the election display to reveal a warrant for his arrest for incitement to murder, and then immediately standing up and pressing him with questions about his real name and his relation to a recently-murdered ex-Yakuza patriarch, thus driving the media into a frenzy. Not bad for a Non-Action Guy.
  • Seonhee gets a lot of attention and is quite popular amongst the community despite mostly being in the background, and not doing that much in the long run. She's popular for being one of the rare occasions where a woman leads an organization in the games (last time was Yayoi all the way back in 2), for being basically the leader of the new Jingweon Mafia, which already was an Ensemble Dark Horse organization in the games themselves, and because she has a cool, unique, and attractive design and voice. She's so popular that, when Famitsu held a poll for which character players wished were party members, she was voted first, a wish that would be granted in Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth.
• Even Better Sequel: While Contested Sequel was assumed upon its announcement and release (given the Genre Shift and the end of Kiryu as the main character), this game has received universal praise among most critics and fans alike, more so than Yakuza 6 and even going toe-to-toe with Yakuza 0 and Judgment as the top entries in the series. Common points of praise are a new take on the combat, an engaging and emotional story that will twist every screw it can find, beautiful graphics with more performance optimization, and finally a line-up of memorable characters, especially Ichiban. Nevermind enjoying a launch across all available platforms simultaneously as opposed to being relegated to a timed PlayStation exclusive like with the previous entries in the series, allowing even more newcomers to dive right in! As a result it's become the best selling game in the franchise in the west and SEGA has come out to say future installments will follow its path rather than previous entries'.
• Evil Is Cool:
  • Sawashiro, absolutely oozes sheer old man badassery and experience, and isn't afraid to use it against Ichiban or his friends. Just watch his Dynamic Intros. Even his choice of weaponry in the boss fights with him are pretty badass and intimidating,.
  • Tendo. It takes a special kind of badass to not only be the Final Boss of the game in all but name, but also being able to No-Sell a dropkick to the chest and retaliate in kind with a punch that knocks Ichiban quite a ways back. Paired with his Dragon tattoo and sheer aura that makes the fight feel like David going up against Goliath, and Tendo more than earns his spot as the Climax Boss of Like a Dragon.
• Fanon:
  • Though never explicitly stated in-game, many fans go with the interpretation (jokingly or otherwise) that Ichiban's RPG-like hallucinations are caused in part by brain damage he sustained as a child. Evidence for the theory is that his more bizarre hallucinations, such as enemies literally transforming into RPG archetypes, are involuntary and initially freaked Ichiban out, and also that the strenuous trauma he went through as a newborn (being left in a coin locker in temperatures cold enough to invoke hypothermia) left a fellow baby with extensive organ damage.
  • Many fans will jokingly insist that while all the other Poundmates' over-the-top attacks are clearly just part of Ichiban's imagination, Majima actually does his attack for real. For that matter some of his more outland-ish attacks in his boss fight are even insisted to be actually real and not something imagined by Ichiban, supported by Majima using Doppelganger against Saejima in 5 .
• Fan Nickname:
  • Japanese Eric Andre (or alternatively, Ichi Andre) for Ichiban. Considering the 'fro, suit and rather wild characteristics, it's not hard to see the resemblance.
  • Japanese Hercules and Wario for Tendo largely in part because of his heroic build and Non-Standard Character Design, respectively.
  • Korean Lightning or Korean Trish for Seonhee. She's essentially the latter without the Action Girl traits, and is also the Hyper-Competent Sidekick to the Ijin Three, being the one who keeps the peace. The fact that she works with Joon-gi Han (a.k.a, Korean Vergil) is also icing on the cake. Like Lightning, Seonhee also has a smooth and sultry contralto and, well, pink hair, of course.
  • Joon-Gi Han, just like in Yakuza 6, continues to be called Korean Vergil in this game. The fact that he's The Stoic of the group and his fighting style being very methodical and to-the-point really doesn't help his case. The fact that you can even get a job class for him that allows him to use a katana is just icing on the cake. Though some have also christened him with Korean Dante due to being a body double (twin) to the original Joon-Gi Han of 6, the fact that one of his Kiwami moves is making use of Gun Fu with dual pistols just furthers it.
  • Zhao seems to be christened with Chinese Johnny Depp due to his flamboyant fashion choice and similar stubble. That, and Chinese Akechi for obvious reasons. He's also been called Chinese Majima, since, as the psychotic, less heroic foil to the main character, he's basically Majima 2.0 in some ways, it's further enhanced when the two characters meet, with Majima complimenting Zhao's good eye when the latter feels that the two are a threat.
  • One of the unlockable Poundmates, Megumi, is often nicknamed "Mr. Shakedown's daughter" due to how her ability deals heavy damage to enemies and also siphoning large amounts of money from them.
  • The original four party members are sometimes called the Yokohomies.
  • As a non-character example, due to the various music tracks in the game not receiving official names until the soundtrack's release, the fanbase ended up coming up with their own. Examples include "Receive and Turn You" for "Receive You the Hyperactive", "Confrontation" for "Brutality", "Overcoming the Dragon" for "Triplet After Triplet", and "Light and Darkness" for "ism".
  • Kume has been called "Japanese Ben Shapiro" due to their similar hairstyle and them both being controversial right-wing political figures.
• Fan-Preferred Couple:
  • Ichiban has 6 women that he can pursue a romance with, with 2 of them, Saeko and Eri, being party members. The story also provides Ship Tease moments with him and Saeko in particular and Infinite Wealth has their Relationship Upgrade be a major part in their character arcs. However, these romances aren't particularly memorable, and the option for Ichiban to cheat on all six women at once and eventually be punished for it is seen as out-of-character for him and leads the whole system to be derided as a Persona 5 knockoff. It's more common instead to find works that ship Ichiban with Nanba (his first and closest party member, with their friendship leading to one of the most heartwarming moments in the game) or Zhao (a fan-favourite character who has some fun Ho Yay moments with Ichiban).
  • Saeko, despite her Ship Tease with Ichiban, is more commonly shipped with Seonhee. Besides the appeal of pairing two Action Girls together, Saeko eventually allying with Seonhee despite clearly disliking her can easily be molded into the popular enemies-to-lovers archetype. Infinite Wealth having Ichiban and Saeko go through a Relationship Upgrade did little to diminish the ship's popularity.
• Fashion-Victim Villain:
  • Bleach Japan's activists are a deliberate example, given the franchise's sense of humour. Oversized T-shirts with 'BJ' on them in enormous bold letters were perhaps not the wisest choice of attire for an anti-sex-worker movement.
