Yakuza Kiwami 3 & Dark Ties Hands-on Preview – Kiryu Kicks Ass, Saves Kids
Yakuza 3: Kiwami & Dark Ties blends the old with the new: a remake of the 2009 Yakuza 3 has us controlling Kiryu as he tends to an orphanage, while Dark Ties is a new adventure starring a favorite antagonist from the same game. MP1st was invited to a private preview event a couple of weeks ago, and have our hands-on impressions ready right now.
Authentic Fictionalized Japan
It seems SEGA wanted to give those selected for this event a taste of authenticity, literally. The event took place at a Japanese-style restaurant located in Los Angeles known as Budonoki. It bills itself as “your neighborhood Izakaya,” and feels like it was ripped straight out of Japan (at least in this Westerner’s mind). The bar was stocked with authentic Japanese liquor and beer, and plenty of food continued to pour out of the kitchen as the event went on. While we played on Xbox Developer Kits, the experience should remain largely the same regardless of the platform you play on.
An outdoor section of the restaurant around the back had one peculiar artifact in a restaurant which was dripping with Yakuza-style decorations: a lone sewing machine was perched on a table, almost as an afterthought. As it turns out, it would be the first thing we ended up doing in Yakuza 3 Kiwami. Our demo session began with the street-tested ex-yakuza Kazuma Kiryu battling enemies of a different kind: household chores. You see, when we catch up with Kiryu, he is tending to the needs of an orphanage he is now running in Okinawa. There are perhaps a dozen children under its tutelage, each of which has a relationship meter like you’d expect in a typical graphic novel game. Yet here it is, in a Yakuza game. Kiryu’s goal is to increase his “Daddy Rank,” and he even asks the children to call him “Uncle Kaz” or even Dad. It feels and sounds hilarious, if not outright ridiculous, to see this hardened criminal care about helping elementary-age kids with homework, or to stitch up some clothing, or to try to increase the yield from a garden growing within the orphanage. Yet it no doubt speaks to a lot of men who yearn to be a good parent, a responsible caretaker, or just a good human being.
Besides pulling at the heartstrings from time to time, the tasks at the orphanage have been gamified in the usual over-the-top Yakuza style. For example, stitching fabric involves setting the speed of your sewing machine, and then using the left analog stick to guide the needle as closely to the design outline as possible. The faster you thread the needle, the more points you can collect, but also the more risk of stitching an ugly design and losing points. The first homework assignment consisted of a rapid-fire selection of ten questions covering basic science, with only ten seconds to answer each. If it’s been a couple of decades since you were in elementary school, some of the questions may catch you by surprise, and a passing grade is not guaranteed. Of course, as you pass each chore, Kiryu will celebrate as if he just won a big fight, because he doesn’t really do subtlety.
Uncle Kaz to the Rescue!
The orphanage seems to be an optional thing that you can take care of at your leisure, because as I played the rest of the demo, I didn’t receive any sort of notification about tending to it. This is implied in an early cutscene at the orphanage, as one child is clearly business-savvy and capable of running things in Kiryu’s stead. So, the only babysitting you’ll probably end up doing is that of your choosing, besides story-mandated visits as the adventure progresses, and Kiryu is inevitably forced to face his past to save what matters most to him.
Kiryu can throw punches with the best of them still, with different stances offering more offense, defense, or a mixture of the two, along with weapons and objects available to be picked up and hurled at enemies. The combat is easy to pick up, and the island of Okinawa where things start feature roving groups of thugs to take out, who also serve as fodder to perfect your fighting. Tougher enemies do require a bit of strategy to hit, as they love to block your attacks only to come out swinging with a haymaker or two of their own.
A Fan Favorite Returns
After spending a couple of hours in Yakuza 3 Kiwami, we were directed back to the application’s title screen, to select Dark Ties. Dark Ties is a whole new game, which sees players taking on the role of the much more serious adversary of Kiryu, Yoshitaka Mine. Mine launched a successful startup company, but appears to be a one-hit wonder as he has since fallen on hard times. He resorts to the seedy underbelly of modern Tokyo involving the yakuza. Mine is a fan favorite, even if he is ultimately a tragic character. But seeing him during an earlier phase in his life is a great bit of fan service for players who want to see more backstory.
Mine fights a lot like any other protagonist in a mainline Yakuza entry. He has a shoot boxing style of street fighting, and can toggle between a regular and a charged-up mode called Dark Awakening which temporarily increases his stats and allows for more powerful moves. Mine can also perform a special move at any time where he plants a foot onto the chest of any enemy in front of him, leap off of them, and spin around mid-air to land a bit punch on any unsuspecting enemy directly behind him. It’s a flashy move which is basically free to execute, and feels very nice whenever it connects. Even when you fail to hit anyone with it, your movement becomes unpredictable; on more than one occasion during my time with Dark Ties, I used it to evade some incoming damage.
Both titles feature downtime and allow you to explore the city as much as you desire once any mandatory missions are completed first. As theses games take place before the era of today’s smartphones and being terminally online, your main method of communicating with others is via text messages or old-fashioned phone calls on a flip phone. You can customize it with up to three daisy-chained charms, as well as backgrounds. The charms and backgrounds you collect have subtle effects on fighting, so they are more than just cute or cool collectibles. You’ll collect these around the city, but also as a reward for some side quests, which are as zany and varied as you remember them, whether you’re helping film a reality television show, quirky host included, or (unsuccessfully) helping a nervous young man score a date with a fast food employee he has fallen madly in love with at first sight. Most of these side quests offer comical relief from some of the main story’s occasionally heavier segments, though even these side quests aren’t without their own heart and charm.
A Full Game Gear Experience!
While our visit to Okinawa was short, we also still managed to score some time in the arcade to help a girl “win” her favorite stuffed animal from a UFO catcher claw game, and we also played an actual arcade game called Emergency Call Ambulance, which was basically Crazy Taxi but with you driving an ambulance all over town in an attempt to get dying patients to the hospital before they expire. That game was tough-as-nails back in the original arcade era of quarter-sucking machines, and it’s perfectly replicated here, though you do have an option to try it on Easy, which is still a challenge, but should be more doable for anyone who didn’t grow up with difficult arcade games. While we’re on the topic of side activities, the first-ever inclusion of SEGA’s Game Gear is notable, too. You can collect various cartridges from the battery-hogging handheld, and play the entire games whenever you want, all without having to get up to find more batteries. I’ve never played a Game Gear outside of emulation, as is no doubt the case for many gamers these days, so this serves as the next best thing.
Yakuza Kiwami 3 & Dark Ties is shaping up to be a great reimagining of another beloved entry in the venerable Yakuza series. While it’s treading a lot of familiar territory, especially in a location which many fans know intimately, new activities, cutscenes, and a whole new game starring Kiryu’s main adversary also mean there will be plenty of new things to take in, complete, and collect. Expect dozens of hours to complete both games, and no doubt even more time to see everything they have to offer. Look forward to our review of Yakuza Kiwami 3 & Dark Ties when it releases on February 12, 2026 for Steam, PlayStation 4 & 5, Xbox Series X|S, and Switch 2.
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