Both characters exist well outside the law, though Kiryu treads a lot closer to the institutions of justice (despite being a former and sometimes Yakuza, hence the series title) than Majima does. I say that the Majima and Kiryu relationship is like Batman and the Joker, but it’s actually a fair bit more chummy than that. Remember when Batman and the Joker would just hang out together, shirtless? He plays the perfect counterpart to Kiryu’s often-humourless (even in the face of the patently absurd situations he often finds himself in) persona and always finds a way to upstage the “Dragon of Dojima.” Nicknamed “The Mad Dog of Shimano”, Majima’s hilarious but deranged style and unpredictability has made him one of my favourite characters, not just in video games but in any narrative art form. Though Kiryu is the main protagonist of the Yakuza saga, kind of a stoic and self-serious version of the modern Batman portrayals, his sometime-nemesis Goro Majima is very much his Joker and is equally as important. But it’s also very much it’s own thing, introducing a complex and wide-reaching story and a fully fleshed-out world of side characters and relationships. I’ve described it in the past as a version of Grand Theft Auto that supplants that series’ American cultural references and nuances with Japanese ones, while retaining the same chaotic energy that underpins it all. Perhaps only second to that feisty little blue hedgehog, the saga of Kiryu Kazama and his rise through the ranks of the organized crime world in the fictionalized Japan is one of the game company’s biggest accomplishments, and is one of my favourite game series. The Yakuza video game series is one of the most long-running and popular franchises in Sega’s arsenal.
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