  • Seonhee is an underground gang leader with a very garish style. Involving purple hair, a biker leather jacket, needle high heels that can easily get stuck in the floor grates in their base, a ridiculously short skirt, and a campy spider necklace. Makes you wonder how she is even secretive in the first place when her entire design just screams trouble.
• Friendly Fandoms: With Persona fans. From the somewhat similar gameplay to Persona 5, to the English dub having several of its voice actors present in this title (e.g. Ichiban's voice actor also having voiced Iwai in P5), to being a Sega title^note  SEGA is a parent company to Atlus, Persona's publisher and there was also crossover DLC in Persona 5: Dancing in Starlight. , it's not hard to see why, since Like A Dragon is basically Persona 5, but with jaded, washed-up adults rather than teens. Coincidentally, both Like a Dragon and Persona 4 have a cop named Adachi in it.
• Game-Breaker: Has its own page.
• Genius Bonus: The official name of Tendo's Leitmotif "Triplet After Triplet" which previously had the more straight-forward Fan Nickname "Overcoming The Dragon". It's a reference to "Triple Champions", specifically the boxing incarnation of the term. Triple champions are historically considered as paragons of boxing, since winning 3 world championships in a row was nigh impossible up until the 90s when they started having 17 weight divisions and 5 concurrent world championships. A triplet after triplet means Tendo is a sextuple champion, which is unachieved even today with this system.
• Germans Love David Hasselhoff: An odd example that applies only to the pre-release. While Western fans generally had apprehension at worst about the Turn-Based Combat system and warmed up to it after the trial version was put out, with many expressing relief that what seemed like an April Fool's joke was freshening up the series, initial reaction to the game in its home country of Japan involved utterly eviscerating it, with reactions ranging from refusing to acknowledge it as a proper mainline entry to calling it the downfall of the series. As a result, the game boasted some of its best Western sales to date but some of the worst first-week sales in Japan. However, the story and ended up receiving heavy acclaim all across the board internationally, with several Japanese fans pointing out the refreshing change of gameplay pace in a similar way to Western fans, and the turnaround in Japanese opinion was ironically considered to be like the game's own theme of working your way from the bottom to the top.
• Goddamned Bats:
  • Generally any enemy that can call for backup. Depending on the enemy, this is either a minor annoyance at best or a major pain in the ass at worst. Especially when dealing with the Japan Bleachers that accompany Ishioda and Nanba during their respective boss fight.
  • The Pseudotrash series of enemies. Clever pun aside, they're especially annoying since they blend in with the environment and thus can ambush you at the most inconvenient times, resist every kind of attack except for fire, come in groups of three or four, their Awful Dance inflicts three status effects all at once, can even inflict MP drain (woe betide you if they decide to focus this move on one party member) and they're hardly worth beating due to not giving out much XP upon defeating them. Perhaps the worst offense is how painfully long their attack animations can be, even if they rarely ever do anything actually effective if anything at all.
  • Cultists can be a major pain in the ass for early level players while, even in the endgame, they're still pretty irritating to deal with. They'll often inflict Silence (meaning you can't use your skills), come in groups of five or six, can call for backup, and, because they usually come in groups of more than five or six of them at a time (especially in the Sotenbori Arena), their numbers will drive you up a wall pretty quickly. Especially if you're running out of MP to deal with them.
  • Exhibitionists (Turncoat Titillators, Flash Mobbers, and Crotchety Geezers) for similar reasons to the Pseudotrash series. They hardly pose much of a challenge as a few well-placed Divine Shots or Fulminating Forecasts are enough to deal with them, but that doesn't stop them from being irritating. They come in groups of three or four, their Joyful Jig will make you more susceptible to status effects, and they'll inflict Stun pretty often, preventing your party from moving.
  • Acupuncturists. They can cause paralysis, heal their allies, and often have only one weakness. Good thing they don't have that much health, because once you do find their weakness and prioritize all of your attacks on them, they're easy prey.
• Goddamned Boss:
  • While the second fight against Sawashiro isn't too difficult compared to Majima and Saejima before him and Kiryu after him, the regenerating health buff he has makes it go on for longer than it should.
  • The penultimate boss fight can be very long, but "long" is not necessarily the same as "hard."
    • He has a ton of health. Just spam your team's most powerful attacks, and you'll grind him down eventually. If they run out of MP, there are items and Poundmates to replenish them.
    • He has a One-Hit Kill attack, but the cooldown is long enough that it's not hard to use resurrection items and skills. Ichiban also has a buff available that allows him to survive an attack that would have knocked him out. Just remember to keep refreshing it and you'll be fine. Additionally, simply equipping the Curse Substitute makes you completely immune to his One-Hit Kill, and given that said boss only does blunt damage you're probably not equipping anything else in your party's accessory slots.
• Good Bad Bugs:
  • On some occasions, if you stray too far from your allies and then go into a random encounter, they might get stuck in various spots. This can lead to them running endlessly at the wall until you have them attack, in which case they'll just appear right next to Ichiban. This also applies if they get stuck on some objects (e.g., a trash can or some furniture), too.
  • Carrying over from previous Dragon Engine games, enemies (or even allies) that are knocked down are prone to either flying off-screen or rolling around like a food processor blade on the floor. This is quite rare, unlike your allies being stuck in place running at a wall, but equally hilarious.
  • Just like in previous Dragon Engine games, try to run towards a piece of furniture while you're in a restaurant. Or try to kick anything nearby at an enemy. The worst-case scenario you might get here is the object simply vanishing into thin air. Not that kicking objects at enemies is all that useful, though.
  • For some reason, every time you use Han's Head Trauma, the initial headlock will deal far more damage than the actual hits and occasionally will still do a bit of chip damage even while they're on the floor as well.
• Harsher in Hindsight:
  • The reveal that Ichiban was raised in Shangri-La becomes harder to swallow for those that have played through the first Yakuza/Yakuza Kiwami, Yakuza 2/Kiwami 2, and Yakuza 6. Shangri-La gets wrecked by the Tojo Clan (Majima in particular) during the events of the first game, while in 2 and 6 it's revisited in its abandoned and derelict state.
  • Arakawa shooting Ichiban at the end of Chapter 2 already hurts because of the close relationship between the two, but becomes even more painful when you learn later that Ichiban is Arakawa's true son.
  • Nanba's personal Karaoke song is the ever-memetic "Baka Mitai". Hilarious in the earlier chapters, but its lyrics suddenly become a lot more fitting once Nanba makes a string of bad decisions and betrays the party in Chapter 7, only to make a regretful return later.
