Review: Yakuza 3 Remastered

Old but gold

Up front, Yakuza 3 is a remaster and port of the original 2009 PS3 game, it's not a remake like Yakuza Kiwami 1 & 2. This means it's lacking a lot of quality of life improvements players would've gotten used to. It can be a bit of a shock to the system.

Plot

Putting that aside, the story is of course up to RGG's excellent standard. A bit darker than the story in 0-2 it still has the depth and feels players know and love. Continuing off the story of Yakuza 2, we find Kiryu retired in Okinawa, Japan running an orphanage. It's a peaceful life until the Fire Na...uh... Yakuza attack.

Kiryu then gets called out of retirement and is immediately back to punching people in the search for some peace and quiet. During the playthrough, you meet a lot of old friends, plus new ones. Everyone's a little older with new stories and a ton of substories, which are back to their usual lengths and depth compared to the much shorter ones in 2.

Gameplay

Combat is simultaneously simpler and more complex. Enemies actually block or dodge, and have no trouble landing the hurt. The AI of Gun-wielding enemies is extremely limited. Generally they just stand there harmlessly unless you give them a long enough chance to do something. Using heat actions or grabs can be a bit painful as they're very picky about where you need to stand, how long you need to stand still and the option often vanishes before the enemy even starts moving out of the way.

The lack of QoL features in this older game is highly noticeable, though thankfully doesn't detract from the story. You can't sprint outside of the chase minigame unlike previous games which is definitely noticeable as you have to run across town regularly. You can only order one thing at a time at restaurants/cafes/bars etc which makes it extremely slow if you're trying to complete the 'eat everything' achievements or heal a lot of health. The camera control is pretty annoying moving in tight spaces and especially combat. Inventory is back to limited slots and fills up extremely quickly.

Tech

The game looks solid for the PS3 era, has excellent audio and ran smoothly with no performance issues.

As usual for RGG, Yakuza 3 Remastered has earned a Platinum ProtonDB rating and is Steam Deck Verified, ensuring it runs perfectly out of the box.

Recommendation

If you're a fan of the Yakuza series, I highly recommend giving Yakuza 3 a go. Hopefully it'll get a Kiwami remake eventually, though at the time of writing, RGG's busy with Pirate Majima and Project Century, so might be a while.

• Buy Yakuza 3 Remastered on Steam