Yakuza (Series) Archive

As we’ve been playing Yakuza 6 these past few weeks, Mato & I have been writing down localization examples that would make great topics/articles for the site. The one that has us most intrigued right now is the Live Chat mini game.

You can make Kiryu hunt-and-peck his way into convincing girls to strip on camera. Besides this being totally out of character for Kiryu, thus making it really funny, the best part is the chat on the side. The above image is a poor example, but the chats are full of hilarious usernames saying weird things, memes, creepy things, anything you might expect to see in a chat like this. It really does feel like it’s real. So of course we’re interested in seeing what it’s like in Japanese.

And in case you’re wondering: yes, we recommend this game. Its story isn’t as great as Yakuza 0, but it’s still a really fun adventure.

We got a cool package in the mail yesterday:

Talk about your opposites attracting! The Yoshi stuff is more examples of “Yossy” being used as an alternate romanization of Yoshi’s name. And the Yakuza 0 stuff we got because that game is just damn amazing and I need to absorb everything about it.

Mato & I finished Yakuza 0 over the weekend. It’s hands-down one of our favorite games of all time. A few weeks ago, two of the main localizers played through the first 2 hours of the game and streamed it live. They gave lots of commentary and behind-the-scenes info on why certain localization choices were picked. They also answered questions from viewers. Watch the archive, it’s fascinating!

They did a second stream this past Friday, but the archive isn’t up on Youtube yet. UGH! This game is so good ;_;

Mato & I have been playing Yakuza 0 recently and it’s quickly become one of my favorite games ever. It’s our first Yakuza game and now I want to play the entire series. Good thing Yakuza 1 just got a remake and Yakuza 6 is coming next year!

I found an interview with Scott Strichart over on michibiku.com. He’s currently heading up the localization for the new Yakuza games, and he previously worked on favorites like Persona 4, 3D Dot Game Heroes, Ni no Kuni, and some Final Fantasies. He covers interesting topics in the interview like:

• How he and his coworker took Yakuza 0‘s localization to the next level
• Walking the fine line between a gritty crime drama and over-the-top humor
• Why he recommends new players start with Yakuza 0 instead of Yakuza 1
• How he became a walking Yakuza bible
• The challenge of rewriting stuff like the Mahjong tutorial so that western players could understand how the heck to play Mahjong

It’s a great read, so check out the whole interview here!