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After battling our way through Kamurocho and Sotenbori, we’re here to tell you if the native current-gen versions of the first three Yakuza games fare well.
Following the release of Yakuza Kiwami and Yakuza Kiwami 2 for Nintendo Switch 2 three weeks ago, both titles, along with Yakuza 0 Director’s Cut (which was released for the hybrid console back in June), are poised for release on December 8th for PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S. We’ve been eagerly awaiting these ports, and now we can finally tell whether they’ve improved significantly in terms of visuals and performance, and whether Yakuza Kiwami 2 finally runs natively at 60 frames per second on consoles.
Digital-only upgrade
We played the Yakuza Series 20th Anniversary Edition extensively on PS5 Pro. This is a Europe-only bundle consisting of Yakuza 0 Director’s Cut, Yakuza Kiwami, and Yakuza Kiwami 2 on three Blu-ray discs, along with a beautiful steelbook case (based on the artwork of the Yakuza Kiwami 2 Steelbook Edition) and three stylish art cards, all for around €70. Individually, you’d have to shell out €49.99 / £44.99 / $49.99 for Yakuza 0 Director’s Cut digitally and €19.99 / £15.99 / $19.99 for Yakuza Kiwami (10 bucks less than on Switch 2). The price for Yakuza Kiwami 2 hasn’t been announced yet, but it’s likely to be similar to its predecessor. If you already own the titles digitally, you can upgrade for free (Kiwami 2), for €1.99 / £1.70 / $1.99 (Kiwami), and for €14.99 / £11.99 / $14.99 (Yakuza 0 Director’s Cut). Those who have so far only purchased the series entries from retail stores are out of luck and have to pay the full asking price.
Yakuza 0 Director’s Cut
With Yakuza 0, SEGA achieved its break internationally back in January 2017. Both the prequel Yakuza 0 and the remake Yakuza Kiwami were part of the 10th Anniversary Project. This action-adventure is set in the late 80s and serves as a prequel, allowing players to alternate between the roles of the franchise’s protagonist Kazuma Kiryu and his arch-rival Goro Majima. While Kiryu deals with a murder plot involving a lucrative property in Tokyo’s red light district Kamurocho (Kabukichō), Majima, as the boss of the Cabaret Grand club in Sotenbori, Osaka (Dōtonbori) meets the love of his life and a thrilling bodyguard drama unfolds. In terms of gameplay, the title is quite similar to the remake of the first entry, Yakuza Kiwami. Players can once again utilize a variety of fighting styles, but this time around, they spend cash on everything, including new skills – after all, we’re in the heyday of the materialistic yuppie culture.
Download of the left-hand screenshot | Download of the right-hand screenshot
The Director’s Cut not only offers more detailed textures, which we’ll discuss later, but also, like Kiwami 1 & 2, nine additional text languages – including a great German localization – and, unlike the other two titles, two new spoken languages: English and Chinese. While the dubs sound decent, the English voice acting doesn’t quite reach the heights of the superb Japanese original. Furthermore, the Director’s Cut includes five new cutscenes totaling 26 minutes and the Red Light Raid mode, in which we can fight our way through waves of hordes of criminals as one of 60 characters from the Yakuza universe, either alone or online with up to three other players. Once again, we use wads of cash to upgrade our fighters. While the general consesus among die-had fans is to stay away from the additional story sequences, as they raise more questions than they answer, the six challenge missions of the Red Light Raid mode play out in quite chaotic fashion and offer little added value.
Download of the left-hand screenshot | Download of the right-hand screenshot
Yakuza Origins Trilogy on PS5
Yakuza 0 continues its retro feel when it comes to the technology its based upon – it originated on PS3 just like Kiwami, while Kiwami 2 is powered by the modern Dragon Engine. However, the Director’s Cut aims to give the dated visuals a fresh makeover. While we played the PS4 versions of all the three games on PS5 Pro, we disabled the visual enhancements for last-gen titles. Based on past experience, the Xbox Series X version should look similar to the PS5 version, although we haven’t been able to put this version to the test yet. Finally, the current-gen versions allow us to save at any time, they automatically save our progress and we can bid farewell to hoping to find the next pay phone. Accessibility options vary considerably between games. While in Yakuza Kiwami 2, we can adjust font size, color and background of subtitles to our liking and remap controls, all of of that is missing in Kiwami and Yakuza 0 Director’s Cut.
