Once more with feelings: How Yakuza: Like a Dragon reinvents middle-aged men in video games

Instead of being driven by a twisted sense of vengeance, protagonist Ichiban, a washed-up gangster in his 40s, seeks answers. He's a welcome antidote

It sounds like the set-up for a violent revenge movie. Low-ranking yakuza Ichiban Kasuga takes the blame for an inter-clan assassination and does 18 years in prison to protect the organisation's patriarch. But, on his release, the gang disowns him and the boss, who he considers a father figure, shoots him and leaves him for dead. Kasuga wakes up days later, destitute and alone in another city. Surely, the stage is set for bloody retribution?

Well ... not quite. Kasuga is not that kind of protagonist.