Following the release of Virtua Fighter 5 Ultimate for PS4 worldwide through PlayStation Plus, Sega has released its first post-launch DLC pack for the game in the form of the Yakuza Series Collaboration Pack. While the base game was free for PlayStation Plus subscribers, a Legendary Pack was available with customization options, costumes, retro models, stages, and a lot more. The Yakuza Series Collaboration Pack DLC also arrives after a few months of updates that improved the game in many ways as well, but it still needs work compared to modern fighters.
Virtua Fighter 5 Ultimate Showdown Yakuza Series Collaboration Pack DLC contents
The Virtua Fighter 5 Ultimate Showdown Yakuza Series Collaboration Pack DLC priced at $9.99 includes the following:
- 650 Character customization items
- 19 Character costumes
- 19 Yakuza series character costumes
- 20 Yakuza series BGM
- 20 “Virtua Fighter 3” arranged BGM
- 40 Spectator stamps
The highlights of the pack are definitely the arranged Virtua Fighter 3 and the Yakuza series songs alongside the costumes. In terms of value, I’m more than pleased with the DLC included in this pack, but the problem lies in how some of the cosmetics and music are implemented within Virtua Fighter 5 Ultimate Showdown. The music is mostly focused on Yakuza: Like a Dragon with some tracks from other games including a few classics from the series’ amazing soundtracks. The boss themes and combat music from Yakuza: Like a Dragon fit perfectly in the stages here.
You can’t set background music per stage and are forced to a specific music pack like the Yakuza or arranged Virtua Fighter 3 songs for all stages or nothing. This also means not being able to use the music from one stage in another. Hopefully a future update can let us just pick a song per stage or even select different packs for different stages. On the costume side of things, you can’t change the costume of your opponents to the new Yakuza costumes. Selecting a costume is also a bit tedious still compared to how it should be.
The customization items work just like those in the Legendary Pack where you need to choose a character and costume type before customizing to save within one of the slots. The additions here are pretty good, but consider this bit a nice bonus alongside the spectator stamps and not the main draw of the Virtua Fighter 5 Ultimate Showdown Yakuza Series Collaboration Pack DLC.
Is it worth buying the Virtua Fighter 5 Ultimate Showdown Yakuza Series Collaboration Pack DLC?
The Virtua Fighter 5 Ultimate Showdown Yakuza Series Collaboration Pack DLC is definitely worth it for the music and Yakuza series costumes, but I hope Sega can improve the implementation of the music, costumes, and more within the base game. If you already play Virtua Fighter 5 Ultimate Showdown, this is an easy recommendation if you like the Yakuza games including Yakuza: Like a Dragon that gets the most representation here.
Now that, a new DLC pack is available, I’m hoping Sega considers improving the online infrastructure so that more people are able to play against friends without issues. Arc System Works and SNK are going back and updating older games, and Sega needs to do the same so Virtua Fighter 5 gets the online experience it deservices. Hopefully we also get more DLC packs in the future with other Sega and maybe Atlus franchises.This was a nice surprise as a fan of both Virtua Fighter 5 Ultimate Showdown and the Yakuza games and I’m glad to see more people playing online following its release. If you’ve not gotten Virtua Fighter 5 Ultimate Showdown yet through PlayStation Plus, read my review of it here.
DLC review: This review focusses on the DLC of a specific game, but also takes into account how said game has improved in post-launch updates and what state it is in as of this writing.
