As Stranger Than Heaven serves as a prequel to the Like a Dragon franchise, it’s no shock that RGG Studio is bringing back familiar voices for the new title. Studio head and executive director Masayoshi Yokoyama just shared a brief development vlog, revealing that Shunsuke Daito, who lent his voice to multiple Like a Dragon characters, will be returning for an unannounced part.
Conversely, Kazuhiro Nakaya, celebrated for key portrayals such as Akira Nishikiyama and Ichiban Kasuga, also popped up in the dev vlog, but was officially not slated to appear in Stranger Than Heaven.
The dev vlog centered on Daito’s character, who, according to the voice actor, makes an entrance around the midway point of Stranger Than Heaven’s main narrative and “will turn it (the story) on its head” (though, Yokoyama subsequently tempered Daito’s claim, indicating the character doesn’t bring about that significant of a twist). Daito also noted that he shares the same family name as the game’s lead, Makoto Daito, and playfully complained about Yu Shirota (Makoto’s voice actor) having far more dialogue than him.
Daito (the talent, not the character) previously voiced Todo Heisuke in Like a Dragon: Ishin!, Shigeki Baba in Yakuza 5, and Mortimer in Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii. Similar to his past roles, he will contribute to Stranger Than Heaven solely as a voice actor, meaning the character model won’t be modeled after his appearance.
Although Kazuhiro Nakaya’s presence in the dev vlog seemed like a coincidence, it gave Yokoyama the opportunity to confirm that the voice actor won’t be appearing in Stranger than Heaven. Nakaya would echo the announcement shortly after, affirming his non-appearance before chuckling about the peculiar situation:
An announcement has been made about my non-appearance (lol)
Yokoyama then teased that this might mark the first non-appearance announcement in RGG Studio’s history, and Nakayama was happy to accept the distinction. Whether this is a deliberate misdirection or not is left to your interpretation, but many Like a Dragon enthusiasts were still thrilled to see Nakaya make an appearance in a Stranger than Heaven-related announcement.
Stranger Than Heaven is scheduled to launch sometime this Winter on PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, and Windows (Steam).
Mido