Download of the left-hand screenshot | Download of the right-hand screenshot
Yakuza 0 looks very similar on all three tested systems – PS4, PS5 and Switch 2 – even down to glitches like button prompts never leaving. As with Kiwami, the differences between the PS4 and Switch 2 versions are mostly marginal. In the native PS5 version, the higher resolution is noticeable upon closer inspection, and – more importantly – distant objects like bicycles and trees don’t break down into their individual parts as much as they do on Switch 2.
Download of the left-hand screenshot | Download of the right-hand screenshot
This also applies to Kiwami 2, although the Yakuza 2 remake benefits particularly well from the higher resolution of the PS5 version. We can almost make out individual fibers of Kiryu’s scarlet shirt and perceive fine skin pores around the iconic scar of his adversary Ryuji Goda. Posters and signs also look significantly sharper than in the original, which means we can actually read them. The bloom effect, which was very prominent in the original, has been considerably reduced, and aliasing has also been significantly lowered, although it is still visible. Overall, the image is considerably more stable than in the PS4 original.
Download of the left-hand screenshot | Download of the right-hand screenshot
However, the downside of this boost in clarity is that this puts a spotlight on the often blurry and simplistic reflections, low-resolution objects, strange-looking rain effects on clothing and the often simplistic sterile lighting. A lot of text—from main menu to karaoke song lyrics—and overlays, such as the recurring cash counter in Yakuza 0 and the minimap, haven’t been optimized for the high 4K resolution and therefore they tend to look quite washed out in all three games. The excessive use of depth of field, especially in Yakuza Kiwami 2, can lead to having to wait for several seconds for your surroundings to actually be displayed after panning the camera. An option to disable depth of field is sorely missed.
Download of the left-hand screenshot | Download of the right-hand screenshot
All three titles run at 60 frames per second. While Yakuza 0 and Kiwami already achieved this in their original PS4 and later Switch 2 versions, the native PS5 version is the first to display Yakuza Kiwami 2 at 60 instead of 30 FPS – both in cutscenes and during gameplay. Fights are exceptionally well animated and they massively benefit from the frame rate boost. Add crisp visuals and Yakuza Kiwami 2 is a real eye-catcher on PS5. The frame rate can dip slightly during transitions from gameplay to dialogue, as it did on Switch 2, but it’s not too bad. Less favourable is the constant pop-in of all kinds of objects in Kiwami – from trash cans and character shadows to entire trees. RGG Studio should address the low draw distance quite quickly.
Final thoughts
Yakuza 0, Yakuza Kiwami, and Yakuza Kiwami 2 remain excellent action-adventure games in 2025, each boasting an intricate combat system, satisfying progression and an entertaining blend of exhilarating gangster drama and some of the most absurd stuff you can come up with. The Yakuza Origins trilogy on current-gen systems offers a solid upgrade for fans of the franchise and is a great entry point for those new to the series, though it could’ve been better with more consistent choices. The new versions feature excellent localization in the added languages and significantly improved visuals with some caveats – if only it was more consistent. English and Chinese dubs are exclusive to Yakuza 0 Director’s Cut, only Kiwami 2 provides comprehensive accessibility options, and save game import is only available for those making the jump from Switch to Switch 2 in Kiwami. One thing that is available across all games is excessive depth of field.
Dragon Engine-powered Yakuza Kiwami 2 looks that stunning on PS5 with its crisp 4K visuals and a buttery-smooth 60 frames per second presentation that we wish other installments, like Yakuza 6: The Song of Life, would receive a similar upgrade. Furthermore, owners of the digital PS4 version can upgrade free-of-charge – a no-brainer. Why the comparatively meager Kiwami upgrade costs €1.99 remains a mystery, although the additional text languages and the two previously Japan-exclusive intro songs may be worth the asking price. At €14.99 for Yakuza 0 Director’s Cut, you may think twice about upgrading, though it kind of makes sense due to the additional dubs. However, SEGA’s decision to charge owners of the disc versions full price is incomprehensible. At least in Europe, they’re able to opt for the more affordable Yakuza Series 20th Anniversary Edition. If you want to add the original games to your digital library, you gotta go fast since SEGA aims to delist those games upon release of the new versions. It’ll be interesting to see what the franchise will have in store for its 30th anniversary.
SEGA provided us with Yakuza Kiwami and Yakuza Kiwami 2 for Nintendo Switch 2 and PlayStation 4. We captured the screenshots on PS5 Pro, if not stated otherwise. While the screenshots we captured were uncompressed for comparison purposes, we had to compress them slightly due to their file size (90 percent image quality). The last three screenshots were captured directly on the console.
