It’s more or less agreed that Yakuza 0 is really good–many will even say the best in the whole series. But with the Switch 2’s launch lineup being somewhat sparse, Sega (and Nintendo, which has timed exclusivity on this edition) are likely hoping players want to complement their Mario Karting, Cyberpunk 2077ing, and Street Fighting with a hard-hitting open-world adventure. But is it worth it? It really depends.
At $50, Yakuza 0 Director’s Cut is cheaper than many of the other Switch 2 launch games, and there’s a lot to do here between the lengthy, dual-protagonist narrative and the surprisingly involving minigames. You can easily get hundreds of hours of gameplay out of Yakuza 0: Director’s Cut, and that’s not even taking into account the new content.
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Now Playing: Switch 2’s Yakuza 0 Director’s Cut Is An Upgraded Version Aimed At Old And New Fans
The first major difference is the addition of new voice and subtitle tracks. Your choice of voice actors is down to personal preference, but for me, the Japanese ones are too iconic to switch away from. Chinese and English voice tracks have been recorded for the entire game. If you’re a series veteran, you’ll also notice that the demo cinematic features the Japanese rock song “Bubble” by Shounan no Kaze–a song featured in the original Yakuza 0’s Japanese release but excised overseas. It’s back, it’s rockin’, and it sets the stage for a grand old time in 1988 Bubble Era Japan.
At the title screen, there’s a mode selectable right off the bat: Red Light Raid, which has you and up to four online or offline companions beating up waves of hooligans for fun and profit. I was intrigued by this mode, hoping it might serve as a callback to classic multiplayer arcade brawlers–some of which were made by Sega itself. What I actually got was somewhat underwhelming: You pick a character out of a massive roster (many of which require a good amount of in-game cash to unlock) and take them into battle with up to four player- or CPU-controlled companions. You’ll pick a challenge, fight wave after wave of enemies, sometimes encountering a boss fight, before dealing with a final boss. Finishing a challenge run earns you lots of sweet, sweet yen.
The Director’s Cut looks on par with the original game on PS4.
You can do all the fun head-cracking, chest-smashing moves here as you can in the base game (though both Kiryu and Majima require you to pick one fighting style and stick with it). It’s a way to play as characters who are otherwise uncontrollable in the base game, which is nice. But overall it feels undercooked: Characters vary wildly in usefulness, and the sessions can devolve into messy chaos, especially in dark settings and on the Switch 2’s handheld mode. It’s obvious this game’s combat, which frequently takes place in narrow streets, corridors, and cluttered rooms, wasn’t built for multiplayer originally—and it frequently feels crowded and hard to get your bearings even on more open arenas. There’s a mix of character models and moves mostly mashed together from this game and others in the series, including a lot of barely-seen NPCs. Still, if you can get your friend group together in a GameChat channel as you play, you’ll have some fun.
Graphically, I didn’t notice any major changes or upgrades compared to the PS4 original–the textures look mostly identical and the character models seem to be a 1:1 port, though the Switch 2 version does include 4K support.
The Director’s Cut adds five brand-new cutscenes to the game’s story.
One of the bigger selling points has been the addition of five brand-new cutscenes–almost a half-hour’s worth. I got the impression that these new scenes were meant to give some additional screen time to characters who fell by the wayside in the original, along with additional screentime for the Kiryu and Nishikiyama duo. They’re certainly a nice addition, though how much you’ll get from them depends on how invested in the cast you are.
Yakuza 0 Director’s Cut is definitely an upgrade–but the biggest elephant in the room is that the original Yakuza 0 has frequently gone on very deep discount on Steam and elsewhere; during some sales, you could pick this saga up for well under $10. Even at a lower-than-average price of $50, this poses the question: Do the additional cutscenes, voice/subtitle languages, and other extra content in Director’s Cut make up for that big price hike? For me, no–I like this series a lot, but I’m not hungry enough for new Yakuza to want to pay a huge premium for some extras that ultimately don’t add all that much. But if you can’t get enough of that crime drama, English isn’t your first language, or you just have to have an English or Chinese voice track, then go ahead and grab it–it’s a fantastic time.
