Yakuza: Dead Souls Critic Reviews

Conceptually, the Yakuza series might appear to have "jumped the shark," but Sega has designed the game well enough and with such enthusiasm that you can't help but be impressed.

Sega's Yakuza team goes way off the beaten path with Yakuza: Dead Souls and infuses its otherwise serious, grounded series with a fresh injection of zombie mayhem. With gunplay as clunky as Resident Evil 4 it manages to emulate Capcom's franchise quite well, and in pure chaos and weirdness, actually manages to outshine the latter attempts. Not as much of a world to explore as in Yakuza 4, but way more zombies to murder and a nice catch-up of some of the series' strongest characters.

It's the equivalent of a shrapnel grenade rather than single, well-placed sniper bullets. Some bits will miss, others will lodge deep enough to leave a lasting impression.

It has a blemished, blood-soaked face that's going to scare off some gamers, but there's a lot of heart and fun to be found by those willing to dig beneath the ghoulish surface.

Packs a charming city hub, but dull repetitive combat lets it down.

Yakuza: Dead Souls doesn't reinvent the zombie shooter with its simple combat scheme, but mowing down the walking dead in their hundreds and executing some neat special moves provides some frantically-paced arcade-styled thrills.

Going into Yakuza: Dead Souls I had some reservations, but after playing it, I'm happy to say that this works surprisingly well.

Well, you certainly didn't see this one coming. Zombie invasion in Yakuza controlled Kamurocho is certainly something you don't see every day. The game isn't an Asian version of the Left 4 Dead, thanks to the sloppy controls.

Unlike its predecessor, which could be described as a brawler that focuses on brutal melee attacks, Dead Souls is a true third person shooter. Pistols, shotguns, machine guns: anything that smells like lead and gunpowder is used to blow those brain munchers back to Yomi. (You'll have to look that one up).

Dead Souls sits in a strange middle zone, stuck somewhere between the past Yakuza series games and the tired zombie sandbox genre. While fans will surely enjoy seeing series stars in this zombie apocalypse setting, they could miss some of the classic Yakuza pacing and gameplay.

It's a fun game if you are already a Yakuza fan. It's just a rather awful introduction to the Yakuza franchise.

It's unlikely that fans will be left with anything other than positive memories of a franchise that never quite got the praise it deserved.

Dead Souls' controls and camera will work on your nerves frequently. Luckily, you'll get used to it pretty fast, allowing you to see a game with a good story, humor and so on. So without a doubt, you should give this one a try.

The zombie-invasion is by no means a cheap bridge to motivate some western gamers to cross over to the eastern side, but the means to add some variety to SEGAs gangster-soap and at the same time provide a little bit of insight in some of the less common aspects of the Japanese Yakuza.

If you're in need of a zombie fix, you could do better… even if to me it feels more than a little like a crime-themed Shenmue with an undead army.

Although it's made especially for Yakuza fans, Dead Souls is also an unconventional mix of Japanese eccentricity and undead mythology.

Yakuza Dead Souls merges good RPG elements with TPS mechanics unfortunately damaged by some technical problems that compromise the entire game experience.

Ultimately, the zombie sections are to be stomached while we wait for beter bits to load.

It's a bold move to step away from the established mechanics of the Yakuza franchise and it turns out mostly okay. A great story with memorable characters makes sure that every Yakuza fan will have to check this one out. In the end, however, a sluggish camera and outdated graphics make for a mediocre title.

It's not Yakuza anymore – it's a new House of the Dead in a Yakuza environment. Poor mechanics, weird story and repetitive gameplay kill the atmosphere and leave a mediocre third-person zombie shooter.