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Creation and development

Following the release of Yakuza 6: The Song of Life, the game developers wanted to take a new take of video game main character that constrated yakuza Kazuma Kiryu whose final appearance was in that game. Eventually, the team decided to use a detective mainly due to the producer producer Kazuki Hosokawa's preference. Seeing that detective dramas are not that famous within gaming, Hosokawa wanted Yagami stand out within the game. The making of the new character was noted to be a major challenge. In order to make a protagonist that properly succeeded Kiryu, the developer wanted Yagami to be "more grounded to fit the noir vibe". He further claimed "hen you’re writing a story and there’s a really solid character that’s been around for a long time, the character dictates what happens next," he explains. "In contrast to that, with Yagami, at the start of development we didn’t really have anything attached to him at all. It was a challenge, but also an opportunity for a development team that has been working so long on the same series."

Early in the making of Judgment, the Sega staff considered using a famous star to develop Yagami to which they ultimately decided to use Takuya Kimura. The friendship system was developed in order to solidify Yagami's characterization as across them, he forms bonds with multiple not playable characters while also developing how Yagami fits into the setting. He was made to balance his traits through both the main story and the sidequests. This was also done for fans who wanted a balance between seriousness and comedy; the former is explored in the main story while the latter is featured in sidequests. Yagami initially supposed to be an original character but they later decided to ask Kimura to play him, as it would greatly help with marketing. Takayuki speaks more than Kiryu in any individual Yakuza game. There are many legal terms too so it was not easy at first for Kimura to voice him, but he did a really good job according to Sega. The lines which needed retakes were much fewer than what they expected. Some lines were rewritten or added to be a better match for Kimura's acting as well, but they were careful enough to not alter Takayuki’s personality from what they initially planned. They also recorded the chapters in order, starting chapter 1, so fans would feel Kimura’s voice "evolving" at the same time as Yagami's development. Kimura was really into it according to the staff, so much that when Nagoshi would send him a message over LINE, he would always immediately answer. The recording was made after its whole scenario was completed, something that did not happen with Yakuza, so this greatly helped Kimura and the other actors.

Greg Chun was surprised and pleased when he was selected to voice Yagami in Judgment as he knew of the franchise for a long time. He said in the official announcement of the game that "I'm super psyched to be a part of this game" as he liked the character he has seen so far. He further felt his work in the game was gratifying as it felt "it really did require me to let go of the tricks that you use to push a performance through, and I really did need to fall back on authenticity and genuine groundedness". While finding the faithfulness to the original Japanese audio challenging, Chun was pleased with his character due to the balance he has between seriousness and comedy. However, he felt the screaming areas of the game felt too difficult. While noting fans tend to pick the original Japanese audio, Chun wanted them to try the English dub to test his voice.

Appearances

The son of a murdered lawyer, Takayuki Yagami was raised on the streets of Kamurocho by a yakuza patriarch who paves the way for Yagami to follow in his real father's footsteps. Taking a job at the Genda Law Office, Yagami accepts a high-profile case: Proving Shinpei Okubo, a man suspected of murder, innocent. Yagami succeeds and is hailed as a hero, but his prolific career is short-lived. Only months later, Okubo brutally murders his girlfriend, stabbing her over ten times with a kitchen knife before setting their apartment on fire. Yagami becomes the lawyer who let a murderer walk - and everything he had worked for comes crashing down.

Three years later, Yagami has taken off his lawyer's badge to run a small detective agency in the red-light district of Kamurocho, scraping by on odd jobs and evidence collection. But even a city as seedy as this is shaken by a string of serial murders, where the victims' bodies are discovered with their eyes gouged out. Yagami is drawn into the case by his old law firm, where he discovers that in order to bring this killer to light, he must seek the truth that slipped from his grasp three years ago. With his best friend Kaito – an expelled member of the Tojo Clan subsidiary Matsugane Family – serving as his ally, Yagami leverages his lawyer connections via the Genda law offices to get to the bottom of a web of corruption engulfing Kamurocho and beyond.

Reception

Critical response to Takayuki Yagami has been generally positive with Entertaining Focus enjoying already early in the game Yagami is humanised and is given a high depth to his story. EndGadget referred to him as a "flawed but lovable hero" due to his sense of honor reminiscent of other detectives seen in tv dramas. RPGamer considered Yagami as a likable hero for his character arc presented across the game which remains as the best of it. GamesRadar considered Yagami's character as one the biggest differences between Judgment and the Yakuza games due to how he is associated with law and that he has a different view of the world in contrast to Kazuma Kiryu. Nevertheless, they praised how Yagami manages to stand out both physically and mentally as reflected in the multiple forms of gameplay Sega presents. GameRevolution considered Yagami as a more complex character than Kiryu due to his knowledge with the dark areas of society and how he is close to them, something that Kiryu often avoided. Vida Extra felt the character was appealing and compared him with comic book hero Captain America due to their similarities when it comes to fighting. Besides that, Vida Extra noted that Yagami bonded with multiple characters across the story including the romantic interests giving the story further depth, also enjoying his fighting techniques The character's comical scenes were noted to also stand within the dark storyline. Despite finding challenging to find Yagami as a true successor to Kiryu's legacy due to both characters being lead characters fighting thugs in the same city, GameSpot emjoyed the narrative presented through the character but instead compared him to Shun Akiyama, a playable character from Yakuza 4 and Yakuza 5.

IGN claimed that while Sega initially introduces Yagami as a typical Yakuza character, across the story he instead shown as a more mature person that will make players reflect the nature of the narrative. Another writer from IGN enjoyed Yagami's actions, finding his fightstyle as an improvement from previous techniques from Yakuza that make reminded him of the actor Jackie Chan. Despite fearing Yagami might come across as Kiryu with another design, Polygon enjoyed the way the character is handled as he interacts with multiple secondary characters across the game, giving him an identity of his own. USGamer was more critical in in regards to the comparisons between the Judgment and Yakuza heroes, stating Yagami is not as appealing as his predecessor and that his backstory is also similar to Kiryu's. Some of the reviewers focused on Yagami's voice actors. According to DualShockers, Kimura "really put his soul in the game, so even fans of him who never played games can definitely enjoy Project Judge". Greg Chun's performance as Yagami earned positive response by Hollywood Reporter. GotGame agreed with Hollywood Reporter and thus lamented that the sidemissions from the game had almost no voice acting.

Yagami has appeared in the game Yakuza Kiwami 2 as an alternate skin for the main character as a result of a fan mod which received good response by Dsogaming.

In a bigger analysis of the game and its narrative, Soapbox noted that in a certain part of the story, Yagami goes through a dark moment in his life and "instead of having an out-of-the-blue phone call snap Yagami from his funk, the game just lets you stew -- Yagami tells himself that he should take a walk and clear his head." As a result, Soapbox believed that Yagami was also an appealing character despite being so different from Kiryu and at the same time it helped the player to connect with the character. Due to Kimura portraying and voicing the character, VG247 believed female Japanese fans would find the character appealing based on the actor's past roles. He noted that Yagami was a "Yagami is a younger more nimble character, sporting boyband looks with hair to match" However, he critcized how some of his relationships with female characters come across as more romantic instead of being rivals, citing Mafuyu Fujii as an example.