Like A Dragon Dev Shoots Down Hopes For A Yakuza: Dead Souls Remake

22.12.2023 - 22:37 / thegamer.com / Masayoshi Yokoyama

The Like A Dragon (formerly Yakuza) series is more popular than it's ever been at the moment, and its newfound success has convinced developer Ryu Ga Gotoku Studios to return to its older and more niche titles and give them a fresh coat of paint. Like a Dragon: Ishin came to the West for the first time earlier this year, and Yakuza: Dead Souls fans had hoped the zombie-slaying spinoff would get the same love down the road.

Unfortunately, those hopes were well and truly dashed earlier this week, as Like A Dragon: Infinite Wealth writer Masayoshi Yokoyama recently claimed on a livestream that there would be no profit in a remake or remaster of Dead Souls, so it won't be happening. The livestream itself was in Japanese, but was translated by Twitter account Harusari, who actually asked Yokoyama about the chances of a remake.

Yakuza: Dead Souls is considered quite a low point for the series in general, so it's not too surprising that people at Ryu Ga Gotoku are hesitant to revisit the title. It was released during a time when Yakuza was still trying to break into the Western market, and some point to the poor performance of Dead Souls as one of the main reasons we didn't see Yakuza 5 come to the West for a long time as well.

There's also the possibility that Like A Dragon: Ishin, which released earlier this year, may not have sold particularly well. It's a similarly niche spinoff, and poor sales could potentially have soured Ryu Ga Gotoku on the idea of remasters and remakes entirely. It was called a "global hit" by Sega Sammy executive vice president Yukio Sugino, though exact sales figures are still unknown.

Either way, the Like A Dragon series is in a very good place right now, and the folks at Ryu Ga Gotoku probably don't want to risk that by revisiting a game that almost tanked its reputation in the West, regardless of if it would even sell that well. It's clear that the studio is very much focused on the future at the moment, with the release of Like A Dragon: Infinite Wealth just around the corner, launching on January 26.

It seems as though some fans weren't able to wait until then, as dataminers recently uncovered the names of Infinite Wealth's chapters. From this new info, we can actually gather how much time is split between protagonists Kazuma Kiryu and Ichiban Kasuga. It seems as though the latter will be the main focus of the story for the most part, with Kiryu coming in towards the second half.