SEGA and Ryu Ga Gotoku Studios have gone a little overboard with their greed with Yakuza 8.

Like A Dragon: Infinite Wealth was well-received. The mini-games, two main characters, the crazy style, drama, and humor are still present, but the DLCs seem to follow the path set by Yakuza: Like A Dragon’s initial release. In other words, if you want to play through Infinite Wealth a second time, retaining your skills, levels, etc., you’ll have to pay because New Game+ (from now on NG+) has been put behind a paywall…

The DLC in question is called Masters Vacation Pack. It is included in the Deluxe and Ultimate editions of Like A Dragon: Infinite Wealth. If you play through the game on one of the three difficulty levels (Normal, Hard, Legend), you can use that save to restart with special costumes and items, reliving Big Swell’s story. It is only available in this pack, according to the official description. The problem is that the wording seems to hint at NG+ being part of the DLC.

Back then, Ryu Ga Gotoku 7 (Japan included the number 7 in the game title, but the West didn’t) suffered from a similar problem, as the original Japanese release included NG+ in the Premium Masters Pack DLC. By the time SEGA localized the game, they had rethought the whole thing, and around here, this option was part of the game by default. Yet, there were DLCs, such as the $15 Ultimate Costume Pack, meaning the greed of the Japanese publisher was thoroughly present.

According to the game’s website, the DLCs can be purchased separately. Still, it should be pointed out that the basic version of Like A Dragon: Infinite Wealth is $70, while the Deluxe version with the Masters Vacation Pack is $85, meaning you’ll have to pay $15 for NG+ in the game, which launches on January 26 for PlayStation 5, Xbox Series, PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One…

Source: GameRant