Yakuza Kiwami 3 Day One Update Has Fixed Kubochi River; Comparison Shows It’s a Day & Night Difference

The Yakuza Kiwami 3 and Dark Ties embargo has finally been lifted! For those who haven’t already, be sure to check out our review to see what we think of the remake, and whether or not RGG Studio has delivered the definitive version of Kiryu’s Okinawan adventure.

While we covered much of the remake in the review, I felt we needed to focus more on one of the game’s biggest complaints: the visuals.

Specifically, the game’s lighting and areas around the Kubochi River have recently become a focus of fan criticism, with many calling the visuals worse than in the original. Thankfully, RGG Studio has addressed this with the new Day One update (which is version 1.11), bringing a transformative upgrade to the river’s water physics and lighting that honestly feels like a complete overhaul to the section.

Yakuza Kiwami 3 Day One Update Ver. 1.11 Brings Major Graphical Improvements

By now, many of you have seen the images floating around online, showing what the Kubochi River looks like in Yakuza Kiwami 3. While there are plenty of other graphical complaints about the demo, the in-game view of the Kubochi River has been the biggest topic of discussion regarding the game’s visuals.

It’s not a pretty sight, and while many feel the demo did more harm than good, it did bring this issue to light, and as a result, RGG Studio announced that they would be fixing the area, along with addressing other graphical issues. The results? Well, why not have a look for it yourself.

Personally, I wasn’t bothered too much by the way the water looked in the original. That’s not to say that it didn’t look bad, but my biggest issue was more so how the lighting reacted to the environment, and how things lacked shadows and such. If you’re looking at the comparison, and thinking all they did was make the area darker, well, you’re partially right. It’s more so that they fixed the area not rendering shadows correctly. It should be somewhat dark in this section of the map because it’s directly underneath a bridge.

This is why it looked so off for many, because realistically, it shouldn’t have been that bright to begin with, especially with little to no shadows. Yes, it is definitely darker than how it was before, but I do want to point out this isn’t the case of RGG just turning down the brightness, at least around the Kubochi River area as there are several other improvements they introduced. I’ll go over some of those shortly, but beyond that, yeah, it does look like they lowered the brightness down to the point that it’s no longer blinding.

It’s not the most drastic of changes if I am honest, and I would love to see RGG continue to work on the lighting system in current and future releases. Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth and Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii were both titles where we really saw an issue with the games being too bright, and I felt that at first with Yakuza Kiwami 3 during the review period. The update definitely helps, and there are other areas I noticed the changes the more. Specifically, when it comes to inside stores, where looking at the window looked like the world was about to end because of how bright it was.

Interesting enough, there are even some assets that have been changed around the river area. Take this signage for example:

There may be other areas in the game that have seen updates, but the patch does mainly focus on Okinawa as shown in the examples above. In fact, I believe the lighting for the other locations (Morning Glory and Kamurocho) has been left untouched, though those aren’t areas I can say needed much improvement to begin with.

Overall, while I think there is still more work to be done, the changes that RGG has implemented for the game’s launch this week do seem to be very good ones. Maybe a bit too dark in some cases, but I think I would rather take that than deal with an apocalyptic level of brightness that was seen in the demo and prior review builds.

But what do you think, are these the kind of graphical changes you were hoping to see? What other aspects of the game’s visuals can RGG improve on? Let us know!

For those who have already pre-loaded (on supported platforms) the game, this update should already be included in the initial download. Those buying physical will have to download the update. Yakuza Kiwami 3 will be officially released on February 12, 2026.

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