Don't understand why most people call the Yakuza games "Japanese GTA"

[MeanBob]

It's nothing like it. Do people really expect anything and everything where you have a bit of free will to be just like GTA? I never understood it :/

[Captain Epic]

I agree. I refuse to call it a "Japanese GTA" because it's not - The only similarity between the 2 is the fact they revolve around gangs.

[Cius_Warren180sx]

I think it has to do with the crime aspect. But yeah thats really what happens when a game gets massively popular. Any game with any minor similarity suddenly becomes a clone. But yeah its more like Shenmue or Rent a Hero.

[Macross1984]

It's nothing like it. Do people really expect anything and everything where you have a bit of free will to be just like GTA? I never understood it :/

Same reason why we have california rolls, kamikaze rolls and **** rolls at the sushi bars. Dont give the full Japanese experience, just a little with alot of good ol USA "in yo face" snazz.

American Consumer: Whoa now I can GTA in Japan I'm pickin this up!


This is the essence of what resonates with Americans.

[Oxvial]

I post in psxtreme and remember a guy saying he didn't care about ripoffs of a game that he doesn't like(GTA) I recommended the game to him, after he played the demo he was like.

''Hey! you are right this is nothing like GTA! gonna buy it !''

[Darkpen]

Seriously! Back when Yakuza 1 came out, everyone was calling it a Japanese GTA clone, and that was reason alone for me to be completely un-interested in the game. Then I kept seeing posts about Yakuza 2 on the NeoGAF message boards, and then someone traded me a copy of Yakuza 1 for something I had, and I was completely blown away by how un-GTA this game was. It has more in common with River City Ransom and JRPGs than it does with GTA. The fact that there are some game journos (primarily from IGN) who continue to make the correlation between this and GTA is absolutely infuriating, and I wish that Sega of America would have put out a "This is not a Japanese GTA" bullet point somewhere in their press releases or review/preview guides that they send in their press kits.

[Darkpen]

Here are some offenders:
http://ps3.ign.com/articles/107/1071367p1.html
http://ps3.ign.com/articles/105/1053324p1.html

Their hands-on preview dedicates a paragraph to pointing out that you shouldn't write it off as a GTA clone, but I personally don't think the author goes far enough
http://ps3.ign.com/articles/107/1070602p1.html

All written by Greg Miller of IGN

[Chass32]

On a holiday trip to Hong Kong I went to a Pc`s supermarket (don`t know exactly the name of it, but are buildings with 5 or 6 floors full of PC shops with small corridors, you have to see it to believe it) and found a small console games shop, no bigger than a telephone cabin (really) with a bored guy inside. I could recognize Ryū ga Gotoku 3 behind him, and since the console games prices are ridiculous cheap in HK i decided to buy it.

When I pointed at the game, he said "Ah yes, the Japanese GTA!" and I thought "what the....you know about Yakuza and GTA??"", well the guy was quite nice so I bought it anyway.

[Yakuzakilla3]

Greg miller is the person who started most of this BS I hope sega goes after him

[evilmajikman]

Honestly I always thought Yakuza was more like Shenmue..... just with crime gangs instead of a psychotic Chinese guy looking for magical trinkets.