Forget Black Flag. Forget Skull & Bones. The best pirate game of the last ten years is, defying all expectations, Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii.
Despite the cumbersome name and despite the fact that it's a spinoff of a series mostly known for serious-faced men beating each other up in various Japanese locales, the newest Yakuza game captures that swashbuckling feeling in a way very few before it have. The plot focuses on Goro Majima, a fan-favorite character and hardened yakuza who gets shipwrecked on his trip to Hawaii and develops amnesia as a result. With this new lease on life, Majima does what any sane man would: immediately leaves everything behind to become a modern-day pirate sailing the Pacific on a seriously outdated ship.
It's the kind of no-holds-barred reinvention the series is becoming known for, with all the open-sea swashbuckling, booty, and side activities you could ever want, from karaoke booths to batting cages to, weirdly, a Mario Kart minigame. The Yakuza games have been favorites of mine for a while, so I do recognize that I have a bit of a bias… but the demo is out now, so if you don't believe me, give it a try! And if you still don't take my word for it, how about the actual yakuza?