  • The mere presence of Club Sega in Kamurocho very much became this in the wake of Sega closing it down due to the COVID-19 Pandemic.
  • Ishioda's line in the English dub, "Fuckin' Tendo", which has since become a meme, is this when it's revealed later that Tendo was the one who personally killed Arakawa, not Ishioda as Ichiban had thought. Nevermind that Tendo himself is the Final Boss of the game in all but title. Fuckin' Tendo indeed.
• He Really Can Act:
  • While his dramatic chops are already proven in Yakuza 0 and Yakuza Kiwami, Kazuhiro Nakaya really comes into his own as Ichiban here, making the character very expressive and energetic, be it during some of the more heartwarming or comedic scenes.
  • Kaiji Tang is relatively new to voice-acting and, while difficult to pigeon-hole, is well known for either his comedic chops or stoic baritone. While he expectedly delivers in Ichiban's comedic moments, many were floored by his performance at the game's climax, when Ichiban tearfully pleads for Masato not to take his own life.
  • Kiichi Nakai and George Takei both do a very solid job as Masumi Arakawa. The former especially during the scene where he's trying to rescue a baby Masato from a freezing cold locker after hearing him cry out and letting paternal instinct kick in. Though Takei doesn't dub the aforementioned scene, Johnny Yong Bosch does just as much of an amazing job as Nakai did, really bringing out Arakawa's desperation during that heated moment.
  • While Kosuke Toriumi is no slouch, Will Yun Lee's performance during Masato's Villainous Breakdown is nothing short of soul-crushing. Especially in the scene where he's recalling the incident that started his Start of Darkness.
  • Returning character Kiryu is voiced by Darryl Kurylo, who portrayed him in the much-maligned Yakuza 1 dub. This time around, however, he has much better voice direction, and truly shines as the ultimate badass Kamurocho knows as The Dragon of Dojima.
  • The voice actor for the foreigner in Japanese version of the "can you tell me how to get to the station?" scene speaks English as well as a native speaker, which is impressive considering the many differences between Japanese and English.
• Heartwarming in Hindsight:
  • Any time Ichiban and Arakawa spend time together is already sweet, but is made even more so after it's revealed that Ichiban is Arakawa's birth son, as Arakawa took Sawashiro's son by accident that night instead of Ichiban.
  • In Chapter 4, Ichiban, Nanba, and Adachi infiltrate Sunlight Castle to save the life of Nanoha's father and they succeed with flying colors in getting the retirement home shut down and get Nanoha her money back ^note  Two million yen (roughly $20,000 USD), to be exact. , too. By the next chapter, we're introduced to Saeko, who is Nanoha's estranged twin sister. Thus, by proxy, the boys also saved Saeko's family!
  • After Han saves Ichiban's life, Ichiban says he'll buy him dinner as thanks. This turns out to be true later when Han eventually joins the Heroes of Tomorrow!
• Hilarious in Hindsight:
  • Remember the April Fools' 2019 teaser for Yakuza Online? Well guess what ended up making the final product...
  • The "Essence of RIP" HEAT move in the Devil Rocker DLC class involves the user summoning a coffin and putting the victim inside, being taken away by other mooks in the process. Keep in mind that Like a Dragon was originally released in Japan on January 16th, 2020 - two months before a similar meme would have its peak in popularity.
  • Amusingly, one of Tendo's attacks is called God's Right Hand. Thirty-one years prior in Yakuza 0, Majima fought Wen Hai Lee, who went by the name, "God Hands". Guess what Lee says to Majima in their initial fight?
    Lee: Have a taste of the God Hand!
  • One can't help but wonder what Kiryu would think of his successor when he realizes that he's fought not one, not even two, definitely not three or four, but five animals total. Granted, he only fights one tiger in the actual story at Qing Jin, but he fights three other animals consisting of another tiger, a bear (Saejima would also be very proud here), and a chimp in a digger as part of a substory, and then a tiger again in the Sotenbori Battle Arena. Nevermind that both of the aforementioned characters are fought against in the main story, too. Poor Ichi's really put through the wringer just in his debut game alone.
  • The ending of the game, where Daigo and the other remaining top yakuza decide to help their members integrate into normal society now that the Tojo and Omi are both gone, is quite similar in concept to the Honest Living Association way back in Yakuza 3. Bonus points for the Honest Living Association being founded by none other than Kashiwagi, who was thought to have been dead since that game but as of Like a Dragon seems to be alive after all.
  • The incredibly-calm and nearly Bring It-type attitude that Watase has as a scorned Omi Alliance member runs up to shank him during the Omi and Tojo dissolution conference becomes far more hilarious and badass if you're aware of the events of Gaiden, as not even hours before the conference, Watase had already recieved a vicious stab wound from Nishitani III after fighting off his and Shishido's own group of Omi traitors; Watase didn't react to almost being stabbed during the conference riot because he literally just survived a similar attempt on his life.
• Ho Yay:
  • The Host and Night Queen classes, in general, are a nice source of this during gameplay, doubly so if you assign Zhao to the former class. Hosts are a male-exclusive class that can charm enemies in a game where every fightable bad guy is male, whereas Night Queen is a female-exclusive class that can support her allies (which can include a fellow female party member) through sexual acts.
  • Saeko and Eri can cast Essence Of Titillating Claws on each other, a Night Queen move where she performs a crotch grab to motivate her target. Saeko can also use Essence of Remotivation on Eri, wherein Eri will be brought back to life and be fully motivated from Saeko giving her CPR.
  • The Drink Links with Zhao, given Zhao's suggestive demeanour, familiarity with "Kasuga-kun", and Ichiban's eagerness to praise Zhao at every opportunity. What's more, one potential dialogue option has Ichi ask Zhao if he wants to see Ichi strip down (Zhao says they shouldn't get themselves kicked out of the bar, but otherwise seems interested).
  • You can obtain flower bouquets and gift them to people. While they're meant for the female romance sidequests, there's nothing stopping Ichiban from gifting them to his male party members too.
• Iron Woobie:
  • Ichiban himself. He was abandoned at birth, his adoptive father passed away while he was still in his early to mid teens, he ends up having to wait a hundred days straight (including waiting outside in the rain) just to get into the Arakawa Family, he goes to jail for 18 years to take the fall for a murder he didn't commit, he gets shot by his father figure not long after he's released from prison (and literally tossed in the trash to boot), his actual, biological father is killed not too long after the latter accepts the former back as his pupil, and then learning of his true parentage shortly after, and finally, his adoptive brother dies in his arms after having been stabbed in the gut, the latter after having a Heel Realization and was willing to turn himself in for his crimes. Thankfully, it was his determination and perseverance that kept him moving forward, especially from his new friends.
