"The one who killed those eighteen men all the way back in 1985. Well...it was me."
"It's too late, Majima! The wheels are already spinning. War will consume the east and the west. And the Tojo Clan will fade. Things are about to get interesting! It'll be prime entertainment! So I'll go on ahead...and get the best seat in the house."
—Kei Ibuchi to Goro Majima, Yakuza Kiwami 2
Of the countless enemies faced by "The Dragon of Dojima", "The Mad Dog of Shimano", "The Dragon of Rock Bottom", and others, a select few stand out as the worst the criminal underworld has to offer.
Fist of the North Star: Lost Paradise can be found here.
All spoilers are unmarked. You Have Been Warned!
Main Games
- Sohei Dojima is the ruthless patriarch of the Dojima Family. Prior to the series, Dojima rose to power by ordering the massacre of multiple rival crime gangs, including the Jingweon Mafia, disregarding the lives of any civilians who would be caught in the crossfire. During the events of the prequel, in a bid to acquire the Empty Lot so that he could better his chances at becoming the Tojo Clan's next Chairman, Dojima attempts to murder the young Makoto Makimura to take ownership from her as well as allowing Kiryu to be framed for murder so that the Captain of the Family, Shintaro Kazama, will be removed from his position. Dojima later allows the Shibusawa Family to hunt down and kill every member of the Family who's loyal to Kazama. Declining in power after he fails to acquire the Empty Lot, Dojima began to kidnap young women and forced himself onto them, attempting to do the same to Kiryu and Nishiki's childhood friend, Yumi.
- Yakuza 2 (Includes Kiwami 2):
- Ryo Takashima is the Chief Director of the Omi Alliance and the true mastermind behind the events of the game. Desiring to destroy both the Tojo Clan and the Omi Alliance and rule the nation's Yakuza, Ryo teams up with Jingweon Mafia survivor, Yukio Terada, to pit the Tojo and the Omi against each other by having Ryuji Goda rebel against his father and start a war with the Tojo, endangering countless lives in the process. Ryo would later allow Terada and the Jingweon to plant bombs throughout Kamurocho just so he can eliminate the Tojo and the Omi, uncaring for the lives that would be lost. Once his enemies are weakened after Ryuji's defeat, Ryo betrays and murders both Terada and Jin Goda, before attempting to kill Kiryu, Kaoru, and Ryuji as well, while planning to spread the Jingweon into the mainland so he can expand his empire.
- Kiwami 2 only: Kei Ibuchi is the mastermind behind the events of the Majima Saga. Viewing the current way Yakuza operate as outdated, Ibuchi aims to "update" them by having them throw away any sense of moral codes. In an attempt to become the next captain of the Tojo Clan, Ibuchi manipulates the debt-ridden Kawamura into killing Uematsu, the most likely candidate for Clan Captain, and attempts to frame Majima for the crime. Afterwards, Ibuchi orders Kawamura to kill an Omi Alliance patriarch and Majima in order to erase his debts, and when Kawamura fails to kill the latter, Ibuchi kills him due to having no further use for him. Ibuchi then reveals to Majima how he intends to kill Terada in order to take over the Tojo Clan and that, to justify a merger between the Tojo and Omi, Ibuchi plans on orchestrating a war between the two clans by having officers on both sides killed. Even when defeated, Ibuchi mocks Majima for being unable to stop the war before killing himself to ensure that it happens, all for his own amusement.
- Yakuza 4:
- Seishiro Munakata is the corrupt Deputy Commissioner of the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department who desires control over the Tokyo Underworld. Upon discovering that Katsuragi was the one responsible for the Ueno Seiwa Massacre and that he framed Taiga Saejima, Munakata blackmails Katsuragi and Sugiuchi into becoming his pawns in exchange for keeping the truth a secret, while also having Tanimura's father killed by Sugiuchi when he discovers the truth. Munakata also has secret illegal prisons built for disposing of Yakuza and political enemies, with one of these prisons having a sadistic prison guard who tortures many prisoners to death. Munakata also plans to release some of the inmates to create artificial crime to make his police force look good. When Tanimura discovers the truth of the conspiracy from Sugiuchi, Munakata has Hisai kill Sugiuchi, before trying to make him kill Tanimura and his friends as well. Upon recovering a file that was stolen from one of prisons with the help of Arai, Munakata attempts to have Arai kidnap or kill Haruka and the orphans from Morning Glory to force Kiryu to give him Akiyama's 100 billion yen that he needs to fund his prisons. When that fails, he attempts to have his enemies killed and take the money for himself. Upon having his crimes exposed, Munakata attempts to kill Akiyama out of spite.
