During today’s Like A Dragon Direct, Sega revealed the release date for Like A Dragon: Infinite Wealth, and it’s coming much sooner than you might have suspected, on January 26, 2024. The Direct also dropped a few more details about what to expect from the gameplay and story of the upcoming game, which promises to be just as wild and emotional as fans have come to expect.
The biggest revelation has to do with Kiryu Kazuma, who returns as a playable character after sitting out the previous series entry, Yakuza: Like A Dragon. This time around, he’s facing his most troublesome adversary yet — cancer — and that has galvanized him with a new sense of energy, which the trailer suggests will include seeking to dissolve the Yakuza. However, Infinite Wealth remains firmly the story of Ichiban Kasuga, who we learned today is in Hawaii to try to find his mother. We also got a little bit of backstory as to how he ended up naked on the Honolulu beach in the game’s first trailer, as well as an introduction to some of the characters he’ll be meeting.
And Rya Ga Gotoku Studio has drafted some Hollywood talents to voice certain characters in the English dub. Notably, Machete himself, Danny Trejo, will be playing the leader of the local Honolulu mafia (known as the Barracudas), while Lost and Hawaii Five-O alumnus Daniel Dae Kim will play Yakuza syndicate leader Masataka Ebina. These two will join the expansive cast, which will see the return of most of Ichiban’s crew from the previous game, alongside a few new characters.
In terms of gameplay, Infinite Wealth expands on the previous game, with a range of new jobs for the turn-based combat system and new characters for the summoning system. You’ll also now have full freedom of movement within combat, which opens up more opportunities to strategize based on player and enemy placements.
Meanwhile, outside of combat, there’s the usual bevy of minigames and side activities to partake in. One of the big new ones is the Crazy Taxi-inspired Crazy Delivery, which sees Ichiban biking about Honolulu and pulling off sick tricks while delivering food. There’s also an in-game dating app called Miss Match, a Pokémon-like battle system called Sujimon, and plenty more.
Related: Like a Dragon Gaiden to Get Physical Release Through Playasia
It’s a lot to take in, but series fans know that few games enjoy this kind of scope and will no doubt be champing at the bit to dive in. And with less than three months between the release date of Like A Dragon: Infinite Wealth and that of its prequel Like A Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name, there’s a lot to look forward to. Both games will be available on PC, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X | S.