  • Masumi. From being abused by his mother, witnessing his father's lifeless body (the latter of which was killed because of said mother stealing the money that he was killed for) on his birthday, having his girlfriend (and Ichiban's mother) killed for him going against his boss's arranged marriage, being forced to sell out the Tojo Clan, committing Yubitsume for Ichiban, shooting Ichiban a little while after the latter's release, to Masumi himself getting killed at the hands of Tendo shortly after accepting Ichiban, his biological son, as his underling again, never getting to learn that Ichiban was his true son all along because Sawashiro kept him in the dark about it for all his life. It can be kind of hard not to feel for the poor guy. However, he never complains and faces it because that is what he is known for, just like Ichiban.
• It Was His Sled: Masato being the Big Bad and the true identity of Ryo Aoki, Majima and Saejima's appearances, and Kiryu returning one last time are this due to the Japanese trailers showing these scenes.
• Jerkass Woobie:
  • Sawashiro by the end of the game. He may have been an unapologetic Jerkass to Ichiban, but he had to atone for abandoning Masato after seeing him in his state prior to joining the Arakawa Family, he was ordered to kill his own patriarch by none other than Masato himself (the latter of which never knew that Sawashiro was his biological father), said patriarch dies either way at Tendo's hand, and he's already in prison by the time Masato himself dies, making his efforts to atone himself worthless.
  • Masato may have been responsible for much of the events of the game (including being the one that Ichiban actually took the fall for, not Sawashiro) in his lust for power, but the whole reason he did so in the first place was so that he would never feel helpless or used by anyone ever again. And that's not even mentioning his supposed girlfriend Yumeno only using him for his money while ditching him for an older man. As a result, by the end of the game, he ends up losing everything... including his life.
  • The Geomijul as a whole. Being comprised entirely of Jingweon Mafia refugees (anyone that's played Yakuza 2 and Yakuza 6 would know that they're not exactly saints in the slightest) who lost their way of life while being a part of Ijincho's largest "Gray Zone" effectively makes them this. Especially when it's revealed in Han's Drink Link that besides Han himself not actually being the real Joon-gi Han, they've long since scattered and drifted aimlessly after the death of the real Joon-gi Han in 6, desperately looking for a place to call home when they've lost everything back in Kamurocho. Also, thanks partly to Nanba and Bleach Japan and partly to their own refusal to communicate, they're forced to burn down their own home to hide any trace of the counterfeiting operation that's keeping the Ijin Three from tearing each other apart.
• Low-Tier Letdown:
  • Saeko's Barmaid job is considered one of the worst classes in the game. This is because it's a primarily physical job only usable by one of the designated mages. This, combined with her getting the Idol job the earliest between her and Eri, made many stick her as the designated healer, and never look back.
  • Adachi's Detective job comes across as a poor man's Enforcer and many switch him out of it as soon as the Job system becomes available. The Character Skills aren't great either. Slick Tongue isn't guaranteed to work, and while it does good damage, Grand Helmsplitter is just another Blunt skill.
  • Ichiban's Freelancer job. While it isn't bad, it's stymied by the simple fact that it's a precursor to Ichiban's Hero job, which is Ichiban's best class that has a variety of damage, healing, and buffing skills that make him much more versatile in a fight. That the Freelancer job also does not have access to weapons and instead relies on Good Old Fisticuffs also limits its damage potential in comparison to other jobs that Ichiban can use. However, it does yield the Release German Suplex, one of the most powerful grab skills Ichiban can carry over into other jobs.
  • In regards to normal jobs, the Chef is fairly underwhelming on account of its pretty low damage output and relatively high unlock requirement... except for Zhao, that is. He's the only one who benefits nicely, if at all, from this class.
  • The Bodyguard class is outclassed by most character's default classes. The Bodyguard serves as the traditional Berserker class in the game, focusing purely on physical attacks, some of which are Cast from Hit Points. For characters like Joon-Gi Han and Zhao, their default-classes Hitman and Gangster respectively are just leaps and bounds superior and offer better utility. Ichiban meanwhile would be sacrificing his Area of Attack, healing and buff spells from the Hero Class. Its saving grace is likely its strength as a growth job to grind with: Diehard Skewer is a good attack and the only transferrable Blade skill in the game (ignoring DLC), and Bodyguard's key growth skills being Attack and Dexterity is something that every character can greatly benefit from.
• Memetic Mutation: Can be found here.
• Moral Event Horizon:
  • Kume crosses it when he insults Nonomiya in wake of the latter's suicide, saying that Nonomiya did everyone including himself a favour by killing himself. If not, then he definitely crossed it when he murders Masato just as the latter was about to atone for his crimes.
  • Ryo Aoki crosses it by having Bleach Japan set up facilities for Ijincho's illegal immigrants to gain citizenship and legitimate employment... only for them to turn out to be honeypots for mass deportations, depriving thousands of the only homes and livelihoods they had. Before that, it was possible to see him and his movement as Well Intentioned Extremists who sincerely wanted to help the public, even if they were being puritanical jerks about it. Afterwards, not so much.
  • In the final chapters, Tendo reveals that he's only cared about himself since the start of the game when he actually does the deed of killing Arakawa with a smile on his face after presenting himself to Arakawa as a steadfast ally, all for the sake of getting into Masato's good graces to secure more power for himself. Ichiban has every right to be pissed at him as a result.
  • Deconstructed with Sawashiro and his then-girlfriend leaving their infant son in a freezing locker and actually locking it and keeping the key, more or less ensuring that even if someone did hear the crying it would be very difficult to actually save him. While he tries to ignore it, they eventually return out of guilt only to witness Masumi saving their son and taking him away, with them deciding to leave the issue as it is while splitting up. Sawashiro would encounter his son again years later, wheelchair-bound as a result of his earlier actions almost killing the child through hypothermia. The additional guilt of this drives him to join the Arakawa family to be closer to and atone for abandoning and almost killing his own son... resulting in him following all of Masato's orders even after Masato becomes a corrupt governor who murders anyone in his way.
• Most Wonderful Sound: Taking a page from Devil May Cry's Royal Guard, you'll hear a clashing sound every time you time a Perfect Guard properly in this game. And you will almost never get sick of it by the time you get the hang of the parry window, either.
