1 week Ago By [email protected] (Amaar Chowdhury)
SEGA trademarked the Yakuza Wars name in August. This week, a Facebook page was pre-emptively published that marketed it to Chinese audiences. The page was first created on July 17th, though the trademark was only filed for the game on July 26th, supporting the evidence that this is a legitimate posting.
The Facebook page lists some text which, when translated from traditional Chinese to English via Google Translate, reads: “Sega’s first officially authorized mobile game: Dragon Among Men, as a new classic gangster-themed masterpiece on mobile phones, it creates innovative strategic war gameplay. Here, you can fight side by side with classic characters such as Kiryu Kazuma, Kasuga Ichiban, and Majima Goro, and write your own legendary story in the underworld world.” While it states the name of the game is ‘Dragon Among Men,’ this is a localised translation.
Yakuza Wars is the game’s name in English. BBGame is listed as the game’s publisher, which is a studio with “over hundreds employees in multiple offices around Asia.” Its other mobile games include ‘New RTK’ (alongside Koei Tecmo) and ‘High Society,’ the latter of which seems to feature Robert Downey Jr’s likeness.
When the trademark was first filed, speculation focused on what the game might be. Rya Ga Gotoku had, according to fans attending the Essence of Fandom event at Anime Expo, said that fans “will be surprised” by the next title, though it can’t speak about it just yet. Possible avenues included an RTS route.
BBGame’s involvement in the project confirms its status as a mobile game, and the hints from the game’s summary suggest it’s going to be focused on strategy. BBGame’s website lists that three other games are “coming soon,” with one of these spots likely populated by Yakuza Wars. The studio’s success is also exemplified by Romance of the Three Kingdom XI demonstrating “significant success across markets worldwide, with millions of users and steadily maintaining its position within the top grossing list until today.
” Fans have already begun reacting to Yakuza Wars’ visuals. Critique of the possible AI generated images has called it “awful.” Ads for the game are also running, though they do little more than introduce characters that fans of the franchise are already familiar with.
Little is known of the gameplay just yet. Just last week, Yakuza Kiwami was announced for the Nintendo Switch, marking the first time that Nintendo’s flagship console has had a mainline game from SEGA’s blockbuster series. We will likely hear more about Yakuza Wars at Tokyo Game Show towards the end of this month.
We have reached out to SEGA for comment..
