Toshihiro Nagoshi, the sober genius behind Super Monkey Ball, will see his crime epic Ryu Ga Gotoku released in the US and Europe this year, in news that will sate the increasingly agitated fans, many of whom worried Sega would not support the title outside of Japan.

Nagoshi built the game around the words on acclaimed Japanese novelist Seishu Hase creating a richly-populated fantasy world centring on the Japanese organised crime syndicate, who amusingly have always kept strong ties with the games industry, unaudited videogames being amongst the easiest ways to launder money...

When Nagoshi first unveiled Ryu Ga Gotoku last year, many thought the game was a spin-off from Yu Suzuki's Shenmue series. There was a similar atmosphere – serious and woven into lush visuals beautifully recreating a fictional Tokyo.

Yakuza, as Ryu Ga Gotoku will be know in the US and Europe, was heavily imported on release, with even the demo disc changing hands for big bananas on auctions sites. It shifted around 140,000 units at launch in Japan, many of which were snapped up by eager western importers.

The game will ship exclusively for PlayStation 2 in European and North America at an undisclosed point this summer.