You’re standing in the middle of Kamurocho. It’s raining. The neon lights of the Millennium Tower are reflecting off the puddles, and some guy in a cheap suit just tried to pick a fight with you because you looked at him funny. If you’ve played a Ryu Ga Gotoku game, you know this feeling. But for a long time, if you wanted to see the middle of Kazuma Kiryu’s life story on a modern console, you were basically out of luck. Then the Yakuza Remastered Collection PS4 dropped, and honestly, it changed the preservation game for this series.
It’s weird to think about now, but there was this massive gap in the timeline. You had Yakuza 0, Kiwami, and Kiwami 2—all shiny, rebuilt, or modern. Then you had Yakuza 6 and Like a Dragon. In the middle? A black hole where the PlayStation 3 era lived. This collection didn’t just port those games; it rescued them from technical purgatory.
What actually comes in the Yakuza Remastered Collection PS4?
We’re talking about three massive games: Yakuza 3, Yakuza 4, and Yakuza 5. This isn't a "Kiwami" style remake. Don't go in expecting the Dragon Engine physics of Yakuza 6 or the buttery-smooth transitions of the later titles. These are remasters in the truest sense. Sega took the original PS3 code, bumped the resolution up to 1080p, and—most importantly—doubled the frame rate to 60fps.
The jump to 60fps is the real hero here. If you ever played Yakuza 3 on the original hardware, it felt a bit heavy. Kinda sluggish. Now, Kiryu moves with a snappiness that makes the combat feel fresh, even if the animations are nearly fifteen years old. It’s a technical facelift that actually affects how the game plays, not just how it looks.
The Content Restoration Factor
Sega did something with the Yakuza Remastered Collection PS4 that they rarely get enough credit for. They fixed the mistakes of the past. When Yakuza 3 first came West years ago, it was butchered. Localizers thought Westerners wouldn't care about Japanese culture, so they cut out the mahjong, the massage parlors, and even a bunch of side quests. It was a mess.
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This version restores all of it. Every bit of weirdness, every substory about a kappa, and all the hostesses are back. They even re-translated the scripts from scratch to ensure the tone matched the newer games. It finally feels like the complete vision that Toshihiro Nagoshi and the team at RGG Studio intended.
Why Yakuza 3 is the hardest pill to swallow (but worth it)
Let’s be real for a second. Yakuza 3 is often the "black sheep" for people coming straight from Kiwami 2. You go from a cutting-edge engine to a game from 2009. The "block-heavy" AI is legendary at this point—enemies in Yakuza 3 love to guard. A lot. It can be frustrating. You’ll find yourself swinging into a wall of forearms more often than not.
But here’s the thing: Yakuza 3 has the best heart in the whole series. Half the game is spent at the Morning Glory orphanage in Okinawa. You’re literally just being a dad. You’re helping kids with their homework, cooking food, and dealing with local land disputes. It’s slow. It’s a slow burn that builds the stakes for Kiryu’s character in a way that the flashier games don't. Without the Yakuza Remastered Collection PS4, most players would skip this, and honestly, that’s a tragedy. You need to see Kiryu in a Hawaiian shirt to truly understand why he fights so hard later on.
The expansion of the Dragon: Yakuza 4 and 5
Once you get past the "Okinawa Dad Simulator," the collection opens up exponentially. Yakuza 4 was the first time the series moved away from just Kiryu. It introduced Shun Akiyama—the coolest man in gaming history—alongside Saejima and Tanimura.
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Akiyama’s combat is all kicks and speed. It’s a total contrast to Kiryu’s brawling. Then you hit Yakuza 5, which is, frankly, too big for its own good. It’s massive. You have five protagonists, five different cities, and a hunting minigame in the snowy mountains that could honestly be its own standalone title. Oh, and Haruka becomes a pop idol. You’ll be doing dance battles in the streets of Osaka instead of breaking heads with bicycles. It’s jarring, it’s ambitious, and it’s beautiful.
- Yakuza 3: Focused, emotional, slightly dated combat.
- Yakuza 4: The birth of the multi-protagonist system.
- Yakuza 5: A sprawling epic that pushes the PS3-era engine to its absolute breaking point.
Technical Performance on PlayStation 4 and Pro
If you’re playing this on a base PS4, it’s solid. But if you’ve got a PS4 Pro or you're running it via backwards compatibility on a PS5, it’s rock-solid. There were some initial issues with the fishing minigame and certain heat actions because of the 60fps logic—the timing windows got halved—but patches fixed the majority of the game-breaking stuff.
The load times are basically non-existent compared to the PS3 originals. That matters when you're entering and exiting buildings every thirty seconds.
One thing to watch out for: Yakuza 3 and 4 use the same engine, so they look very similar. Yakuza 5 uses the engine that eventually powered Yakuza 0, so it looks significantly better. The facial animations in 5 are still impressive today. You can see the sweat and the pores on the characters' faces during the high-stakes cutscenes. It’s easy to forget these games aren't "remakes."
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Is the physical version still a thing?
Finding a physical copy of the Yakuza Remastered Collection PS4 is becoming a bit of a hunt. When it first launched, it came in a gorgeous red digipack that even included an empty PS3 case for Yakuza 5 (since that game never got a physical release in the West back in the day). It was a brilliant "thank you" to the long-time fans.
Nowadays, you’re mostly looking at digital sales or the second-hand market. If you see the physical version with the PS3 case intact, grab it. It’s a collector's item that actually has soul.
Why you shouldn't skip these and go to Yakuza 6
A lot of people ask if they can just watch a YouTube summary and jump to the "modern" games. You could. But you shouldn't. There’s a specific kind of "world-weariness" that develops as you play through these three games. You see Kamurocho change. You see the stores move, the characters age, and the political landscape of the Tojo Clan crumble and rebuild.
The Yakuza Remastered Collection PS4 bridges the gap between Kiryu the "Legend" and Kiryu the "Man who wants to be left alone." By the time you reach the end of Yakuza 5, your investment in these characters isn't just based on a cutscene; it's based on the hundred hours you spent playing mahjong and hitting home runs at the batting cages.
Actionable Steps for New Players
If you're ready to dive into this massive chunk of crime drama, don't just rush through the main story. You'll burn out. These games are marathons, not sprints.
- Adjust your expectations for Yakuza 3 combat. Don't try to mash buttons. Use grabs, use the environment, and focus on getting behind the enemy. The "block" meta is real, and you have to play around it.
- Don't ignore the side content in Yakuza 4. Akiyama’s substories are some of the best writing in the series. They provide a lot of flavor for the Kamurocho underground.
- Pace yourself in Yakuza 5. It is a gargantuan game. If you try to do every "Side Story" (the major branching missions for each character) back-to-back, you might get overwhelmed. Focus on one city at a time.
- Check the settings. Make sure you’ve got the subs the way you like them. The localization is top-tier, so keep an eye out for the puns—the translators had a lot of fun with the dialogue.
The Yakuza Remastered Collection PS4 isn't just a bundle of old games. It’s a preserved history of one of the most unique franchises in gaming. It’s messy, it’s melodramatic, and it’s occasionally very weird, but it's also incredibly human. Go buy some Staminan Royale and get to work. Kamurocho isn't going to save itself.