Amazon Prime Video's Like a Dragon: Yakuza TV series has arrived, but not all episodes in the season will be available at once.
Like a Dragon: Yakuza is the latest in a string of video game adaptations, with the Prime Video series bringing Sega's long-running Japanese crime-action games to life in live-action.
The American-Japanese co-production series will be presented in Japanese with English subtitles.
Like a Dragon: Yakuza Episode Release Schedule
Like a Dragon: Yakuza's initial season consists of six episodes, which are released in two batches on Prime Video. Luckily, fans don't have to wait long between episode drops, as the entire season is spread across two weeks.
The release schedule of Like a Dragon: Yakuza episodes is as follows:
- Episode 1 - Thursday, October 24
- Episode 2 - Thursday, October 24
- Episode 3 - Thursday, October 24
- Episode 4 - Friday, November 1
- Episode 5 - Friday, November 1
- Episode 6 - Friday, November 1
New episodes will stream on Prime Video on these dates at 8 a.m. PT/11 a.m. ET.
What Is Prime Video's Like a Dragon: Yakuza About?
Like a Dragon: Yakuza stars Ryoma Takeuchi as Kazuma Kiryu, a man who is drawn back into his life of crime as a Yakuza gang member by his ex-best friend and rival, Akira Nishikiyama (Kento Kaku).
The series is spread across two timelines, showing Kiryu and Nishiki as teenagers in 1995 and 2005, after Kiryu has been released from a 10-year stint in jail.
Speaking to The Direct earlier in 2024, cast members Takeuchi and Kaku and executive producer Erik Barmack said the intention of Like a Dragon: Yakuza was to honor "the local nature of the game and the storytelling:"
"There's hundreds of plot lines so it's hard to put all the plot lines in, but we also wanted to be faithful to the characters in the game so that people who played the games, which there's millions around the world, felt like we were doing honest renditions of the emotions of the characters."
As hinted at in the trailer, Like a Dragon: Yakuza features plenty of action, with knife fights, shootouts, and hand-to-hand combat all part of the story, which involves a massive commitment from the cast members. Takeuchi revealed it took eight months to get in shape for his role and that he trained with a professional fighter five days a week.
The plot of Like a Dragon: Yakuza seems quite similar to that of Sega's first Yakuza game, which was released in 2005. The video game franchise includes nine mainline games and multiple spin-offs, providing plenty of future season opportunities for Prime Video.
Like a Dragon: Yakuza's first batch of episodes are streaming on Prime Video.
