There are few series more consistent than the Like a Dragon (née Yakuza) franchise. You know each entry is going to greet you with positive vibes, unforgettable characters, bizarre side quests, and at least one minigame so good you would play it all on its own.
In Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii, that minigame is the Pirates’ Coliseum. It is exactly what it sounds like: An aquatic arena where pirates duel in front of thousands of cheering audience members (and one glowering professional wrestler). In the Pirates’ Coliseum, Goro Majima and his crew on the Goromaru get to take on dozens of rival pirate crews: first in naval battles, and then on the deck of the ship in physical combat. It’s a sensationally fun time that pulls all of the game’s combat mechanics together into one irresistible package.
As you would expect with a Like a Dragon title, each pirate crew you face has a dedicated theme, which impacts both how their ships look and how their crews are dressed. The themed opponents range from what you’d expect from pirates (Inked Up Pirates, Biker Pirates) to what you’d expect from the Like a Dragon series (Mecha Pirates, Ghoulish Pirates, Sumo Pirates). There are some combat implications for these — the Mecha Pirates can shock you, the Sumo Pirates can stunlock you with their sumo movies — but for the most part, it’s just another fun aesthetic layer to a franchise filled with them.
What distinguishes the Pirates’ Coliseum from some other excellent minigames in the franchise (like the Pokémon-inspired Sujimon collecting, or Sicko Snap) is it doesn’t feel like a silly, extraneous add-on. It fulfills the very core of the game’s promise — pirate adventures!!! — and a fair amount of the main plot revolves around your success in the Coliseum.
One of the most important elements of both the larger game and the Pirate Coliseum minigame is building your pirate crew. Over the course of the game, you enlist crew members: In addition to the main cast of characters, basically anyone you complete a side quest for is recruited to your crew, and many, many random people you meet in Honolulu and Madlantis can also be recruited. Each crew member has different skills, and you can assign people to certain teams or tasks on your ship — mainly whether they’re going to be handling a gun or a cannon on the ship, or fighting with you on the deck. This part of the game definitely scratched the “sports management sim” side of my brain as I tried to optimize the right combination of crew (while still prioritizing including the characters I liked the most).
Because it’s structured somewhat like a sports game, playing the Pirates’ Coliseum minigame reminded me of how much I loved playing blitzball in Final Fantasy 10. I’m very much in favor of using the structures of sports games to create something new, and as soon as I unlocked the Pirates’ Coliseum (it’s located in the underground pirate kingdom of Madlantis), it took a lot of restraint not to just immediately run through every challenge.
Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii is one of the most remarkable games of 2025: a contained (by the franchise’s standards) romp of an adventure that successfully builds on the phenomenal Infinite Wealth while changing the definition of what an “asset flip” can be. But it wouldn’t be a Like a Dragon game without a kick-ass minigame. In conclusion: Yo ho, yo ho, a pirate’s life for me.
The post In true Like a Dragon form, this incredible pirate minigame could stand alone appeared first on Polygon.
