Yakuza (#843)

[Nicolaas Hamman]

Credits can be weird and interesting. There can certain unspoken rules to them that we might eventually notice. I think it's not uncommon for some credits to remove people from said credits if the person who worked on it has left the company they worked for.

That's definitely the case with the Like a Dragon series, and interestingly, because there have been years between Japanese and English releases, then years between those releases and remastered versions, a lot of people have had their credits removed. I've verified across other developers like the design team, the art team or the programming team, it definitely happens for people are confirmed to have left SEGA. People like Miho Nakamura, who does the calligraphy for the series, kept her credits until Yakuza 3: Remastered, but left after that, and suddenly Yakuza 4: Remastered and Yakuza 5: Remastered cut her out. A more minor person I know of is Kohichiro Tamura, who left 2 months before the release of Yakuza 2 in Japan, and whose credit was removed from the international release 2 years later. It was big news when Toshihiro Nagoshi left SEGA to found Nagoshi Studio, with many previous developers of the series, and they all got their credits removed. Also, most of the people who get their names removed are probably women, and probably many of them quit their jobs to work as stay-at-home mothers.

Despicable in a way, but also helpful, because it can show us who has left. Also helps let us know that someone's still working there even if we haven't heard of one of their projects in a while, like Ryohei Kohno still being credited in Like a Dragon Ishin!

These are all the sound people who I know were cut out of re-edited credits.

Yakuza 2
/English version (2008)
Hideki Naganuma [confirmed left in 2008]

Yakuza 3
/Remastered version (2018)
Yuichi Kanatani [confirmed left SEGA before 2014, when he was working for Sammy]
Yuki Takatsuto [confirmed left SEGA before 2012, when he was working for Sammy]
Kentaro Koyama [confirmed in 2011 or earlier, commentary in WM-0680]

Yakuza 4
/Remastered version (2019)
Yuichi Kanatani

Yakuza 5
/Remastered version (2019)
Takeshi Isozaki
Yusuke Sawai

Ryu ga Gotoku Ishin!
/Kiwami (2023)
Sachio Ogawa
Yusuke Sawai

Judgment
/Remastered version (2021)
Yuki Kobayashi
Rio Hashikawa [confirmed left in 2019]

Yakuza: Like a Dragon
/Base version
Rio Hashikawa [confirmed left in 2019]


Wanted to highlight the regulars then
Yusuke Sawai's career lasts 2012 to at least early 2018 as his credit was not removed for the English version of Yakuza 6, which released in March 2018. It is odd that he apparently didn't contribute to the series between 2016 and 2018, though... moved somewhere else?
Rio Hashikawa's career at SEGA lasts 2017 to 2019 and has acknowledged that he isn't credit for his work in 2020's Yakuza: Like a Dragon.
Takeshi Isozaki isn't so clear, since I've no idea if there were any arcade games after Sengoku Taisen in 2015 that he worked on.

[Brad Evans II]

Originally Posted by Nicolaas Hamman

Credits can be weird and interesting. There can certain unspoken rules to them that we might eventually notice. I think it's not uncommon for some credits to remove people from said credits if the person who worked on it has left the company they worked for.

You're correct; it's not uncommon to remove ppl from credits that have left companies. A few years ago there was a controversy about this concerning Xseed and I can't say I'm surprised this is how this is handled.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xseed_Games

Read the last paragraph under history; this is what I was referencing.