Preview: Yakuza 4 Demo

Ever wanted to know what it's like being a gangsta in the Japanese underworld? Well now you can with the upcoming release of Yakuza 4 (Ryu no Gotoku). The game is being made exclusively for the Playstation 3 and recently I had the chance to sit down and play the demo.

In the demo you get to brawl as each of the four characters that make up the game. Here you can try out their skills and some of the most devastating special moves ever. The amount of special's you can perform differs on the amount of items that are available in the area. I'll just give a quick rundown on each characters moves and fight styles.

Shun Akiyama
He is the 1st character you get to test out in the demo and his brawl is set on the streets of Kamurocho. His fight style is heavily kick based, resulting in high and low combinations at a fast speed. I managed to land two special moves with him in the demo, one of them being that if you grab the enemy and take him to the closes wall, you can perform a devastating move where Shun slams his head in to the wall and then elbows it for even further damage. Another special move is where he charges at one of the enemies and fly kicks him. He then uses the momentum from that kick two land a further two more on the enemies behind him.

Masayoshi Tanimura
He is the 2nd character you use and his brawl takes place on the rooftops. His fight style has a good mix of both punches and kicks which is used lightly and heavily. His grabs are a good type of submission hold and if enemies are nearby, it can knock them away. I managed to only find one special move here, where Masayoshi grabs the enemy and throws him off the rooftop! In a way it almost seems comical but then that could just be me.

Taiga Saejima
He is the 3rd character and is known as the toughest of them all. His fight takes place inside a building which I think is a warehouse of some sorts. His fight style has a mix of high-low heavy punches and mid knee strikes. Like before I was only able to find one special move but then again it might be different depending on the character. The special I was able to find is where Taiga slams the enemies head against the rail, punches it and once the enemy drops on the floor, he proceeds to stomp on his head!

Kazuma Kiryu
Yeah that's right, even the main character that's been in all of the previous Yakuza games is also available to play in the demo. To finish the demo you'll be brawling with him back on the streets of Kamurocho. Kazuma's fight style is very similar to Shun's in terms of speed but with the addition of both heavy and light punches. I managed to find two special moves with Kazuma, the first being a complete head slam on to the ground! I mean he literally just grabs your head and smashes it in the floor. In the second move he slams you head into the bonnet of a car and then proceeds to stomp on your head. Truly gruesome stuff!!

Yakuza 4 looks to be another great game by the folks over at Sega and the prospect of playing four different characters which I'm guessing interlink, sounds really cool.
Check out our gameplay video below from the demo!

Yakuza 4 is set to be released March 15, exclusively for the Playstation 3