Yet another big non-indie game looks to be skipping a physical release. According to a recent tweet from Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio, Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name might only come out on digital storefronts in most territories.
Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name probably won’t get a physical release
The studio’s tweet simply states that the game will be “available for download” on November 9, its release date. It’s a specific choice of words that appears to mean it isn’t going to get a physical release in the West. Like a Dragon Gaiden is, however, going to have a disc for Japan on PlayStation systems, which collectors or physical game aficionados can likely import. We have reached out to Sega for clarification and will update this story if we get a response.
Kamurocho Bros., a YouTube channel dedicated to the Like a Dragon series, already seemed to have dug this up in June. The channel claimed that retailers said that there was no physical ESRB version for Gaiden.
This is the second notable upcoming game to forgo a physical release. Remedy Entertainment announced that Alan Wake 2 will also only come out digitally in order to keep the price down and give the team more time to polish the game. Since discs don’t have to be pressed, the game can be finalized a little later and therefore be slightly more complete.
“As creatives obviously, by going digital-only it does allow us more time to polish the game,” said game director Kyle Rowley. “Like, a significant amount of weeks actually. Because otherwise, the game that goes on the disc, obviously it has to be playable without a patch. We didn’t want to release something that we weren’t proud of basically, and that we didn’t want players to play. So hopefully this way we can give you a better version of the game.”
