My Recommended Yakuza / Like a Dragon / Ryu ga Gotoku Pathway

I saw a lot of discussion about playing and getting the most out of the Like a Dragon/Yakuza series and entry points. I’m going to list MY recommended English release order for first timers. This is gonna sound wild but hear me out!

If you have the time AND the means… Don’t start with 0.

If you already played any of the games, then this experience changes as a whole. Please note this order is based off of my experience in playing every single game in the series, as they were released in English and to the western world.

Anyways here is the list!

• Yakuza (PS2)
• Yakuza 2 (PS2)
• Yakuza 3
• Yakuza 4
• (Optional – Yakuza: Dead Souls)
• Yakuza 5
• Yakuza 0
• Yakuza Kiwami
• Yakuza Kiwami 2
• Yakuza 6
• Judgment
• Yakuza: Like a Dragon
• Lost Judgment
• Like a Dragon: Ishin!
• Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name
• Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth

There are many reasons why I would recommend this and it’s purely for character and story development. Knowledge of key events and why people and things are the way they are. If you go straight into 0 or 7, you lose a lot of the emotional investment. If you’re going to learn about my man Kiryu, put some respect on his journey and find out why he’s really crying.

If you need help finding Yakuza 1 and 2 on PS2, then you can get it for fairly cheap (even brand new) on ebay or amazon US. They’ll work on certain model PS2 (obviously), some model PS3s and with most emulators on PC (as long as you have a DVD drive).