• Narm Charm:
  • Ichiban's allies constantly indulging his Dragon Quest fantasies? Kind of weird and cheesy. Ichiban's allies constantly indulging his Dragon Quest fantasies because they know it makes him stronger in a fight? Hilarious.
  • Late in the game Ichiban has an imagine spot during his fight with Kiryu where he sees himself as a knight trying to defeat a dragon. As random as this suddenly is, Ichiban at this point of the story was headed down a dark path and alienating himself from people who care about him, so this sudden Imagine Spot shows that he's finally back to his old self.
• One-Scene Wonder: Johnny Yong Bosch plays Young Arakawa for less than five minutes in the flashback where he saves the infant Masato's life, but damn if he doesn't sell the shit out of it.
• Player Punch:
  • After struggling with Kiryu and others for 7 installments to keep the Tojo Clan in control of Kamurocho, seeing the Omi Alliance rolling in and conquering the place the second he isn't there to support them is quite the gut-punch. Even more so when the Tojo Clan and Omi Alliance end up disbanding, rendering games-worth of attempts to preserve them completely pointless.
  • The end of the game has Masato's death. Sure, he's no saint, but given that he had spent a majority of his life gasping for air in a wheelchair, as well as Ichiban's tearful "The Reason You Suck" Speech that ended with him begging Masato not to take his life, Kume suddenly stabbing him when it looks like he was going to atone for his crimes really felt like we, the player, were also stabbed in the gut as well.
• Polished Port: The PC version of the game runs without a hitch, as all of the usual amenities like an uncapped framerate, widescreen support, and a FOV slider are all present.
• Questionable Casting: Majima is no longer voiced by Mark Hamill in the dub. Instead he is voiced by Matthew Mercer. While many acknowledge him as a talented actor, fans of the series believed his voice was too young for the now 54 year-old Majima. Others were at least expecting something similar to Hamill's performance like Troy Baker as The Joker.
• The Scrappy: Nonomiya, the proprietor of Otohime Land. The game portrays him as a Jerk with a Heart of Gold, but many fans take umbrage at how imbalanced this portrayal is: most of his kindly acts happen offscreen and are only revealed after his death, whereas on-screen he's shown to be needlessly cruel and predatory towards his workers (even boasting about how he only takes on women who are too desperate to turn down the work). Ichiban's defence for working under him - that it's better to work for someone who's openly a jerk rather than someone that pretends otherwise - is also seen as shaky reasoning from a character who's otherwise compassionate and was raised by sex workers to boot. Overall, Nonomiya is seen as an unlikable scumbag whose vindication comes out of left field, rather than the multi-faceted character that the game portrays him as, and his role in the game is regarded as one of its weakest points of writing.
• Scrappy Mechanic:
  • To provide a link back to the series' classic gameplay formula, combat features characters moving around the battle area to do attacks and abilities, as opposed to the traditional RPG system of characters largely staying in static positions as they trade blows. The issue comes in with the fact that many attacks are positioning dependent and require making physical contact with their targets, particularly ones that have an AOE. There will be occasions where attacks miss because characters you can't control were standing just slightly out of position, or fail because pathfinding couldn't navigate an inconveniently placed wall. It is noteworthy that Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth introduced the ability to move characters and aim certain attacks in response to this.
  • The ability to set the background music in the Survive Bar to a range of both Yakuza series classics and picks from other SEGA games is a nice idea, but is let down by the music resetting to default after doing almost anything from leaving and returning the bar, to doing karaoke or a character sub story, or even just going upstairs to refresh your HP and SP. The feature to select a track or even a playlist and have that play every time you visit Survive is sadly absent.
• Sidetracked by the Gold Saucer: It wouldn't be a Yakuza game without the usual assortment of side activities to do in the event that one wants a break from the main plot.
  • Series staples such as Substories, Karaoke, Golf, and the arcade games at Club SEGA all make a return here, with a fully playable arcade version of Virtua Fighter 5!
  • Ichiban Confections/Holdings, which is a sort of spiritual successor to the Kamurocho Real Estate Royale minigame from Yakuza 0 and one of the best ways to earn money in the game.
  • Dragon Kart, which is of the "Totally-not-Mario Kart" variety, being every bit as fun as its influence.
  • Can Quest, which is a very nice and addictive way of racking up some pocket tissues to give for the poor souls stuck without toilet paper... oh, and some crafting materials and CDs, too.
  • Seagull Cinema, which takes the form of a whack-a-mole style minigame that has you keeping Ichiban from falling asleep in the theater. A great way of raising your bond with your teammates as well as your Personality Traits.
  • The Ounabara Vocational School, where you can raise your Personality Traits as quickly as possible while also testing your own knowledge on various subjects ranging from Sega's IPs to the Yakuza series in itself. May or may not require a guide.
  • The Sotenbori Tower, which becomes available in the last third of the game, being an excellent source of experience and valuable items, particularly Infinity -1 Swords which you can either use or sell for even more money. The time it becomes unlocked is rather fitting considering that it's shortly before the boss battle against Majima and Saejima, making prep work for them easier.
• Shocking Moments:
  • Even though his story was over and done with, Kiryu makes an appearance alongside Saejima and Majima. It also helps to reassert the fact that, while Kiryu isn't the protagonist this time around, he will always be there for when shit hits the fan.
  • Sawashiro revealing to Ichiban that Masato is in fact his son and that Arakawa is his true birth father. "Holy shit" doesn't even begin to describe the emotional impact that this has on Ichiban, especially since this is after Arakawa was killed by Tendo.
• Slow-Paced Beginning: There's about three hours of cutscene-heavy backstory and exposition to get through before the game reaches Yokohama and you can start doing all of the wacky stuff that you saw on YouTube. It isn't until mid Chapter 5 (of 15) that the game really opens up, as that's when you unlock the Job System, the Company Management quest, and have access to most of the minigames.
• Spiritual Adaptation: Given the Whole-Plot Reference contained in the backstories of two of its major characters, the game is the closest thing to an adaptation of Coin Locker Babies.
• Squick:
  • The You Have Outlived Your Usefulness moment that establishes the Geomijul has them execute Matsuo with a crossbow by going for the head. What, were you expecting a Gory Discretion Shot here? Nope. Not even close. Especially since you get to see the shot of the arrow piercing through Matsuo's skull for a fair bit before the game moves on to the next scene.
  • The moment when Jo literally kills a man by stabbing his right eye with his thumb with blood splattering all over his face. Hope you're not squeamish...
