Yakuza series developers are surprised that other studios don’t recycle what they do

In the last few hours Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza, the new game from Ryū ga Gotoku Studio, has been announcedas well as a new spin-off of the famous series. Given the surprise for the speed with which it was made, the journalist Gene Park of the Washington Post has brought out an interview dating back to the beginning of the year in which he had the opportunity to speak with the software house about his very fast development cyclesgaining an interesting perspective on the issue.

A well-established system

In Ryū ga Gotoku they are amazed by the fact that the aOther studios start practically from scratch with each project, that is, they do not reuse part of the resources they have produced. Instead, they follow the path of television shows and movies, “which reuse resources at every possible opportunity.”

Ryū ga Gotoku is a truly prolific studio. Probably one of the most prolific in the world, and it manages to combine quantity and quality in an incredible way. In the last four years, they have released: Isshin Remake, The Man Who Erased His Name and Infinite Wealth. Now they have announced a new title, a pirate-themed spin-off of the main series. In times where development cycles can reach up to eight years, this is an incredible achievement.

Masayoshi Yokoyama, the director of Ryū ga Gotoku Studio, did the example of the GTA or Assassin’s Creed serieswhich with each chapter “reinvents large chunks of the game.” According to him, “these days, most games aren’t improvements on their predecessors, but actual reboots.”

For the Yakuza it was different. Many chapters are in fact set in the Kabukicho district, whose models and textures were reused several times. “Our system is to build new games on old ones,” Yokoyama explained, before stating that it’s a model that comes from cinema and TV series and that practically only they in the video game industry have adopted.

It must be said that their system is also feasible for how the Yakuza series was conceived. In games that change setting with each iteration, like Assassin’s Creed, it becomes complicated to reuse resources in the same way.