First, Constantine Hantzopoulos from of America, speaking on the 1UP podcast, announced that 3 would have full English-language voice acting in and North America.

Then, Sega of Europe told VG247 that, in fact, was wrong. Yakuza 3 would have Japanese voice acting with English subtitles.

Now Sega of America have confirmed that Yakuza 3 will indeed feature Japanese voice acting with English subtitles. Sega of America's final answer is this: "Yakuza 3 will actually have full English subtitling only, no English voice-overs. The only Yakuza game to have English voice-over was the first one and with Yakuza 2 and 3 we feel that subtitling would be the best way to go in order to convey and preserve the emotion and intensity of the dialog."

Hantzopoulos' original comments were: "The bulk of the cost is actually the [voice-overs]. A lot of lines in [Yakuza 3], so obviously the more expensive it gets, you want to land the right actors, voice the right parts."

He continued: "Whenever Sega brings a game over [to the US] and makes the investment, the heavy investment, into localization, we're talking over 500, 600, 700K to localize this game. Lot of voices, lot of different peeps, lot of different characters."

This means that cost may have been the deciding factor on the decision to subtitle Yakuza 3, rather than record English dialogue.

By Ewan Aiton