A shocking 77% of Like a Dragon: Gaiden’s cutscene data is cabaret club scenes 

 
Yutaka Ito, the technical manager of Sega’s Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio, shared some trivia about Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name on December 5. It seems that the live cabaret club scenes make up 77% of the game’s total cutscene data. 

According to Ito, cinematics in the Like a Dragon series had been Full-HD/30fps for a long time. However, thanks to improvements in hardware performance, it became possible to have the real-time gameplay run in 4K/60fps, which made the Full-HD/30fps cutscenes look comparatively low quality. Due to this, the studio decided to produce the cinematics in 4K/60fps too, starting from the 2022 release “Lost Judgement.” 

The upgrade in quality obviously meant a jump in file size, and Like a Dragon Gaiden saw the introduction of live action hostess cinematics, which made the game’s cutscene data enormous. Ito mentions that the first estimate for Gaiden’s size was 30GB for the application and 60GB for the cinematics, which made him think, “Oh, this won’t fit on a disc, will it…” 

#龍が如く7外伝 のムービーの容量を調べてみました。キャバクラがここまで圧倒的だとは…😅イベントシーンはなるべくリアルタイムで頑張るので、ムービーは意外と少ないです。「アセット」は背景のタブレットや鏡に写っている映像のことで、描画に手間がかかるのでムービーが使われることが多いです。 pic.twitter.com/bBy3qFcux6

— 伊東 豊（セガ・龍が如くスタジオ技術責任者） (@YutakaIto_RGG) December 5, 2023

Ito shared a pie chart that gives a break down of the cutscene data in Gaiden, and the cabaret club scenes take up a whopping 77%. On the other hand, event and karaoke scenes make up 6% and 3% of the cutscenes respectively. Ito explains that the reason event scenes are so underrepresented among cinematics is that for Gaiden, they tried to incorporate events into real-time gameplay as much as possible. 

But what caused this surge in cabaret club scenes? My guess would be that it has something to do with the switch from 3D animation to live action footage. Cabaret club scenes, in which you interact, give presents and get closer to the hostesses, have always been a classic element of the Like a Dragon series, and the hostesses have been modeled after real-life persons on occasions, but Gaiden took things a step further, featuring “live hostesses.” 
 

The live cabaret club scenes give the player a first-person POV when interacting with the hostesses, and likely reduced the ime needed to create 3D models for the title. 
 

The sheer amount of these scenes is impressive, as they cover various dialogue patterns for five different hostesses. Taking into consideration the high resolution and quality they are presented in, it’s easy to understand why they take up such a big percentage of all of Gaiden’s cinematics. 

One has to wonder if the live hostess element will continue to feature in upcoming entries. Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth has already been described as a “monster-class game” in terms of size, so it may not have room left over for live hostess cinematics.  

#龍が如く7外伝 では、街を歩く人たちの数も、シリーズ最多となっています。蒼天堀の賑やかさを出すために、担当プログラマーが一生懸命に最適化を行いました。地味な作業ですが、タイトルのクオリティーを大きく左右する重要な仕事です。 pic.twitter.com/ZuVHXTHegm

— 伊東 豊（セガ・龍が如くスタジオ技術責任者） (@YutakaIto_RGG) November 21, 2023

As an aside, Ito also shared via his official X/Twitter account that Like a Dragon: Gaiden has the largest number of random people walking on the streets in the series so far. This decision was made to ensure that Sotenbori’s lively atmosphere is conveyed. 

Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name is available for the PC (Windows/Steam)/Xbox Series X|S/Xbox One/PS4/PS5. 

Written by. Amber V based on the original Japanese article (original article’s publication date: 2023-12-06 09:11 JST)