Sega pulls Yakuza 6 trial after accidentally releasing the full game for free

Sega has been making a big push for Yakuza over the last year. In 2017 we received Yakuza 0, a prequel to the entire series and Yakuza Kiwami, a remake of the first game. Now this year, fans are eagerly awaiting the release of Yakuza 6. To help promote the game, Sega released a demo version of Yakuza 6 on PSN this week, but to the surprise of many, players ended up unlocking the full game for free.

The Yakuza 6 trial version is 30GB in size and contains the full game. This was an intentional move so that buyers wouldn't have to sit through another huge download on launch day. In the European and Australian versions of the trial, the game would stop after reaching a certain point in the game. The North American version of the demo did not have that, meaning players were able to play through much more of the full game than intended- well ahead of release.

Since Sega accidentally released the entire game for free, the trial version has now been pulled and an apology has been issued: “We apologize, but have had to remove the Yakuza 6: The Song of Life demo from the PlayStation Store. We are as upset as you are, and had hoped to have this demo available for everyone today. We discovered that some were able to use the demo to unlock the full game.”

The demo will be back at some point once the developers figure out why the game didn't stop at its intended point.

KitGuru Says: This isn't the first time that a developer accidentally released a full game for free as part of a demo. However, it certainly isn't something that happens often. That said, with consoles being so connected nowadays, this is much easier to fix now than it was back in older generations. 

Become a Patron!