Yakuza creator Toshihiro Nagoshi and his studio, the aptly-named Nagoshi Studio, have become the latest to lose funding from Chinese gaming giant NetEase as it continues to drop studios.
A NetEase spokesperson told Bloomberg that Nagoshi's studio will be losing funding from May onwards, while "people familiar with the situation" said that Nagoshi Studio employees were told the company would be losing funding on Friday.
Those same people say that Nagoshi is attempting to find new investors to fund development on the studio's debut project, the very Yakuza-looking Gang of Dragon, but that he's been unable to drum up interest so far.
Bloomberg's sources say that NetEase has told Nagoshi Studio it will have to negotiate over Gang of Dragon assets already developed; while Nagoshi Studio can continue working on the game, it'll have to pay for the brand in order to keep doing so.
We first learned about Nagoshi Studios back in 2022, with the studio also counting Yakuza veterans like Yakuza 3 director Daisuke Sato and designer Masao Shirosaki also signing on alongside Nagoshi himself.
Nagoshi Studios' debut project, Gang of Dragon, was revealed during last year's Game Awards ceremony, and the trailer showed a game...
