Like a Dragon Gaiden: New English Voice Actor Infuriates…

Kazuma Kiryu is getting a new English voice actor in the upcoming Like a Dragon spinoff, and the fans are divided over the casting decision.

Like a Dragon Gaiden: The Man Who Erased His Name will take place between Yakuza 6: The Song of Life and Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth. Closing the existent gap between those titles.

Infinite Wealth is the eighth entry in this installment and will feature the new protagonist Kasuga Ichiban. He first debuted in the seventh entry, Yakuza: Like a Dragon, and takes the heavy burden, replacing Kazuma Kiryu as a protagonist, head on.

New English Voice Actor For The Man Who Erased His Name

With Like a Dragon Gaiden launching in November there is still much ground to cover and finding the right English voice actor is one of the bigger changes to the series. Voice actor Yong Yea is going to be the new voice for Kazuma Kiryu starting with Like a Dragon Gaiden. He takes on the mantle from Darryl Kuylo who portrayed the English voice beforehand.

During the Anime Expo 2023 at a live panel for the game, Yong Yea read a line taken from Like a Dragon Gaiden. This small clip was shared on Twitter by ANN events. And the fan base was really divided on this interpretation. But see for yourself:

Yong Yea line-reading as Kiryu Kazuma #AnimeExpo2023 pic.twitter.com/GxvnDo2Cqc
— ANN Events (@ann_events) July 3, 2023

The main points of discussion are the differences between the original voice line from Takaya Kuroda, the former English voice actor Darryl Kurylo and Yong Yea. Kuroda seems to reflect Kiryu perfectly, with his unwavering will and the strong silent hero personality.

Kurylo put in all his experience as a voice actor and gave Kiryu a distinctivly deep and rich voice. It's only natural the fans are divided, since Yea must first convince people of his interpretation of the Dragon of Dojima.

Yong Yea's Other Voice Actor Roles

Before his biggest role up to now, Yong Yea voiced characters like Arios Maclaine from The Legend of Heroes: Trails into Reverie, Sekido from Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba or Enrico Pucci in JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Stone Ocean. Besides those jobs he is also occupied as a gaming YouTuber with over 1.23 million subscribers.