Yakuza 0 Director's Cut review — A good look at an old favorite

Yakuza 0 is usually whispered among Yakuza fans and newcomers as one of the best starting points in the series. There are little breadcrumbs of detail that carry over into later games, serving extremely well as a prequel and a teaser of what’s to come in the series. After years of floundering ideas trying to sell these games in the west, Yakuza 0 helped catapult the series into a new era with its bombastic action, gripping crime drama story, dozens of side activities, and lovable characters.

We are now almost ten years out from the original Japanese release of the game, now with this Director’s Cut version for Nintendo Switch 2. Yakuza 0 Director’s Cut pitches a pretty stellar package. The entire Yakuza 0 game, along with a dub, new cutscenes, and an online multiplayer mode is pretty enticing, especially given this is a much more faithful conversion than Yakuza Kiwami. But do these new additions make Yakuza 0 something worth checking out?

Generally this review will be for the Director’s Cut version specifically, but it’s worth talking a bit about the original game and content for newcomers. A battle for a small plot of land called the Empty Lot escalates into a turf war between the Yakuza and a mysterious third party. You play as Kiryu Kazuma and Goro Majima as they slowly unravel different parts of this whole fiasco. As you play through the story and complete side quests, you’ll use those rewards to power the duo up with new skills and buffs. Just the core content of Yakuza 0 is a wonderful experience.

There are plenty of high impact battles, intense story scenes, and fun to be had but that’s not without some drawbacks. This has been my first major revisit since my original 2017 playthrough on PS4 and I’m noticing a lot more that I didn’t before. There are multiple instances of the game forcing you into some form of minigame or side quest for basic story progression. Did we really have to spend an hour buying Kiryu a suit? Did the Majima escort segment have to go on for as long as it did?

This actually ties into the first major issue with Director’s Cut - these new cutscenes do not deliver. Yes, 25 minutes of new cutscenes sounds enticing, but these new scenes clash with the tone of the original story and even undermine moments in the story. New fans may not catch on or notice, but these new scenes are an outright poor addition. They feel like the deleted scenes on a bonus edition of a movie. I’d even argue some of the early game scenes could have been slimmed down.

There’s also a new Red Light Raid mode, which is pretty fun, although somewhat bloated. You can join up with randoms or friends to play an online beat 'em up mode. You get the option of six different challenge courses you can do with fifteen stages each. As in the main game, the more enemies you defeat, the more money you get which can be used to unlock more characters and level up unlocked ones.

There are dozens of playable characters to unlock but given most of them are basic NPC enemies, I don’t know if that would be a selling point. If you get a chance to try it out, it might be fun for an afternoon or something. With multiplayer playable character types, moves, and functional online play, combined with Nintendo Switch 2 GameChat? It’s pretty enjoyable albeit not particularly deep.

I’m not trying to come across as negative, but revisiting this game dragged a bit, even if the game is still as good as ever. The combat can be visceral and satisfying, Kiryu is poorly cast but the new English dub is pretty decent otherwise, the side activities and new raid mode make for a fun excursion, but those new scenes really drag down the experience and the game takes too long to really get going.