It actually happened you guys, I'm still kind of in shock. They're even gonna bring 0 over as well (at some point).

source

Anybody else as stupidly excited as me?

Been waiting for so long, Zero announcement made me so happy too.

Wish Ishin would be brought over too, but doubt it.

very excited for this as well. cant wait to finally play it.

i was also shocked at the Zero announcement. I had downloaded the demo off of Japanese PSN and i thought that was all i was ever gonna get to play of it. very happy to be wrong.

Looking forward to playing it. Hoping to beat the shit out of "Fat Guy With Teddy Bear On His Jumper" again soon.

Man, I really didn't want to have play anything on my PS3 ever again... Yakuza 0 coming over is fantastic news, though! Runs at 60fps on PS4 due to it being a cross-gen game, which is nice.

They sure waited until the last minute to announce a release date.

I'll probably have to wait until after Christmas to play it at this point. Too broke now.

Nice, was getting a bit worried there. UK store still says december 7th and is listed as a "disc only release" but i'm guessing somebody messed up there.

Yakuza 0 seemed like a no brainer. Hoping since it's on a console people own and doesnt require any knowledge of the prior games it might be some sort of gateway to get more people to play these games.

Man, going back to my PS3 will a little bit strange but i don't mind as long as i finally get to play Yakuza 5... FFFiiinnnaaalllyyyy!

I'm just glad they announced 0 before releasing 5. That way, they won't be able to look at the sales data and realize they're making a terrible decision. For real though, glad to see Sony putting some push into these games. Hyped to play 5 once finals are over.

wait...so is it digital only or something? looked on amazon and couldn't find it

@dystopiax: Yes, this one is digital only, like 4. I hear 0 is confirmed for a physical release though.

Wait this coming to the US? Is it gonna be subbed? I've always wanted to play one of these.

Yakuza 4 wasn't digital only. It had a physical release in Europe at least.

It was released as a physical disc in NA as well. I own it.

I think the first game is the only one that's ever been dubbed. It's cheaper and easier for them to only do subs, and honestly, it makes sense for a game that is so Japan-centric to have people speaking Japanese.

@kerse: All of the Yakuza games have been sub only.

If you're just starting I suggest playing 4 first. It would be cheaper, and 5 seems like largely a continuation of what they started in 4. 4 was the closest thing to a reboot the series has gotten though, so I think it's a great place for a newcomer to jump in.

@chaser324: Huh, I guess you're right. I was sure it was digital only, but maybe it's just because I got it free from PS+ that I never bothered to look into a physical copy.

damn I'm on one of those 40 (60?) GB PS3s, gotta clear some space

dunno if I want to preorder it though, it's 6 bucks cheaper if I do but the fact that the release date was announced so close to their launch has me on my guard. It could be (probably is?) because it's PS3 only and they don't expect this to sell at all, but I just don't want it to be like weirdly busted.

The first game was dubbed. Though it's also getting remade (which if it makes its way over here will undoubtedly use subs), and for how incredibly similar these games are from one to the next, the remake may theoretically make for a much better game, too.

Finally... Now I have to take out the PS3... Wish they'd stream it on that PS Now thing...

Oh man oh man oh man!

OH MY GOSHHHH WE'RE GETTING 0 TOO?!??! ahhhhhhhhhhhh

I came in here to lament the loss of the preorder discount, but it looks like they fixed the glitch. It's still 10% off until it gets released.

Also, I still need to play through Yakuza 3 and 4. Hopefully 3 is better than 2. 2 was pretty good, but it didn't hit the same high notes as the first game.

The game has been out in Japan for ages and I haven't heard anything about it being "busted". They'd have to try pretty hard to screw it up when all they're doing is translating text.

yeah I really gotta get a PS4 now...lol

yeah I know it has been, but the weird like, announce it a couple days before it's out has got my guard up. Like even if you weren't expecting the game to do well, you could announce it well ahead of time right?

@dystopiax: They announced it was coming out over a year ago, but the fact that they waited until now to announce a firm release date isn't all that surprising with how SEGA has treated the series in the west. I wouldn't be surprised if they had finished localizing it months ago and forgot they even had to release it until like yesterday.

@getz: I was starting to get worried that it wasn't coming this year, a la P5. Glas to see 0's coming as well, since what I hear of that game is ridiculously cool. Will definitely pick this up.

Oh... I'm sorry. Did I just say that? What I meant was "Holy Hell, it's here? Finally?! Well, I guess I have three days to beat Chronicles X before I drop EVERYTHING for this. Shit man, I was NOT expecting to fight bears this Christmas. Hoping, not expecting. And Zero, too? I mean, a while off, sure, but still..."