  • The 'loving' shot of the corpse that Masato killed, with the incredibly detailed bullet hole, and the gigantic amount of blood from the back. You can almost imagine that you can see brain matter.
  • Any time Nanba weaponizes his bad breath (e.g., Essence of Resuscitation, where his stench is enough to bring an ally back to life). Poor guy could really use a mint.
  • The Essence of Human Grating Kiwami action from the Chef's class doesn't seem so bad at first. For one thing, the user pulls out a comically gigantic grater and throws it at the opponent, tripping them right onto the floor as they sit right above the grater. And then... oh, dear god. As the name would imply, the user shreds and deforms the victim's face with a grater. Made of solid wood. The amount of blood that comes out while paired with the sound is not for the squeamish.
  • The City Slicker line of enemies in general. They're essentially fat guys in speedos dripping with lube that attack you by slipping and sliding around, occasionally moaning suggestively. And one attack has them debuff a hero by jumping on top of them and rubbing himself all over them.
• Superlative Dubbing: Despite some initial trepidation, which was not unwarranted considering the main series' history with English dubs, response to the English performers has been surprisingly warm. While some aspects of the dub do have a mixed reception, like the karaoke, the overall performances have been widely lauded, owing in part to a wide casting pool of anime, game, western cartoon, and even live action actors.
• Suspiciously Similar Song:
  • More than a few keen listeners have noticed that the Kamurocho Battle Theme shares similar notes to none other than Gangnam Style.
  • The Substory Battle Theme sounds extremely similar to the main battle theme from Dragon Quest V, unsurprising given how much of a major Dragon Quest buff Ichiban is.
  • REIWA LABYRINTH, the track that plays during the Millennium Tower raid in the finale, has a similar introductory cue and chord progression to Afrojack's "Unstoppable" (which featured in Call of Duty: Black Ops III).
• That One Achievement: Like a Dragon mercifully avoids forcing the player to 100% everything in the game in order get the final achievements, but there are still quite a few that will have you pulling out your hair.
  • Pop the Cork requires you to beat all the Dragon Kart cups and every individual rival race. The Cups themselves are fairly doable and offers margin of errors, but the rival races are the real challenge as they will require rematches on courses that are now foggy, limiting your field of vision. Not to mention the very final rival race will see you facing off against a kart that is just pound for pound faster than anyone you will have available.
  • Honk-Honk Hero requires you to find all five Honk-Honk pedestrians and pay for their service. This one is almost practically impossible to do without a guide because not only are their locations hard to find, they're also not guaranteed to be there so you may frequently need to trigger a reload from a taxi to trigger them to reappear.
  • Make That Money and Romancing the Forge are both time sinks rather than difficult. The former requires you to earn 10 billion yen in capital for the Business Management sidequest while the latter requires you to fully upgrade the romance Workshop which will cost 22,250,200 yen. While this will take time, the benefit is that the process of earning enough capital for the first achievement will earn you enough spending money to complete the second.
  • Victory of the Millennium requires you to beat the final-final post-game dungeon of the game. To note, this dungeon was DLC for the original Japanese release and was designed to be Harder Than Hard. You will need to grind your characters max level and max job rank ^note That is level 99 for jobs, not the level 30 that unlocks the Job trophies. if you hope to survive even the normal encounters in it, let alone the bosses.
• That One Attack:
  • Disarm, brought to you by the Soldiers. Want an attack that's incredibly difficult to guard against while also flooring you and debuffing your attack and defense, high damage be damned? Look no further.
  • The Gluttons' Raucous Roast. This does a stupid amount of damage regardless if you time your Perfect Guard against it or not. Better prepare yourself with Peerless Resolve, because if this hits Ichiban, expect to lose either a shit ton of health or the battle altogether.
  • Ishioda's Gunshot/Fearsome Countershot. You had better pray to Nagoshi-san that this misses because it's all but a guaranteed KO if you're not resistant to bullets or have armor that adds such resilience. Better hope Ishioda didn't power up with Malicious Grin, either. Because it also raises his attack and his resilience to status effects.
  • Blade Kill, used by Majima and Saejima after the latter joins in. While the first use can be prepared for (following Saejima's self-buff), it'll still end up being a very damaging attack that will not just gravely damage your party, but will stack on a lot of that onto Ichiban.
  • When Tendo goes into God's Warning, he can do a Megaton Punch aimed straight at your party member's heart called "God's Right Hand". This is an instant-kill attack. If Ichiban is the victim of this attack, prepare to retry this battle all over again unless you have a Sacrifice Stone, Curse Substitute, or Peerless Resolve... or are just plain lucky that it misses.
  • During the Final Milennium Tower, the boss, Shin Amon, can use all kinds of your own attacks against you, but what takes the cake is his use of Essence of Orbital Laser. That Kill Sat you were having so much fun using? The one you were hitting everyone for massive electrical damage with and potentially paralysing them? See how much fun it is when you're on the receiving end. Worse is that in the True Final Milennium Tower, the laser's been beefed up to the point that it's simply impossible to survive normally. Unless you take a very specific set of steps, the laser will cause a Total Party Kill.
• That One Boss:
  • The Excavator in Chapter 6 is probably the first boss that many players will struggle with. Unless you've stocked up on items and used them frugally throughout the dungeon, this boss will punish the unprepared with its very high damage output, AoE attacks that will inflict status effects, and complete immunity to grappling moves such as Ichiban's Headbutt Barrage while in his Freelancer class, or Ichiban and Adachi's Nelson Strike Tag Team attack. The fact that Shock skills are hard to come by at that point in the game also adds to the difficulty.
  • Ishioda is a pain in the ass every time you fight him. High damage output aside, he has a move that causes Fear and buffs his resilience to status effects (e.g., Poison, Shock, Charm, etc.), can counter attack with said move, and is never fought alone. The biggest offender is definitely his fight in Chapter 9 where he's fought alongside Nanba and several Japan Bleachers, who will call for backup very often and only make the fight drag on.
  • Majima and Saejima are this for different reasons than the other two examples. Majima is difficult because, with his clones, he can get more turns than most characters. Also, his tornado spin is very likely to cause paralysis. Saejima is hard because he's just as strong as ever but his attacks cannot be evaded now. In addition, both have MUCH higher attack then other enemies surrounding them, AND can't be 'cheesed' to kill them quickly. A low HP or low defense character is likely to be killed in one shot. To highlight just how much prep might be needed to survive this, the Sotenbori Arena is unlocked several minutes before the section leading up to the fight, providing the player with enough opportunities to grind for levels and materials just in case.