- Isao Katsuragi is the slimy and cowardly lieutenant of the Ueno Seiwa clan. Starting off as an officer of the clan, Katsuragi conspires with Shibata to ascend the ranks by staging a massacre and framing Taiga Saejima by tricking him into shooting 18 men and Chairman Yoshiharu Ueno with rubber bullets, before Katsuragi kills the 18 men with headshots after Saejima leaves, leaving Ueno alive so he can become captain. Forced to become Munakata's pawn to prevent the truth of the conspiracy from being revealed, Katsuragi manipulates Saejima's sister, Yasuko, into murdering anyone who knows the truth, while later having Shibata killed by Arai for blackmailing him with the truth. Katsuragi later attempts to have Tanimura killed for trying to discover the truth, while also attempting to have his friends and the town of Little Asia massacred out of spite. After kidnapping Saejima and Yasuko, and stealing Akiyama's 100 billion yen, Katsuragi makes a deal with Kiryu that if hands him the file that Katsuragi plans to use to blackmail Munakata into giving him control over the Tokyo underworld, he would hand over Saejima, Yasuko, and the money safely, only to go back on his deal after retrieving the file, and attempts to kill the heroes, mortally wounding Yasuko in the process.
- Yuji Katsuura, establishing an association under the guise of helping migrant workers, sells counterfeit passports and visas to women across Asia, and forces them into prostitution in order to pay off their debts. Katsuura regularly has his prostitutes killed for reasons such as hiding any connection to them if the police discover their status as illegals, or having no further use for them when they finally pay of their debts. When he discovers that a detective, Yusuke Kaga, helped a prostitute escape to her home and hid her child in Little Asia, Katsuura murders Kaga, and attempts to kidnap and use the child's life as a bargaining chip to force the woman back into working for him.
- Yakuza 6: Tsuneo Iwami is the son of Yomei Alliance chairman Heizo Iwami and CEO of Iwami Shipbuilding. Resenting his father for keeping him out of the Yakuza lifestyle, Iwami takes his own shot at making it to the top of the criminal underworld. Teaming up with Tojo Clan advisor Katsumi Sugai, Iwami is responsible for all the events that occurred throughout the game, such as having Sugai and Takumi Someya burn down Little Asia to stage a war with the Saio Triad and have Daigo Dojima be arrested; murdering his father to gain control of the Yomei; and attempting to have Kiryu, the Hirose Family, Haruka, and her infant son Haruto killed. Forcing Someya to fight Kazuma Kiryu to the death by threatening the man's family, Iwami then gives Kiryu a Sadistic Choice to either kill Someya or let Someya's ex-wife Kiyomi die. Someya commits seppuku to appease Iwami, only for Iwami to order Kiyomi's execution anyway. When finally confronted by Kiryu, Iwami reveals that he has Haruka and Haruto taken hostage, threatening to kill them if Kiryu retaliates. When finally at the receiving end of Kiryu's wrath, Iwami tries to save his own skin by ordering Sugai to shoot Haruka and Haruto. Committing numerous heinous crimes just to prove his father wrong and satisfy his own ego, Tsuneo Iwami is one of the few individuals who truly earned the Dragon of Dojima's hatred.