I'm feeling like I was when I thought P5 was still coming this year. Games that I get this hyped for only come around once a year if I'm lucky. Let's fucking go. Game day is Dec. 8th, lace up them cleats! Time to suplex some dudes onto guard rails!

Fuck yeah I'm so glad this is finally coming out. Super hyped for Yakuza 0 too. Hopefully they can do a Quick Look on the site, any Yakuza exposure is good.

Seems more likely now that Austin's here, seems like this game is kinda up his alley, even though there's no giant robots

Weird that there's no option to pre-order it in the European PSN store. Just gonna get it off the American one then.

Never pre-ordered from PS3, do they usually allow preloading?

I almost imported it in Japanese to play with a guide last year but then they announced it would come to the West in 2015. Glad to finally have it soon.

Is this game still just shenmue with gangsters?

Never say never.

I went on a Yakuza tear about a year and a half ago, played everything up to the bleeding heart cop guy in 4 and sort of fell off. I don't really feel like starting 4 over again, so I'll probably just jump right into 5.

Tanimura? He's my favorite to fight with because he has a ton of heat moves (and who doesn't like heat moves?)

Probably the weakest in terms of character development though; the prize for that goes to Akiyama.

@talonar: The game has a fully working Virtua Fighter 2 arcade machine in it. If that doesn't at least peak Jeff's interest then nothing will.

It's the 8th in the UK and PSN still has the date wrong. This doesnt bode well ;(

I'm probably overreacting SCEE cant have forgotten this game exists right?

I've never played any of these games, are they any good? I have Yakuza 4 on PS3 because it was part of PS plus but I never got around to try it. Now this is coming out and that teaser was interesting.

@ericjasonwade: It was the first one I'd ever played after PS+ handed it to me. I thought it was actually the most Japanese thing I'd ever played. And not in that silly "Ha ha, this game is so odd and fan servicey, how Japanese" way. In the fascinating, "so these are things the Japanese culture finds normal" way. Plus I thought it was fun to play and they did a good job of condensing 3 games worth of stuff I'm never going to play into a digestible backstory.

@mortuss_zero:

I haven't spent a lot of time with JRPG's or Japanese centric games, they just never really spoke to me the way it does for other people or more Western centric stuff has. Which in my defense I am American so that makes sense. I do want to try these just to expand a little more. So you're saying they do a good job of conducing the other 3 games into Yakuza 4?

@boozak: When I searched earlier (Aus/NZ region), it took me to a page that said the game came out in 2014 and had no details. There was also a second page buried after a bunch of avatars that was the game's actual page, purchaseable and all (unfortunately no discount like the US store had). Might be a similar thing on the UK store?

Game is available on NA PSN, downloading now.

I started with Yakuza 3, I think Yakuza in general is pretty good at giving you enough backstory to go on.

Just in case, they also have a mode you can access from the menu where you can watch a lengthy video/series of cutscenes along with explanations of each game's plot, but I found it unnecessary.

@ericjasonwade: 4 was my introduction to the series and I honestly felt like it was the perfect place to start at this point. There are pretty decent video recaps of the first 3 games included with the game, but more importantly, 4 kinda acts like a half reboot for the franchise, taking the focus away from the main character of the first 3 games and putting it on several all new characters. I didn't feel like I needed to know a bunch of back story to understand what was happening.

@getz said:

Yes, but I don't have a PS3 anymore :( I would really like to try this whole series out, but I'm gonna have to wait for PS4 and Yakuza 0. I hope this doesn't become a self-fulfilling thing. "We didn't think we'd sell many copies, and we didn't, so let's not do this again." I feel like the US tends to jump on the early adopter bandwagon fast, and although I know a lot of dedicated fans of Japanese games probably still have PS3s hooked up, I certainly don't.

I love mob movies and games, whether it's Italian, Irish, Japanese, Chinese, or whatever else I'm missing (any good Russian mob games?). One way or another, I'll get my shot!

The game is up in Europe now, downloading it right now. So excited!

@teddie: They've updated it, it's available now. Weird how they didnt bother to get rid of the fake Yakuza 5 but PSN has always been a mess so it's not too surprising.

Had to get rid of virtually everything on my hard drive but it's downloading now :D

Playing it now and oh man it is good. Played a bit of 4 earlier today and 5 feels like a big improvement in just gameplay. Boy having to go through the PS3's wonderful process of downloading and installing the game was a joy though.

Essence of Face Grating. That is all.

@ericjasonwade: Yeah, it did a good enough job that I actually understood the significance of returning characters. Mind you, I watched the three videos presented in the game that sum up the first three, so that helped. Fun and interesting without having a Yakuza background.

;_; so happy right now.