  • Kiryu manages to be frustrating no matter your level, as he is resistant to nearly every attack barring Ice skills. He's also strong enough to KO any of your party members in just two turns. Though he won't attack your female party members, which leaves your potential healer (Saeko) safe, it's a double-edged sword since that just increases the chance he'll instead target Ichiban. And in his later phases he can move twice, which may spell doom if he focuses entirely on Kasuga. Oh, and, for whatever reason, if Han and/or Zhao are in your immediate party, expect Kiryu to be focusing on them a lot. Considering just who and what Kiryu is to the series, however, this is, in a sense, an invoked example.
  • Tendo can also be a candidate for this because of his One-Hit KO God's Right Hand attack, not taking into account the amount of health that can make him worthy of being a Marathon Boss. He also is only weak to (magic-based) Lightning attacks (Essence of Electromagnetic Shield, Essence of Orbital Laser, Fulminating Forecast), so you'll very likely be in for a long, brutal fight if you have anything else than three Enforcers and an Idol, and even if you do, you're just making it slightly less slow going. If you have neither, but managed to acquire Ichiban's Essence of Orbital Laser via the Company Management minigame (which is one of the most powerful magic-based Lightning attacks in the entire game, but also the most expensive at a whopping 200 MP), expect to be using many more MP restoration items than the fight's sheer length is already likely to demand.
• That One Level: The dungeons under Yokohama and Kamurocho came in for severe criticism in reviews for being repetitive, non-level scaling slogs in copy-pasted concrete environs that take far, far too long for relatively paltry rewards. It's thankfully only mandatory to go through Yokohama's, and only once at that, but if you want to level up anywhere near quickly you'll need to do it quite a few times to gather enough EXP, since you get virtually none from beating standard thugs on the streets. Similarly, the Kamurucho dungeon becomes needed when farming for high-level crafting materials and grinding stronger foes, which will definitely be needed to survive the post-game.
• That One Sidequest: Getting 100% completion of the Part-time Hero requests, especially the Support requests.
  • Many of them require you to get something that's only available from one specific store in the first place, but the worst are the three Egg delivery requests. They require three normal Eggs, two Quality Eggs, and one Golden Egg. And the only way to get eggs in the game is from Omlette the chicken in the Ichiban Holdings headquarters in Chinatown. You need to talk to Omlette 21 times to get her to lay an egg, which is never told to the player, and on top of that hope that it's the egg you're looking for. Be prepared to get carpal tunnel by repeatedly mashing the X button.
  • If that's not maddening enough, there are also the ever-frustrating UFO Catchers you'll have to deal with, since there are seven Support requests in total which require specific prize items to complete. Better hope your claw game is on point, otherwise you'll be in for a massive time and money sink.
  • By far the most maligned minigame is the already-infamous Riichi Mahjong, which causes many players to just give up on the goal of completing all minigame challenges. You will need to spend a significant amount of time just understanding how the game even works since you aren't given the full rules to the game but instead a "basic rules" summary that leave out vitally important pieces of information. Once you finally look up the actual rules online, you still have to play and win many rounds of this largely Luck-Based Mission spread out at more locations than any other minigame. Making this even worse are the challenges that specifically require you to win by declaring Ron or Tsumo^note Declaring victory after forming a winning hand by discarding/drawing a tile without declaring Riichi, which require even more luck due to the fickleness of the tile distribution. Even players who have gotten the rules of Mahjong down pat can still expect these particular challenges to remain uncompleted for a long while despite their low total requirement.
• They Changed It, Now It Sucks!:
  • While many old fans still sing the game’s praises for the story and characters, the shift from Beat 'em Up to a classic style turn-based JRPG has been polarizing among fans of said Beat 'em Up formula.
  • The extremely questionable decision to make New Game Plus DLC has similarly sparked a massive debate, especially since the feature was always included in the base game until Like a Dragon. Thankfully, the localized release includes New Game + in the base product. Unfortunately, it has been confirmed that New Game+ will also be DLC in Infinite Wealth, and since Infinite Wealth will get a simultaneous global release, it will apply to the Western version as well.
  • The fact that Don Quijote does not exist in this entry^note Possibly due to an expired licensing deal has made many fans upset, as the iconic department store franchise had been a staple in all Yakuza games prior, even in Ryū ga Gotoku Ishin!.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character:
  • More like wasting perfectly good cities in this case - Kamurocho and Sotenbori, in comparison to their portrayals in prior games, offer very little to do in them compared to Isezaki Ijincho. They're only really there for plot relevance and the best that both cities offer is mostly extra items and XP through the Sotenbori Tower and through killing endless amounts of Invested Vagabonds in Kamurocho's Underground 2F. Neither city offers any substories to complete either.^note It's somewhat similar to Yakuza 0 in that bringing one protagonist into the other major city doesn't offer much to do either. Given that Isezaki Ijincho is replacing Kamurocho as the main setting from this game onward, it's not hard to see why both cities are quite underutilized otherwise.
  • Mitsuo. For someone who was the closest thing that Ichiban had to a brother, he's is all but gone once the Omi and the Tojo are dissolved. This is especially sudden since Mitsuo was close enough to Ichiban that it's implied he's covered for him before^note  He reacts to having to give back the money that Ushio conned out of some horny teenagers in a tone that indicates he's done this before. during his time with the Arakawa Family. Nevermind going out of his way to rescue Zhao from the Omi Alliance at the risk of his own life. However, given that he makes an appearance during the Arakawas' funeral in The Stinger, it's likely that he may play a bigger, supporting role later down the line.
  • Despite him being the focal point of Nanba's character, Nanba's younger brother never appears on-screen even after it is discovered that he's alive. Nanba ends up just meeting him off-screen.
  • Seonhee is an interesting case on multiple fronts:
    • Despite being the primary antagonist of Chapter 7, Seonhee is never directly fought, keeping to series tradition of not having the main characters engage in violence against women.
    • Despite the Geomijul formally becoming allies with Ichiban in Chapter 10, Seonhee doesn't become a playable party member. She's convinced by Joon-Gi to stay behind to watch over the rest of the Geomijul. This is considered a missed opportunity because, despite being the leader of the group, you only really get to learn about Seonhee from second hand information Joon-Gi tells you.
    • Most of her dialogue can be considered exposition about current plot events, like the fake money for example, and because of that, she never gets to show her actual character that much.