- Infinite Wealth: Bryce Fairchild is the leader of Palekana and overseer of Hawaii. Having stolen the right of Palekana sage from the Mililani family decades ago, he discovers that a surviving member, Lani, is under Akane Kishida's care. Wanting any evidence of his false status erased, Bryce sends numerous Hawaiian gangs after Akane to kidnap and kill Lani. He runs Nele Island as a training ground for brainwashing, morphing children from the Palekana orphanage into Child Soldiers and having followers kill each other as a test of loyalty. Teaming up with Masataka Ebina, he intends to also use Nele Island as a dumping ground for nuclear waste, which would cause severe damage to the surrounding environment, and would condemn numerous ex-Yakuza sent by Ebina to slow deaths of radiation poisoning. Bryce considers his own followers expendable, as they are conditioned to take their own lives to serve him, use themselves as suicide bombers, and Bryce kills one of them to take their gun during the final battle.
- Dead Souls: DD is a Mad Scientist and Arms Dealer using Kamurocho as a testing grounds for a zombie plague dubbed Thanatos. Teaming up with Tetsu Nikaido, their first victim is loyal Omi Alliance hatchet man Hayashi. DD later helps Nikaido kidnap Haruka to lure Nikaido's true target—Kazama Kiryu—to the city. When Nikaido accepts defeat, DD shoots him full of his enhanced Thanatos, turning him into a monster. Responsible for the death of thousands of innocents, DD makes his mark on Japan's criminal underworld.
- Judgment duology:
- First game:
- Mitsuru Kuroiwa is an assassin masquerading as a Serial Killer who leaves his victims with their eyes gouged out. Initially a police informant for the Yakuza, Kuroiwa was eventually hired by Kaoru Ichinose to serve as the chief enforcer for AD-9, a drug development project intended to cure Alzheimer's disease. Alongside his Yakuza partner Kyohei Hamura, Kuroiwa would procure unwilling test subjects to be lethally experimented on before gouging out their eyes to hide any possible evidence of experimentation, performing a similar process on an attorney before planting his body in Takayuki Yagami's office to frame him and his allies when they got closer to the truth. Kuroiwa later tries to assassinate Hamura in the likelihood that he would snitch, beats Yagami's allies within an inch of their lives, and tries to kill Yagami himself by attempting to gouge out his eyes. Once exposed, Kuroiwa abducts AD-9's lead researcher in hopes of continuing the project, vowing to procure as many subjects as it takes under the delusion that the world would hail him as a hero for holding the cure to Alzheimer's.
- Kaoru Ichinose is the Vice-Minister of Health, and the founder of the Advanced Drug Development Center. In an attempt to keep the ADDC funded so that he can maintain political power, Ichinose covers up the crimes of the lead researcher behind AD-9, and helps him kidnap and experiment on countless test subjects, leading them to suffer agonizing deaths. When the Vice-Director attempts to sabotage development behind AD-9, Ichinose hires Kuroiwa to murder him, later having Kuroiwa kidnap and deliver Yakuza to test the drug and make it look like they died in a turf war. Ichinose later orders the death of an attorney for digging too deep into AD-9 and has a detective framed for it. When it looks like his crimes will be exposed in court, Ichinose orders Kuroiwa to be killed to prevent himself from being connected to the killings.
- Lost Judgment DLC The Kaito Files: Kyoya Sadamoto is the secret leader of the Crimson Lotus, and the man responsible behind the events of the campaign. In an attempt to obtain the Natsume family fortune, Sadamoto marries the eldest daughter, Mikiko, and tricks his right-hand man, Shusuke Kenmochi, into burning the rest of the Natsumes alive, leading Kenmochi to be traumatized for years on end. Attempting to kill Mikiko when she discovers the truth, Sadamoto, when he finds out that she's alive, decides to kill every founding member of the Crimson Lotus to cover up his affiliation with them. Later organizing a reunion party, Sadamoto poisons the drinks in order to kill his last four targets, happily causing the deaths of all the remaining Crimson Lotus members and dozens of party guests. When confronted by Kaito and Mikiko, Sadamoto reveals that he's kidnapped his own son, Jun, and orders Mikiko to kill Kaito, or else he'll kill Jun. Viewing human lives as nothing more than means to an end, even fellow criminals were disgusted by Sadamoto's actions.
- First game:
