Ryu Ga Gotoku considered dubbing Like a Dragon: Ishin in English, and the RPG will be released outside of Japan next year.
News of a possible English dub of Like a Dragon: Ishin comes from Yakuza series producer Masayoshi Yokoyama, who discussed the Yakuza series (now called Like a Dragon in the West) and how, despite the ability of the studio to edit English lip movements, voiceovers, the upcoming remake of Like a Dragon: Ishin won’t have that.
“A lot of people mess around with the Japanese voice and English subtitle settings,” says Yokoyama. “For the new version of Ishin, we use subtitles. We do not dub dubbing. We’re translating the game into English, but the specialized vocabulary and the way people spoke in the Bakumatsu era made for incredibly long lines, so it just didn’t work. So this time we are doing subtitles.”
The Bakumatsu period is set in Japan between 1853 and 1867, and Yokoyama points out how culturally different the eras are, which will greatly influence any translated dub. The first Yakuza game had an English dub (with Mark Hamill, no less), but the series only used the Japanese dub until the release of Judgment in 2018, followed by Yakuza: Like a Dragon.
Also in the interview (which was translated by The Tojo Dojo), Yokoyama was asked why people outside of Japan aren’t used to reading subtitles most of the time, so the English dub was added later.
“That’s why they prefer dubbing,” explains Yokoyama. “However, we did not dub Yakuza 0. It was subtitled. Despite this, he was very popular. Foreign fans who have played since then still play these games today. In Japanese with English subtitles. They love Nakano and Kuroda’s voices, so they want to hear their voices while playing.”
A Like a Dragon 8 trailer was recently released showing how the franchise protagonists Kiryu and Ichiban will play in the upcoming game, another game called Like a Dragon Gaiden, and this additional Yakuza trailer promises to show what happened to Kirya in between. parts six and eight.
Source : PC Gamesn
