The Only Sega Franchise Without a Single Bad Game

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Sega was once a leading force in the video game industry. The 1980s and 90s were particularly successful years, with Sega rivaling Nintendo in popularity. Games like Sonic the Hedgehog became massive hits and remain fan favorites.

By the early 2000s, Sega was struggling, and its video game business was declining. They stopped making consoles in 2001 with the discontinuation of the Dreamcast. While some games in the popular Sonic series haven’t been great, other Sega franchises like Yakuza are thriving and consistently deliver high-quality titles.

Yakuza Was One of the Most Expensive Games Ever

The first Yakuza game was a gamble for Sega. Initially called Project J, it aimed to recreate the atmosphere of Kabukicho, Tokyo’s entertainment district. The game featured a realistic and tough story about the yakuza, but also offered fun side activities, such as claw machines.

The biggest gamble with Yakuza wasn’t its concept, but its cost. Development expenses soared to $21 million, which was a significant amount of money at the time. Like Sega’s Shenmue before it, Yakuza had the potential to be a major new franchise, but its high price tag threatened its chances of success.

Fortunately, the game Yakuza benefited from a talented development team. It was spearheaded by Toshihiro Nagoshi, a veteran developer known for classic titles like Daytona USA, Virtua Fighter, and Super Monkey Ball. The story was co-written by Hase Seishū, a published author specializing in yakuza crime fiction.

Sega took a risk with the original Yakuza game, and it ended up being a big hit when it launched in 2005, particularly in Japan, where it’s called Like a Dragon. Players were drawn in by its movie-like story and the incredibly realistic feeling of the game’s Tokyo setting. The Yakuza series has continued to improve over the years and is now a very popular franchise.

The Yakuza Series Keeps Getting Bigger and Better

While the first Yakuza game was a hit in Japan, Sega continued to refine the series. Yakuza 2, released in 2006, built upon the original with improvements to combat and the addition of new gameplay features. Yakuza 3, which came out in 2009, expanded the experience even more, offering players a wide variety of activities with twenty different minigames.

Sega consistently expanded the scope of each Yakuza game while sticking to the core elements that made the original successful: a compelling, movie-like story centered around the world of the yakuza and a detailed open-world version of Tokyo to explore. By 2015, the main Yakuza series included five games, with numerous additional spin-off titles also available.

In 2015, Sega launched Yakuza 0, a game that significantly expanded the Yakuza series. Set in the 1980s, it served as a prequel to the first Yakuza game. Many fans consider it an ideal starting point for newcomers, and its worldwide release in 2017 was instrumental in growing the Yakuza fanbase in Western countries.

Yakuza: Like a Dragon Took the Franchise in a New Direction

Despite the growing success of the Yakuza series, Sega wasn’t hesitant to try new things. Yakuza: Like a Dragon, released in 2020, was a major shift for the franchise. It not only featured a new main character, Ichiban Kasuga, but also changed the gameplay from action-packed fighting to a turn-based RPG system.

Switching to turn-based combat was a risky move, but it proved incredibly successful, with many considering Yakuza: Like a Dragon to be among the best in the series. Sega has continued to use this combat style and the Like a Dragon title in the West, and their latest game, Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth (released in 2024), has received even greater praise from critics.

The Yakuza series has had its ups and downs, but every game is enjoyable in its own way. Despite trying new things with each release, Yakuza has become Sega’s most reliable franchise. It shows that even though Sega isn’t what it once was, the company can still create fantastic games – some of which are as good as the classics from the 1990s.

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2025-11-27 18:42