Barely has the latest Yakuza installment come out, and we’re already anticipating the next one. That’s the pace Sega has decided to maintain with their flagship franchise. And it’s alright. While their games are indeed vast and full of possibilities, Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name was an excellent game, much more contained than usual. It served as an excellent prologue for the next numbered installment in the franchise. Even though, as fans already know, in the West, we won’t be able to find the 8 unless we pay very close attention to the cover.
Precisely because we’re close to the launch, Sega has revealed a lot of new information about everything that’s coming in Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth. Especially, details related to the combat system.
Perhaps the most striking aspect is that, although the game remains an RPG, our characters can now move during their turn. By doing this, we can team up with other characters to perform combos or approach objects in the environment to use them as weapons. Additionally, thanks to this feature, some attacks have an area of effect that we can use to our advantage to attack multiple enemies at once, although our enemies can also exploit it against us. This aspect also applies to environmental elements and other enemies.
Another element they’ve added, addressing a classic issue in RPGs, is the ability to skip battles against weaker enemies. At the cost of earning less experience, we can automatically defeat groups of enemies much weaker than us and continue our game as if nothing happened.
In addition to that, they’ve also showcased a new glimpse of the game’s new classes. With each character being able to have an exclusive class, and with six new classes added to the game, three of which are locked initially, it seems there will be even more possibilities to customize our playstyle than in the first game. This is something to appreciate, especially since the studio has confirmed that this will be the longest game in the franchise to date.
Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth will be released on PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, Xbox One, and PC on January 26, 2024. And if you can’t wait until then, the spinoff Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name, which was recently promoted with a wrestling combat theme, is already available for purchase.