• Underused Game Mechanic:
  • Given how you'll be using skills that are either efficient or can clean out crowds as quickly as possible as well as most of your companions being equipped with weapons (e.g., a bat, a sword, brass knuckles, etc.), you'd be forgiven for barely remembering that they can (occasionally) wail at an enemy with a nearby object a la Kiryu's Beast style in 0. This is a very rare occurrence and more often than not, a majority of your fights will usually take place in open areas with few objects lying around. Adding insult to injury is that there's no dedicated grab button, so you won't really be wailing on people with bicycles all that often. What's even more weird is that Ichiban does have a Job Skill related to this mechanic, as he basically replicates a weapon Heat action Kiryu and Yagami used before, but it's tied to his Freelancer job, which (outside of its Magikarp Power ability to learn the Release German Suplex and apply it to other jobs) doesn't have much practical usage.
  • For some reason, the game begins with a foot chase segment identical to the ones in Judgment (complete with a tutorial pop-up implying that it'll be used more often) but it's never used again, not even in one of the substories where Ichiban needs to chase after a thief, instead skipping straight to where he's already managed to catch the thief.
  • The final fight against Masato has the game's one and only QTE sequence, and many players have said that they wished the game had more boss fight QTEs.
  • This game brings back dedicated Item Boxes for the first time since Yakuza 2, but unlike that game (or subsequent ones that tied Item Boxes and Save Points together) your inventory is so massive here that you will never need to use one.
• Values Dissonance: Masato Arakawa's self-loathing and resentment towards those around him would likely catch a lot of Western players off guard, but then you may remember that Japan has issues with overt prejudice against those with physical disabilities. A law to combat these trends didn't get fully passed until the late 2010s. It puts Ryo Aoki's Drunk with Power spiral in the later game in a new light.
• Visual Effects of Awesome:
  • Though Like a Dragon is a noticeable downgrade in visual quality compared to 6, Kiwami 2, and Judgment before it, the Dragon Engine is now far better optimized across every platform. None more so than the PC version, which has an unlocked framerate, allowing you to experience the visual fidelity that this game still has to offer in the smoothest framerates possible.
  • While it's been memed to hell and back before the localized release, the attention to detail in the bread roll that Ichiban eats when he's told that his sentence has been extended truly is a visual marvel.
  • A lot of the Kiwami attacks and Poundmates, whenever they're not being gut-bustingly hilarious, are truly amazing to look at. Highlights include Zhao's Essence of Deadly Beasts and Ladder Acrobatics, the Matriarch's Essence of Elegance, Nanba's Essence of Pyro Prison, and Kiryu's Essence of the Dragon God, among many others.
  • The facial animations have truly come a long way since the days of the first Yakuza. It reaches its apex during the scene where Ichiban is giving Masato a much-needed and heartfelt "The Reason You Suck" Speech, as you can clearly see the despair and heartbreak in Ichiban's face, complete with bloodshot eyes and tears falling down his face, begging for his adoptive brother not to take his life.
  • One of the most impressive parts of the English dub is the noticeably different lipsync from the original Japanese, altered to match the new dialogue. That's right. The game developers went as far as to redo the lip movements for every major cutscene for added authenticity and make the dialogue easier to manage.
• Wheelchair Woobie: Masato before his injection. Seeing him like this as a child during a flashback after Sawashiro's defeat really is a gut punch of its own, especially for anyone that has or knows someone who's disabled and requires a wheelchair to get around.
• Win Back the Crowd: The Japanese demo managed to help reduce apprehension concerning the Genre Shift, as it actually allowed players to experience the new turn-based combat for themselves, which many deemed quite fast-paced and intuitive.
• The Woobie: The Heroes of Tomorrow, given their trend of being people who've hit rock bottom just like Ichiban:
  • Saeko has it pretty rough. Being excommunicated from her family, losing her only father figure ever since she left home, coming fairly close to losing her actual father to the Seiryu Clan's schemes, and being treated like human garbage by Bleach Japan because of her status as a former hostess. It's a good thing Ichiban and the boys came along when they did.
  • Nanba lost his nursing job and became homeless by taking the fall for a younger female nurse who was stealing drugs and selling them, thinking that she had a better life ahead of her while he was a jaded washout. Only it later turns out she was really a gambling addict who only put on a sweet act to benefit herself. Then his brother went missing, and Nanba barely had any leads to go off on to even start to figure out what happened to him, until Ichiban came along.
  • The fact that Adachi was fired for helping Ichiban, and was left unemployed and without a government pension to support him through retirement only weeks before becoming of retirement age can also qualify him, even though he is fairly sanguine about the whole ordeal.
• Woolseyism: The international release lampshades this in the language options when starting a new game, by indicating that playing with Japanese audio would provide dialogue and subtitles that are more closer to the original Japanese script than the English dub.
  • The summoning service is named Delivery Help in Japanese, a pun on "Delivery Health", a Japanese sex work service. The English dub calls it "Poundmates", keeping the sexual innuendo while also tying it to combat, and preserving the joke in its introduction where Adachi mistakes it for a sex service.
  • A most prominent example is from summoning the Delivery Help/Poundmates, where Kasuga's line in the subs and dub vary from the original Japanese to different degrees.
    Original line: I choose... You! Delivery Help, I'm counting on you!
    English subs: I choose... You! Special delivery!
    English dub: Time to call... A friend! I summon you! YEAH!!
  • Rather than changing the person's ethnicity, the "can you tell me how to get to the station?" scene mostly plays things straight, only having additional details such as the foreigner speaking in a much slower "Do you understand me?" tone and an animation of Kasuga giving an Aside Glance, acknowledging the absurdity of it all, made specifically for the English Dub. That, combined with everything being played straight, somehow makes it even funnier.
  • In the Japanese version, all the achievements you get for maxing your bonds with party members are called "Bond with [*insert name here*]." The English release gives them clever names based off each character (like "Friends like Sisters" for Saeko, since her story involves her protecting her sister, and "Friends from Work" for Eri, since her bond is tied to the Company Management sidequest).
  • Because of how the English dub alters the character avatars to have their mouths flow with the English voice acting and script, additional lines were able to be added. One such moment is when an additional line was added to Ishioda's declaration of his intent to ask Masumi why Kasuga is still alive.
    Ishioda: Next time I see him, I should ask him why you're still alive. Well. Why you were alive.
  • The name "Sujimon" for the enemies stems from the Japanese term "sujimono", which means a dangerous or suspicious person. Obviously, this naming convention doesn't translate into English, so the dub keeps the name, but changes the definition to "monsters of men that make you super jittery".

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Ichiban: Time to call... a friend! Troper, I summon you! YEEEAHHH!!!