Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name Reviews
Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name may not be as long as other games in the series, but it still provides a deep sandbox in which to lose yourself for hours, whether it’s in the arena, the arcade, or simply helping out around the neighborhood.
Ultimately, Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name provides the iconic Kiryu Kazuma with a fitting conclusion to his story and sets the foundation for the next game.
While Like A Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name undoubtedly suffers due to its smaller scale and a heavy reliance on the Akame Network to pad out its 12-hour story, there’s no denying how good it feels to see the Dragon of Dojima back in action – especially with the grab bag of gadgets he has at his disposal. And while this spin-off’s story is over a bit too soon, Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio’s penchant for spinning a compelling narrative shines through, showing Kiryu at his most vulnerable and setting the stage for what’s sure to be a momentous follow-up when Like A Dragon: Infinite Wealth launches next January.
It’s hard for me to truly be let down by a game, but all the way until the final few hours, I was not having fun. A thought in the back of my mind that kept nagging at me, “What is the point of this existing? What purpose does this serve to introducing Infinite Wealth?”. There was no answer.
Like A Dragon Gaiden is another great game in a long-running series, that continues the high-quality tradition. It’s packed to the brim with content and offers great drama that not only gets Kiryu sucked back into the underground world, but also yourself.
Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name is a throwback and a step forward, putting a potential end to what came before on the way to something new. As it does so, it is a shorter, but still truly excellent example of everything that has made the Like a Dragon series so great for so many years.
Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name is a fantastic new entry to the series and bridges the gap between the most recent mainline releases. It's an absolute delight to play as Kazuma Kiryu again with his new skillset and tools. With a plethora of new additions to the franchise, this is one that fans won't want to miss out on until Infinite Wealth in 2024. It's a game packed with rich content for story enthusiasts, and fans of the known and new side activities in the series. Like a Dragon Gaiden is a great package that offers a lot of variety to different ranges of fans.
It's hard to evaluate Gaiden as a standalone game. And that's because it isn't? Sega took what could have been a flashback chapter in Infinite Wealth and tacked on some extras.
Like A Dragon Gaiden should tide fans over until Infinite Wealth drops as a shorter yet still enjoyable romp, but this is hardly a series highlight.
Like a Dragon Gaiden uses brevity to tell an important in-between chapter in Kazama Kiryu's life. Gaiden is the penultimate chapter before The Dragon of Dojima is fully unleashed in Like A Dragon: Infinite Wealth.
Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name delivers an impactful story through the perspective of Kazuma Kiryu, the beloved protagonist of the Yakuza/Like a Dragon series. In preparation for Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth, Gaiden bridges an important gap in the timeline while providing additional context with new characters that enter the fold. Meanwhile, Gaiden introduces various improvements to the signature combat system and many hours of compelling content as a can't-miss entry in the series.
Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name offers the usual high class story, which demands some knowledge from the previous Yakuza entries. The agent abilities insert themselves perfectly into the combat and there are also again, a lot of sidequests to do, sadly without much new elements. This short trip to Sotenbori is a must have for fans of the series but will be difficult for Newcomers to get into.
Review in German | Read full review
As an intermission or appetizer before the next big installment of the series, the Ryu ga Gotoku Studio Studio pays tribute to Kazuma Kiryu with a minor but hard to resist installment.
Review in Spanish | Read full review