With Ryu ga Gotoku 5: Yume Kanaeshi Mono (Yakuza 5) launching only in Japan last year, and the last game to be released in the west being Yakuza 4 back in 2011, the western audience are long overdue a new title from SEGA’s quirky action adventure series.
Though we still don’t know when that will happen, we have learned that producer Masayoshi Yokoyama is working on a new Yakuza title. Japanese magazine Famitsu has confirmed that Yokoyama will be talking about the new game in an upcoming interview which is due to be published later this week. No details about the game have currently been revealed.
There’s currently a petition set up by fans of Yakuza asking SEGA to bring Yakuza 5 to the west. There was also a rumour in February that publisher Atlus was poised to localise the game for the North American market, but since then we’ve not heard a peep.
It’s no surprise really when the main audience for Yakuza is based in Japan. Yakuza may have a fan-base in the west, but Yakuza 4 sold very poorly in North America and Europe. We think it’s unlikely that this latest Yakuza game will hit our shores either.